I f the US Air Force (USAF) had all the money in the world, its fighter of choice would undoubtedly be the Lockheed Martin F-35A. But even the best-funded of services does not always get what it wants. Costing $44,000 per hour to fly, the F-35 is too expensive for the USAF's purse. Earlier this year, it settled for a modernised version of a 1970s design - Boeing's F-15EX - for a purchase of up to 80 aircraft, in part because of it having an operating cost of only $29,000 per hour. Losing sales to an airframe designed nearly five decades ago is a problem for Lockheed's F-35 programme, so the company has responded by promising to reduce the A-model's operating cost to $25,000 per hour by 2025. For its part, the US Department of Defense (DoD) is highly sceptical. "The department doesn't see a path to get to $25,000 per flying hour by [fiscal year 2025]," Robert Daigle, its director of cost analysis and programme evaluation, told the US House Armed Services Subcommittee during a May hearing.
展开▼
