We have two daughters. We had the first because we love each other deeply and want to share that with a family. Shortly after she was born the world was rocked by COVID and all the cracks became too apparent even through our lovebird haze. We love our daughter, but feared for her future, feared for her to be alone in this world without us one day. So we made the conscious decision to bring another person into this world just so that the first wouldn’t have to be alone.
It seems a terrible, selfish thing to do to condemn these two incredible, beautiful creatures to such a grim world. They deserve so much more, and my life is made so much happier for their smiles, and so very much worse when I read articles like this knowing what they will have to suffer. These poor babies deserve the lives we had as children, not this crumbling, cooking world.
Any time you give a weapon to somebody, there is at least one of these two things happening if not both;
You are sure this person is your friend and ally and is therefore no threat to you;
You have a better weapon/the full capability to defend against the shared weapon without fear upon sharing it, thus ensuring your superiority in any potential engagement with what was formerly yours.
In this case, both of these were/are true. Quite simply, the US fleet will remain functional in greater numbers for longer even if it is no longer a reliable ally of global freedom, and the pilots have had far more experience in the cockpit of fully functional vehicles to boot. So even in an engagement where the technology is a literal 1:1 match, pilot skill and experience will absolutely make the difference and the US military knows that.