Lockheed Martin CEO Robert Stevens sees a lot of up-side and not a lot of uncertainty in the Joint Strike Fighter program. In a May 29 presentation to a Sanford Bernstein investor conference (audio here) Stevens nailed his colors to the mast, predicting success and downplaying problems.
Weight "is not an area of concern... for any of the three variants", Stevens says. This does not match the November 2007 report from the UK's National Audit Office, which states flatly that "weight challenges and propulsion integration issues place the vertical landing bring-back [requirement] at increased risk."
Asked about STOVL flight tests of the JSF, Stevens said: "Watch this space. We are committed to flying the STOVL mission by the end of this year and we will be scored as to whether we do or don't do it." The STOVL flight tests were not due to take place until December 2008 or January 2009, even before the most recent blade failure on the F135 engine.
But Stevens wasn't too concerned about that, either. "We can fix it and we're confident that it will perform. "Much has been made of it, but in our line of business, when you take an engine and put it through that kind of stress and you only get one [issue], you're actually doing pretty well."
Stevens also said he expected the core partner group to order more than the 730 F-35s that are planned today. Again, this is a very bullish call: that number includes 138 aircraft for the UK, and more than 100 for Italy, and both of those are not certain, while no other partner has discussed ordering more than their current number of airplanes.
And maybe we should send mr Stevens some links about the procurement in Canada (from 80 to 65), Norway and Denmark (competion) and even the Netherlands (risk of a real competition).
Oh I forgot Israel. + 25.
:)
UK - 138 (reduced to 'below 100')
Italy - 109 (Air Force) 22 (Navy)
Netherlands - 85 (option for 15 more)
Canada - 80 (reduced to 65)
Turkey - 100
Australia - (up to) 100 (and as low as 80)
Norway - ?
Denmark - (up to ) 48
Israel - (over) 100
If each country acquired the numbers listed here, unlikely I grant but still, that's over 750 aircraft from the non-US partners in the JSF program, even taking the low end numbers you end up with 700+ aircraft. I imagine that's where LockMart are getting their numbers...
Lets see... each full JSF partner is paid a fee for each airframe sold to a non-JSF partner country. Israel gets tons of U.S. taxpayer funded mil aid credits, the last big increase had Israel Defense almost guessing what to do with the excess in U.S. help. It shouldn't take an FBI forensic accountant to call this deal what it really is: Laundering, a shell game of money. The U.S. taxpayer pays to develop most of JSF and for some customers pays to "sell it".
Then too Israel has stated a bunch of downsides of JSF: No two-aircrew for attack, value of stealth for stealth sake, being part of a joint program instead of having their own weapons and software put in of which they would have to shell out more money for... etc. But hey: Why look a gift-horse in the mouth?