The British Ministry of Defence has confirmed that the supply of the final seven F-35B fifth era fighters from the USA is not going to arrive on schedule, withprior plans to have all plane delivered by the tip of 2025 not being realised. The supply of the fighters in 2026 will accomplished the primary tranche order to equip the British Armed Forces, which was made up of 48 fighters. Defence Minister Luke Pollard said that the ministry “expects to have obtained all seven F-35B plane ordered in Manufacturing Lot 17 by the tip of April 2026,” confirming that though the fighters “ought to have been delivered by the tip of 2025,” present planning assumes that “4 of these plane will slip into 2026 and be delivered by April 2026 (a 3 to 4 month delay from the unique contract).” He confirmed that “there’s not a monetary treatment for the supply of Lot 17 plane.”
The UK is the only real Tier One associate within the F-35 program, fairly than an exterior consumer for the plane, which prevents it from imposing penalties for supply delays. The U.S. defence sector has struggled to maintain fighter deliveries on schedule, with even its lightest and easiest fighter sort in manufacturing, the F-16, seeing repeated delays in deliveries to its largest consumer of the previous 20 years the Republic of China Air Power. This has fuelled rising calls in Taipei to take authorized motion to acquire compensation. It stays unsure to what extent the UK will proceed to put money into procuring the F-35B after 2026, as whereas the Ministry of Defence had initially deliberate to acquire 138 of the plane, such plans are actually thought-about wholly unaffordable.
The F-35B is the most expensive sort of tactical fight plane recognized to presently be in manufacturing anyplace on the earth, with its price being roughly 50 % increased than that of the extra broadly produced F-35A, on account of its specialised quick takeoff and vertical touchdown capabilities. The fighter however has considerably extra restricted fight capabilities than the F-35A, together with a a lot poorer flight efficiency, shorter vary, and smaller essential weapons bays which scale back its inner air-to-air missile carriage by one third. Sustainment prices and upkeep wants are additionally considerably increased. The F-35B was chosen particularly to function from the Royal Navy’s two Queen Elizabeth class plane carriers, which lack the arresting gear wanted to function standard service based mostly plane just like the F-35C. The fighters are thus operated collectively by the Navy and the Air Power, with the UK being the one F-35 consumer to have relied on the B variant for almost all of its F-35 orders.
The F-35B’s main consumer the U.S. Marine Corps in early 2025 introduced plans to cut back procurements to 280 plane, down from a beforehand deliberate fleet of 353, with the intention of reallocating funds to greater than double its deliberate fleet of F-35C fighters from 67 to 140. This was purported to replicate dissatisfaction with the plane’s efficiency from makeshift airfields, in addition to the necessity to discipline extra succesful fighters with longer reaches even when sacrificing versatility in the place fighters can function from. Following the Marine Corps, it’s anticipated that the British Armed Forces will make investments considerably much less closely within the F-35B, and prioritise funding for procuring F-35A fighters to be operated completely by the Royal Air Power. Main points with the 2 Queen Elizabeth class carriers, together with floods, breakdowns, and the cannibalisation of 1 ship to maintain the opposite, might additional affect the choice, and make the fielding of adequate F-35Bs for each ships seem much less of a precedence.
Plans to acquire the F-35A have been first confirmed in June 2025, and supply the nation with a considerably extra succesful fighter at a a lot decrease price. F-35A procurements are thought-about crucial because the Air Power’s sole present fighter sort, the Eurofighter, is more and more thought-about out of date significantly as a result of its continued reliance on a mechanically scanned array radar. Regardless of lobbying efforts by native trade to proceed Eurofigher procurements and keep away from procuring the F-35A, the British Ministry of Defence had ended procurements, and in September confirmed plans to proceed withdrawing the plane service, whereas releasing figures for deliberate scrapping of the plane. This makes the procurement of additional F-35As significantly pressing, at a time when delays to F-35 acquisition plans have left the nation’s complete fighter numbers at a traditionally unprecedented low.
