The F-22 Raptor will be replaced by the F-35 Lightning II slowly due to considerations the USAF calls unavoidable. It is the heaviest and most costly fighter in the US arsenal that they will send two where all soldiers go when decommissioned. Despite how advanced it is, issues plaguing it that its costly maintenance.

F-22 Has Too Many Negatives

Major General James Peccia, Assistant Budget Secretary, remarked that the fighter's high maintenance costs and the extremely high price of modifying the airframes made it prudent to retire some Raptors from active service, reported the View60s.

The Raptor is one of the most contentious fighters in Air Force history. After its introduction many years late, in December 2005, instructions to terminate production were issued less than four years later, culminating in a very brief production run, cited Military Watch.

While critics have frequently promoted the fighter as the world's premier air superiority fighter, the Pentagon has stated repeatedly that this is not the situation, such as in May 2021.

When Air Force Chief of Staff, General Charles Brown Jr., declared that the jet would not be part of the Air Force's future, the F-15 Eagle and F-16 Fighting Falcon from the 1970s will.

This plane's difficulty incorporating upgrades, extremely high maintenance requirements, and increasingly obsolescence compared to the latest fighters that are much easier to operate, such as the F-35 and F-15EX, were among the leading factors.

The F-22 Raptor stealth fighter is one of just two Western fifth-generation fighters to enter production alongside the F-35. The former is designed as a successor to the fourth-generation F-15 and the latter to the lightweight F-16.

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These 5th generation fighters will be phased out and leave the F-15 in service, but the older Fight Eagle was supposed to go. Historically the F-4 was replaced by the Eagle, but the F-22 proved to be the lesser investment, noted War History Online.

The last production was in 2011, and the F-15, which first flew in 1972, is still in production today. It may be in production for another decade.

The stealth fighter is not a successful replacement for the Eagle, but it costs too much to maintain, upgrade and keep flying with less cost is a sorry understatement.

Failures of the Raptor

The F-22 did not prove to have the standards set by the latest F-15 variants and the F-35. It's a dismal letdown.

For example, the Chinese J-20 is superior since it lacks vital characteristics like distributed aperture systems for situational awareness, current network-planning data linkages, and helmet-mounted sights, which are critical for visual range warfare, mentioned Business Insider.

As observed by F-22 pilots flying versus F-35s, its sensor suite is increasingly considered as totally outclassed, even though the F-35 is a much lighter aircraft.

Retiring the Raptor before even the last of the 1970s F-15C aircraft is a powerful indicator of the military's assessment of the Raptor and the program's failure.

How feasible is the sixth-generation replacement for the F-22 and F-15, which are now being built under Next Generation Air Dominance Program, would be.

The F-22 Raptor just didn't cut it where it mattered, even compared to the J-20; this makes the load on the F-35 greater.

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