The Air Force Secretary Said Elon Musk 'needs To Learn A Little Bit More About The Business' Before Deriding Crewed Fighter Jets

Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said he has "a lot of respect" for Elon Musk as an engineer, but said the billionaire is no warfighter.Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images and Anna Moneymaker/Getty ImagesFrank Kendall, the Air Force Secretary, hit back on Elon Musk's comments slamming the F-35.While Kendall said he respects the billionaire, he said Musk is "not a warfighter."Musk has trashed the F-35 as obsolete compared to drones, but Kendall said that reality is decades away.Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said Elon Musk should learn more about air combat tech before publicly slamming crewed fighter jets as obsolete."I have a lot of respect for Elon Musk as an engineer," Kendall said on Thursday at the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies."He's not a warfighter, and he needs to learn a little bit more about the business, I think, before he makes such grand announcements as he did," Kendall said.Musk recently drew public attention for posting on X that crewed fighters, such as the F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter, were inefficient compared to drones and have a "shit design."Calling the makers of the F-35 "idiots," Musk posted videos of drone swarms and wrote that crewed fighters would be shot down easily by modern surface-to-air missile defenses and enemy drones.Kendall, who oversees the US Air Force's budget, said Musk's vision of drone superiority is many years away."It's provocative, it's interesting," he said of Musk's statements.