The F-35 has been clubbing F-15s, F-16s, F-18s, like baby seals in recent exercises. And In Red Flag 17–1 when the F-35 was declared out of weapons, the F-35 stayed in the battle passing it’s excellent sensor information to F-22s and Eurofighters. Its sensor system is a generation ahead of the F-22s.
It was like a mini forward deployed stealthy AWACs and it made the F-22 and Eurofighter better. The flaws are mostly gone, and the price is below the Rafale, the Eurofighter, and the F-15 Silent Eagle.
And if by flaws you mean it’s development, here’s an excellent post on Reddit from Dragon029, who really knows this stuff. Seems it’s development was no more flawed than other modern fighters.
F-35 vs other aircraft development times
F-22:
ATF program beginning: June 1981
YF-22 (‘demonstrator’) maiden: September 1990 (+9 years)
F-22 first flight: September 1997 (+16 years)
F-22 IOC: December 2005 (+24 years)
Eurofighter Typhoon:
Future European Fighter Aircraft program beginning: 1983
BAE EAP demonstrator maiden: August 1986 (+3 years; note that work had been done prior for the ACA program)
Eurofighter Typhoon maiden: March 1994 (+11 years)
Eurofighter Typhoon IOC: 2003 (+20 years)
Dassault Rafale:
ACX program beginning: October 1982
Rafale A tech demo maiden: July 1986 (+4 years)
Rafale C (arguable beginning of the test program) maiden: May 1991 (+9 years)
Rafale IOC: Oct 2002 (+19 years)
JAS-39 Gripen:
IG JAS ‘program’ beginning: 1980
[No tech demo]
Gripen maiden: December 1988 (+8 years)
Gripen IOC: November 1997 (+17 years)
F-35:
JSF program beginning: November 1996
X-35 tech demo maiden: October 2000 (+4 years)
F-35 maiden: December 2006 (+10 years)
F-35B IOC: July 2015 (+19 years)
F-35A IOC: August / late 2016 (+20 years)
F-35C IOC: December 2018 / early 2019 (+22 / +23 years)
