If you are an F-35 fan for its all-around, go-anywhere fighting ability, you will be concerned about this.
F-35 Can’t Fight?
According to a defense official at a joint program office, American F-35s across the service branches are only 56 percent ready for battle.
The Department of Defense wants to get this number up to at least an average of 64 percent rate of combat readiness within the next year, but that is a glaring shortcoming for the program’s future.
If there is to be conflict with China in a fight over Taiwan, America needs every F-35 it can muster to dominate the skies.
The F-35 Readiness Numbers Need to Improve
The mission-capable goal for the entire F-35 fleet is now 70 percent for the Air Force F-35A and 75 percent for the Marine Corps F-35B and Navy F-35C, according to Lieutenant General Mike Schmidt, who is program executive officer for the F-35 Joint Program Office.
That’s an acceptable objective, but how did the DOD get into this problem in the first place? Is it a lack of spare parts, maintenance, supply chain issues, faulty engines, or general wear and tear expected of a workhorse fighter?
Schmidt has acknowledged some of these problems in a statement to Congress. “It’s resolving the top degraders, returning aircraft listed as long term down to mission capable status, optimizing unit level maintenance, and improving supply chain performance,” he said.
The general wants to fix the “critical degraders” and get those non-combat effective fighters into the air on a regular basis.
Availability Issues Have Been a Problem in Prior Years
This is not a new problem for the F-35. In 2022, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) published “Availability and Use of F-35 Fighter Aircraft.” That report used data from 2021.
The CBO found that “All three F-35 variants have experienced generally declining availability and use with age.”
The CBO studied “full mission capable rates” This means that “The full mission capable rate is a more stringent measure of readiness than the mission capable rate because it reflects an aircraft’s ability to perform all—not just one or more—of its tasked missions.”
The CBO concluded that the entire mission-capable rate for the F-35A was 40 percent. The F-35B and F-35C were considerably lower – each model was less than 20 percent competent.
In 2023, the CBO released another study from F-35 flight data in 2022. It found that “F-35As’ availability fell by 11 percentage points,” from 65 percent to 54, CBO says. “F-35Bs’ availability also fell, by 7 percentage points” — from 61 percent to 54 — “and F-35Cs’ availability rose by 5 percentage points [from 53 percent] to 58 percent.”
The budget office posited that the level of stealthiness for the airplanes was difficult to maintain. Stealth coatings must be replaced sometimes, and these repairs take longer to execute.
It is good that at least one general is sounding the alarm on F-35 readiness and availability. The problems are likely more than just “teething issues” of a newer program. Perhaps more money, airmen, and resources need to be poured into the program.
Congress Should Make This a Priority
It is necessary to keep the F-35 in the air as much as possible. This is America’s premier fighter and let’s hope that other countries that fly it are not having similar problems with combat effectiveness and availability. Sometimes wake-up calls can jar policymakers.
This is a situation in which sounding the alarm is necessary. China knows how to read reports and is likely happy that the F-35 has readiness issues. That could give Beijing more confidence as it plots its air force’s strategy, operations, and tactics for future use against Taiwan.
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Author Expertise and Experience
Serving as 19FortyFive’s Defense and National Security Editor, Dr. Brent M. Eastwood is the author of Humans, Machines, and Data: Future Trends in Warfare. He is an Emerging Threats expert and former U.S. Army Infantry officer. You can follow him on Twitter @BMEastwood. He holds a Ph.D. in Political Science and Foreign Policy/ International Relations.
