You probably thought when Secretary of Defense Bob Gates killed the Lockheed Martin F-22 last year, it was a good thing for the F-35. I'm not so sure anymore. I think Gates simply shifted everyone's target. As the MOST EXPENSIVE WEAPONS PROGRAM IN HISTORY, Lockheed's F-35 program, with its nearly $11 BILLION ANNUAL PRICE TAG (and that's only the US-funded portion), faces F-22-like scrutiny, but now with an unprecedented level of public disclosure.
I spent most of my day reading the 25 reports posted by the Defense Contracts Management Agency (DCMA), an unexpectedly public archive that tramples all over the proprietary secrecy usually reserved for aerospace assembly lines.
The DCMA's disclosure is an extraordinary and unprecedented gesture. Sure, many pages are redacted, but, even so, I do not believe that a major weapons program has ever faced this level of exposure.
How do we interpret all of this data? Carefully.
DCMA reports, by their nature, have to be a bit unfair. DCMA's auditors aren't looking to provide a balanced perspective. The monthly action reports are about finding problems -- and fixing them. That said, the DCMA reports show the F-35 has been having more problems than even some of its critics realized, and they haven't been getting fixed either. It will take me another day or two to process all of it.
Meanwhile, the F-35 data dump keeps rolling.
Ashton Carter's office has released an acquisition decision memorandum on the F-35 that postpones full-rate production 13 months. It adds another year of low-rate production, plus adds four jets to the flight test program, including one new carrier variant and three converted low-rate production aircraft.
Last, but not least, a scathingly critical report on the F-35 program has appeared in Holland. Johan Boeder, a software entrepreneur who tracks the global F-35 supply chain on Saturdays and evenings, has posted an English-language briefing on the F-35. Boeder first presented the brief two weeks ago before the standing defence committee of the Dutch Parliament. His findings are worth reading.
I spent most of my day reading the 25 reports posted by the Defense Contracts Management Agency (DCMA), an unexpectedly public archive that tramples all over the proprietary secrecy usually reserved for aerospace assembly lines.
The DCMA's disclosure is an extraordinary and unprecedented gesture. Sure, many pages are redacted, but, even so, I do not believe that a major weapons program has ever faced this level of exposure.
How do we interpret all of this data? Carefully.
DCMA reports, by their nature, have to be a bit unfair. DCMA's auditors aren't looking to provide a balanced perspective. The monthly action reports are about finding problems -- and fixing them. That said, the DCMA reports show the F-35 has been having more problems than even some of its critics realized, and they haven't been getting fixed either. It will take me another day or two to process all of it.
Meanwhile, the F-35 data dump keeps rolling.
Ashton Carter's office has released an acquisition decision memorandum on the F-35 that postpones full-rate production 13 months. It adds another year of low-rate production, plus adds four jets to the flight test program, including one new carrier variant and three converted low-rate production aircraft.
Last, but not least, a scathingly critical report on the F-35 program has appeared in Holland. Johan Boeder, a software entrepreneur who tracks the global F-35 supply chain on Saturdays and evenings, has posted an English-language briefing on the F-35. Boeder first presented the brief two weeks ago before the standing defence committee of the Dutch Parliament. His findings are worth reading.
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