Yes agree.
And the case of stealth fighter is that reserves to mitigate temperature have to be high.
That fuel requirement for cooling is overblown. The main tank is almost always full, and by the time it becomes empty, the F-35 will be headed home anyway, or it will be in the process of crashing.
Not so easy. F-22 and F-35 rely on heavy maintenance. It's OK for some days but not for heavy tempo ops except if taiwanese have convert their airport to be f-35/F-22 ready.
The victor in the air war will be determined very quickly.
And to support 4 F-22s over 3 days, 1 C-17 is enough. The same with the F-35A. So, if we are talking about 12 groups, that's just 12 C-17s. The 12 groups can be rotated out of Taiwan every second day or third day if necessary and replaced with a whole new set of jets.
Plus the Chinese will give the Americans a lot of preparation time, so quite a bit of the materials needed to support just 12 aircraft groups can be pre-positioned beforehand, even a week before hostilities begin, and transported by trucks.
The F-22/35 don't need aircraft-specific infrastructure during wartime, it's only for peacetime operations. Whatever the C-17 carries, it's enough for 3 days of operations.
The Rapid Raptor program stipulates that F-22 stealth fighters must retain the ability to deploy anywhere in the world within twenty-four hours.
nationalinterest.org
The program prepares four F-22s and crew members with C-17 Globemaster III cargo aircraft that can provide support, fuel, and weapons with the specific purpose of enabling a “first-strike” capability in remote or austere places around the world.
The C-17 too can operate in austere conditions.
The second point is that Taïwan is very close to chinese missiles. Taïwanese airports will be on the constant threat from China.
Highway strips. China's missiles are not enough to stop air operations on the ground against Taiwan.
I only speak of aerial superiority. For penetration mission you don't have to stay one hour in the playzone. Why Chinese would need aerial superiority above Philippines or Japan ?
If the Chinese are to take Taiwan, they need air superiority across the entire length of the water body starting from YellowSea/Sea of Japan, all the way down south to the SCS. That's the frontline. Basically everything between Chinese airspace and the First Island Chain has to be controlled by them, even if most of the fighting happens over Taiwan. If they can't do that, then the USN will fill the gaps and change the equation overnight, China won't be able to escape from the destruction of its coastline.
Air superiority between these two powers is more about technology than logistics. The Americans have proven global logistics and the Chinese are fighting in their airspace. So the equation boils down to whether Chinese J-20s and SAMs can defeat the F-22 and F-35, and the course of the war will be determined in the first few days.
What's annoying and frightening is even a destroyed Taiwan works in China's favour, even if the invasion fails. Most people would leave, the economy would be dead, no more Taiwanese semiconductors, and no more long term ideological threat to the communists.
