As NATO races to supply Ukraine before Trump takes office, Europe is struggling to touch two percent of its GDP on defence expenditure while Russia plans to spend more than 32 percent of its national budget on its military.
Romania has signed a Letter of Offer and Acceptance for 32 F-35A aircraft that are expected to cost around $6.4 billion. Romania already operates the Lockheed Martin F-16 fighter and has become the 20th member of the club of F-35 operator countries.
Ukraine struck Russia’s Bryansk region with U.S.-supplied ATACMS systems while President Vladimir Putin has signed into decree, his country’s revised nuclear doctrine, which has enlarged the conditions under which adversaries would be subject to nuclear deterrence.
Israel will acquire 25 Lockheed Martin fifth-generation F-35 stealth fighters and the Israeli Air Force will expand its fleet to 75 of these advanced stealth aircraft. The delivery of the aircraft to the IDF will commence in 2028 at a rate of three to five aircraft per year. The transaction is valued at approximately USD 3 billion, funded by U.S. Foreign Military Financing (FMF).
The Republic of Korea has selected the Brazilian Embraer C-390 for its transport aircraft requirement for an order estimated to be approximately worth USD 540 million. The C-390 was competing against the Lockheed Martin C-130J and the Airbus A400M, in a contest similar to the ongoing airlifter requirement of the Indian Air Force.
Enjoy this special video report of the flightline at the Dubai Airshow 2023 held earlier this month.
The acquisition of the S-400, differing points of view on the war in Ukraine, eye-watering costs, a domestic 5th gen fighter program and never having operated any U.S. fighter aircraft are some of the reasons why India can’t and shouldn’t consider the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter.
Leading U.S. defence companies like Boeing, Lockheed Martin, GE Aerospace, General Atomics Aeronautical Systems Inc, Pratt & Whitney, and TW Metals, LLC will be exhibiting at the show.
The wing is built at the Tata Lockheed Martin Aerostructures Limited (TLMAL) facility in Hyderabad, which is also the ‘single global source of C-130J empennage assemblies installed on all new Super Hercules aircraft’.
Kiran Dambala was until recently the program manager and the primary contact for all domestic and international F-35 customers for mods and upgrades in Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Lightning II program.
Dambala assumes this position from the outgoing Tata – Lockheed Martin Aerostructures Limited (TLMAL) COO Abhay Paranjape.
Japan has asked for 63 conventional F-35A & 42 F-35B Short Take-Off and Vertical Landing aircraft, and also plans to build its own stealth fighter by 2031.
India has decided to invite Australia to the international naval exercise Malabar
Nepal has banned all private Indian television news channels
Boeing completes delivery of 22 Apache and 15 Chinook helicopters to India
U.S. clears a USD 23 billion sale of F-35 fighter aircraft to Japan
The F-15EX is neither a ‘navy fighter’ nor a renamed F-16 and the IAF is curious about it. That’s why the Rafale might finally have a formidable challenger, if India can get past the fact that it’s American.
Part III of this analysis examines the implications of the single most interesting data point to emerge from the report of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India. This date has never been mentioned in earlier media reports, and what is almost startlingly significant is not only what transpired on this date, but the fact of the date, itself.
Part II of this analysis examines how the defence ministry’s Contract Negotiation Committee (CNC) interpreted an inflated cost analysis of the Eurofighter bid and undervalued the cost of the Rafale bid, five times.
