you would use f18s in place of f15s on your carrier obviously which doesn't have more payload than f15s, but still has multiple times more capacity than the f35. there's also no such thing as a sneak attack, we would know if china is about to attack, we would see movement, our glowniggers would have spies setting off alarms, we would know it's coming and they wouldn't just be able to strike our aircraft which would be in the air immediately. the f35 serves as a forward operating aircraft for the f15s and f18s with a primary role of being sead/dead then tagging ground targets for your f15s and f18s to safely strike from your rear. the f15s and f18s will never be be in range of enemy aircraft or anti air systems before the f35 takes them out
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