Pentagon Truncating Payments To Lockheed Under F-35 Delivery Plan

RAF FAIRFORD, England—The Pentagon is still withholding some payments to Lockheed Martin for F-35s, despite deliveries resuming as a limited number of new jets make their way to U.S. forces.

The Joint Program Office announced July 19 that it had lifted a seven-month-long hiatus on F-35 deliveries that was put in place because of delays to the Tech Refresh 3 upgrade. Deliveries resumed under a “truncated” plan, by which the Pentagon would accept aircraft with not all of the upgrades complete for several months. These jets would be cleared for training, but would not meet all the required needs under the planned Block 4 upgrade.

While acceptance means some payments to Lockheed Martin will resume, Andrew Hunter, the Air Force’s assistant secretary for acquisition, said July 20 that this does not include all the planned spending.

“There are still withholds. Since not everything we’ve been contracted for has been delivered, payment is also not complete,” Hunter told reporters here at the Royal International Air Tattoo. “We will not pay for that which we have not yet received”

Under the plan, newly delivered combat-coded F-35s will not be ready until 2025.

Hunter said extending the delivery delay was having compounding effects, so a decision was made to accept jets with some of the software ready to go before later bringing on additional capabilities as modifications.

"Waiting and waiting and waiting to finalize those capabilities we weren’t quite ready to take yet is actually holding up progress on some of the later capabilities of Block 4 that we also really need," he said.

The Air Force has also cut back on the number of F-35s it is buying in its fiscal 2025 budget request because of the delays to Block 4, and that could change in later requests as upgrades continue. 

"There’s a correlation on how many airplanes we’re buying and progress made on Block 4," Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said. "Most of the jets set to be delivered first are for the U.S. Air Force, with the first going to the Air National Guard base at Dannelly Field, Alabama, and another to Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada."

“There are financial incentives and they are being used—I don’t think Lockheed is trying not to deliver,” Kendall added. “There’s a lot of motivation that’s inherent in the program.”