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But the F-35 is built to go in and take out large buildings and headquarters and do what the F-17 did, a capability that we lost in 2008 and we've, at least

on in the white world, in the unclassified world, we don't have.

You're listening to War College, a weekly podcast that brings you the stories from behind the front lines. Here are your hosts, Matthew Gault.

For decades, the F-16 was the state of the art.

In fact, the fighter bomber still makes up a huge percentage of the world's air forces. It's fast, it's maneuverable, it carries a decent

payload, and it's a whole generation out of date. This week, we're talking about the generation of planes designed to make the F-16 look like a Sherman tank, the fifth generation.

Joining us is Tyler Rogaway. He's the editor-in-chief of the war zone, which is part of the website The Drive.

Thanks for joining us, Tyler.

Hey, great to be with you.

Can we just start off with you telling us what a fifth generation fighter is and compare it to what a fourth generation fighter is and does?

Yeah, you know, it's one of those terms that's probably heavily misunderstood and the reason why is it's really not a you know one

rubric that makes a fifth generation fighter and another one and not a fifth generation fighter.

Generally speaking it has to do with low observability, so a high component of stealth, so not just not being able to be tracked by radar, but also other forms as well, including emissions control,

and even in some cases, infrared signature control.

And then, sensor fused avionics, so instead of a federated system of avionics, where you have your radar and radar warning receiver and multiple different forms of sensors on board that kind of all

do their own thing and the pilot has to fuse them in their own head with a

fifth generation aircraft that that information is fused together and displayed kind of in a god-like view

...