the truth is in opposite direction to what retards say. the problem with f-35 is it's unnecessarily maneuverable and fast. they should have made it bigger so it could carry more fuel with more and bigger payload internally, even to the point it became subsonic only (remove the afterburner too). it would have been still worth it. imagine how much easier bombing iran would have been.

pic related is an example of how much you can gain by not having to sacrifice the design for any supersonic. they could optimize the wing. not only it had fully loaded range that is still unmatched in naval aviation to this day, but also, counterintuitively, it was actually faster at subsonic. thanks to that wing, it could comfortably sustain the high subsonic speeds at full load, where as supersonic fighters actually were slower in that case because the wing was cucked to make supersonic possible.

but at this point it all should be replaced by unmanned aircraft, and the bulk of the technological investment made into durable com links and c&c.