Delays In JSF Program, Five-Year Wait For Australia

With revelations the RAAF's new fighter won't be available until after 2017, Australia faces an air combat capability gap later this decade, according to The Advertiser. US Air Force Major General John Thompson, deputy program executive officer for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program, said the development program for the fighter had been extended by two years to at least 2017. "We are still five to six years away from the end of our development program and we are only 20 per cent through our flight test program," Maj-Gen Thompson was quoted as saying. The Government is only committed to 14 but the plan calls for up to 100 of the jets for the RAAF to replace its fleet of F/A-18 fighters and F-111 strike jets. The latest estimate for the cost of the so-called "fifth generation" stealth jet is about $130 million.