The Victors

The picture in the post had a scale model of an F-22 Raptor aircraft to the orange man's front right.

I started with the prime contractor of the F-22 on the F-22 program just a few days before the first pre-production aircraft flew for the first time. We obviously had the aircraft in a state that it could fly, but it was hardly to the level that a fully developed F-22 could deliver. Two of the main fuel tanks leaked, it was too heavy, it was overly redundant. Over the next few years we worked very long days, week after week, to make the (essentially) prototype into a lean, mean, flying machine. There were weeks that I gave 80, sometimes 90 hours to that gorgeous aircraft, mostly trying to get weight out of the airframe and improve performance. At one point I did close to 9 months straight without a day off (including Saturdays and Sundays). Over the next 15 years I put everything into that project. To me, it was worth it. It was a gorgeous aircraft that, if it did what it was supposed to do, would save American lives by letting all the other aircraft in the US inventory fly without fear of being shot down. We made sure it was able to do what it was supposed to do.

There's no question that it's still the baddest bitch in the sky. It can fly higher, faster, and less detected than any other manned aircraft known to exist. It can dole out punishment more effectively than any other air superiority aircraft created by the United States. And it's no slob at dropping bombs on people, either. There isn't a piece of evidence that any other air-to-air aircraft can match what it is supposed to do, despite what China might say. We won the Collier Trophy, which is almost literally the Heisman Trophy of the Aerospace Engineering world.

So, I love it, almost in the way that someone might love a child. As the dad to four boys, this is hyperbole but not by too much. And to see it on the desk of an odious, vile, incredibly awful piece of shit that has no idea of anything that went into developing the capability of that aircraft; someone who repeatedly violated every single security clearance that I had to give something up for, I feel sick to my stomach. What right does he have to put that gorgeous, sexy piece of precision speed and aerodynamics on his desk? Fuck that motherfucker.