CANBERRA — I enjoyed reading the newspaper commentary in mid-May by Weston Konishi and Robert Dujarric on the hurdles to Japan's acquisition of F-22 aircraft, and broadly agreed with the thrust of their argument.

However, in my view this commentary perpetuated some misleading assumptions about the relative merits of the F-22 and F-35 and, consequently, may encourage some of our Japanese friends to strive for aging air capabilities that are arguably unsuitable for their needs.

At one point the commentary asserts that the F-35 is less advanced than the F-22. In all but one respect this is not really the case.