Is there any reason the US military should ask for something

>>31849972
read up

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_Vertical_Lift

>>31849991
Defiant looks amazing. Valor looks like absolute garbage shit. I wonder how they'll both perform in the future.

Kind of seems unnecessary though, I mean, just throw new tech into the Apache and the platform will probably last another 30 years. Unless someone's making a magic stealth helicopter, there isn't really a point to changing what we have now for a new platform.

>>31850007

The idea is to replace pretty much everything handful of designs. They should also force manufacturers make designs that could be developed into naval variants and force all branches gradually switch to common hardware.

The FVL program will be an even bigger boondoggle than the F35 program is if it even gets off the ground

The US will find that the role of dedicated attack helicopters is too important to pass up and the jack of all trades approach is inappropriate for rotor wing aviation if there are no dedicated aircraft to fill certain roles.

I'm betting that the program will either
>Solicit technology demonstrators and yield nothing
Or, if it does yield something
>Create a helicopter that replaces the UH-60 and OH-58, partially replaces the CH-46 with V-22s doing the rest, fail to replace the AH-64

This in turn would create a new project, something like the “Advanced Attack Helicopter program” or something like that, to fill the perceived gap of modern advanced attack helicopters, and then something like the “Multipurpose Attack, Transport, and Cargo Helicopter (MATCH)” fills the FVLs role trying to make the same thing in 2030

>>31850007
We have already reached the limits of what can be achieved without tiltrotor or coaxial designs. Apart from the ability to hover, rotary wings are far inferior to even ww2 planes in performance. What we have today is not good enough and never was.

>>31850036
Obviously it'll have a dedicated attack helicopter, but dedicated doesn't mean it can't use the same avionics, same engines, props, same composite hull, etc

I expect they'll dump that ultra category eventually, so you end up with 4 light/medium-utility/medium-attack/heavy chopper designs.

>>31850007
Because being good enough isn't enough. We could technically get away with Phantoms and AH-1s against the middle east, but the good ol' usa has to be ahead of the game. Ally/other power decide to build a new plane that bridges into the next generation? Unacceptable, we need to be a generation ahead of them. The US is the most powerful nation in the world, second to none, and if we just kept shit as "good enough" we wouldn't stay that way very long. China and Russia want to be the world superpowers. We need to continue to prove to them and NATO that the United States is not to be fucked with.

>>31850038
By what fucking metric?

>>31850007
Except the tiltrotor design can go fast, farther, and with more payload.