Navy set to lose out on jets due to row with Boeing

The Navy is set to get only 16 of the last F/A-18 Super Hornet jets Boeing will ever make instead of the 20 appropriated d rights that’s dragging out negotiations

Politico

Navy set to lose out on jets due to row with Boeing

Dispute over data rights has bogged down contract negotiations for Super Hornets.

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1 hour ago

DEFENSE

Navy set to lose out on jets due to row with Boeing

Dispute over data rights has bogged down contract negotiations for Super Hornets.

A U.S. Navy Blue Angels F/A-18 Hornet flies over the San Francisco Bay. Washington has been eager to replenish rickety jet stocks and stave off a strike fighter shortfall with new Super Hornets, which are considered the backbone of the Navy’s aviation operations at sea. | Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

By LEE HUDSON

07/06/2023 03:00 PM EDT

Boeing and the Navy aren’t getting along, and it’s costing the military essential jets needed to phase out aging aircraft and be prepared for potential conflict with China.

The Navy is set to get only 16 of the last F/A-18 Super Hornet jets Boeing will ever make instead of the 20 appropriated due to a dispute over intellectual property rights that’s dragging out negotiations, Rep. Mike Garcia (R-Calif.), a member of the House Appropriations defense subcommittee and a former Super Hornet pilot, tells POLITICO.

Washington has been eager to replenish rickety jet stocks and stave off a strike fighter shortfall with new Super Hornets — featured in Tom Cruise’s “Top Gun: Maverick” and considered the backbone of the Navy’s aviation operations at sea. But there’s a time crunch because Boeing is ending production in 2025 to focus on new technologies.

Congress appropriated funding for 12 Super Hornets in fiscal 2022 and eight in fiscal 2023 for jets the Navy didn’t request. But the service decided to use the deal in a last-ditch effort to gain data rights it says it needs to perform maintenance on the aircraft in case of a war with China over Taiwan..."

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DEFENSE

Navy set to lose out on jets due to row with Boeing

Dispute over data rights has bogged down contract negotiations for Super Hornets.

US Navy confident it can fix its fighter jet shortfall — and avoid another

By Megan Eckstein

 Mar 2, 2022

SAN DIEGO — The U.S. Navy has a carefully balanced plan to dig out of a fighter shortfall and stave off another in the 2030s — but several pieces must come together exactly as planned.

The plan involves adding 4,000 more flight hours of service life to existing F/A-18E/F Super Hornets, fully fielding the F-35C Joint Strike Fighter and developing the Next Generation Air Dominance program’s F/A-XX manned fighter — and doing all of that on schedule.

Vice Adm. Kenneth Whitesell, the commander of Naval Air Forces, told Defense News in a Feb. 15 interview that the Navy is making progress in adding new fighters to its inventory and will have fully closed the gap — which had grown to 49 aircraft — by 2025.

But by 2030 or 2035, the F/A-XX must be developed and in its fielding process; otherwise, Whitesell said, the Navy will start losing jets from the inventory without bringing in any replacements, creating a new fighter shortfall..." 

The Drive

Here Is Boeing's Master Plan For The F/A-18E/F Super Hornet's Future

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Blue Angels begin the shift to Super Hornets

 6 Jul, 2023 07:59

Zelensky shifts blame for counteroffensive failures to West

Delays in military assistance allowed Russia to create stronger defenses, the Ukrainian president has said

Ukraine's President Vladimir Zelensky attends a ceremony marking the Day of the Naval Forces in Odessa. ©  Handout / Ukrainian Presidential Press Service / AFP

"Kiev had hoped to launch its military pushback against Russia much sooner, but was hampered by a lack of Western-supplied weapons, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky said in an interview released on Wednesday.

• Speaking to CNN, Zelensky admitted that Ukraine's counteroffensive, which has been running for about a month, has been “slowed down” by strong Russian defenses.

Zelensky noted that he had told European leaders that Ukraine would like to start its campaign “much earlier,” but needed “all the weapons and materiel for that.” 

• In some areas, he said, Kiev’s troops cannot “even think of starting” attacks because they do not have “the relevant weapons.”
  
  • 
    goog_829588166In some areas, he said, Kiev’s troops cannot “even think of starting” attacks because they do not have 
  • The Ukrainian leader explained that Kiev knew the delays would result in slower progress. “Everyone understood that if the counteroffensive unfolds later, then a bigger part of our territory will be mined. We give our enemy the time and possibility to place more mines and prepare their defensive lines,” he added.
• The Ukrainian leader explained that Kiev knew the delays would result in slower progress. “Everyone understood that if the counteroffensive unfolds later, then a bigger part of our territory will be mined. We give our enemy the time and possibility to place more mines and prepare their defensive lines,” he added.

Read more

 Ukraine shifts its counteroffensive focus

Zelensky went on to reiterate calls for deliveries of US-made F-16 fighter jets. 

• While Kiev’s Western backers have already started to train Ukrainian pilots to fly these aircraft, earlier this week Admiral Rob Bauer, chairman of the NATO military committee, warned that the issue of shipments “will not be solved in the short term for this counteroffensive.”

The Ukrainian leader noted that F-16 deliveries are “not even about the Ukrainian advantage in the sky over the Russians” but rather “only about being equal,” adding that the jets will provide cover for Ukrainian troops, enabling them to more easily move across the battlefield.

Kiev started its long-anticipated counteroffensive in early June, attempting to breach Russian defenses along several sections of the front. However, according to the Russian Defense Ministry, all Ukrainian attacks have failed, with heavy losses.

Numerous Ukrainian officials, including Zelensky, have acknowledged difficulties on the battlefield, with the Ukrainian deputy defense minister Anna Malyar urging the public last month not to measure Ukraine’s successes by recaptured territory.

• On Tuesday, Aleksey Danilov, Ukraine’s national security chief, claimed that Kiev’s priority is “the maximum destruction” of the Russian military rather than territorial advances.

However, a Financial Times report last month indicated that Western officials have been unimpressed by Ukraine’s battlefield performance, with the paper’s sources claiming that long-term Western support for Kiev would be contingent on the eventual outcome of the offensive."

Ukraine wanted to launch its counteroffensive earlier but it needed more weapons for that... | Tass

 5 JUL, 17:52

Zelensky says he wanted Ukraine’s counteroffensive to start 'much earlier'

According to the Ukrainian leader, the counteroffensive is slowed down because of difficulties on the battlefield

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky

© AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky

NEW YORK, July 6. /TASS/. Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has said that he told US and European leaders that Ukraine wanted to launch its counteroffensive earlier but it needed more weapons for that.

• According to the Ukrainian leader, the counteroffensive is slowed down because of difficulties on the battlefield. "I wanted our counteroffensive to happen much earlier, because everyone understood that if the counteroffensive unfolds later, then a bigger part of our territory will be mined. We give our enemy the time and possibility to place more mines and prepare their defensive lines," he said in an interview with CNN.

"I’m grateful to the US as the leaders of our support, but I told them as well as the European leaders that we would like to start our counteroffensive earlier, and we need all the weapons and materiel for that. Why? Simply because if we start later, it will go slower," he noted. "The later we start, the more difficult it will be for us."

• According to Zelensky, the counteroffensive can be accelerated should Ukraine have more long-range artillery and missiles. "In some directions it will give us an opportunity to start the counteroffensive," he said. 
• "In some directions we cannot even think of starting it, as we don’t have the relevant weapons. And throwing our people to be killed by Russian long-range weapons would be simply inhumane."

The Ukrainian army has been making futile attempts to stage an offensive since the beginning of the month. Secretary of the Russian Security Council Nikolay Patrushev said on June 22 that since the beginning of the counteroffensive, 

• Ukraine’s losses had exceeded 13,000 troops. According to Russian President Vladimir Putin, Ukrainian forces are not seeing success in any area."

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UkraineTrade & CooperationVladimir Zelensky