Page 2 - Five Forces of Americanisation Richard Hooke 04072025 final post SDR1

The UK Defence Industry in the 21 Century
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The Five Forces of Americanisation

Notes
1. The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is an American series of single-seat, single-engine,
supersonic multirole combat aircraft. Designed for both air superiority and strike missions. Lockheed is the
prime F-35 contractor with principal (“level one)”partners Northrop Grumman (USA) and BAE Systems (UK).

In many ways, the US approach to building and supplying the F-35 has exemplified America’s approach to
overseas trade and diplomacy until now. Costing from US$80 million a copy (a basic F-35A version) or more,
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1,100 have been delivered worldwide so far. According to Newsweek (6 April, 2025) the UK will own 45
aircraft by the end of 2025 with western Europe countries (Italy, Holland, Denmark, Norway, Germany,
Belgium and possibly Portugal) plus Japan (147 aircraft), South Korea (60) and Australia (72) in the Far East
also buyers. Canada has been considered a highly likely acquirer too. The only Middle Eastern buyer to date
is Israel. Consistent with the global security and economic framework that has broadly prevailed since WWII,
NATO countries are considered the focus market.

“[The F-35 is] a capability in indications and warnings, command and control, and intelligence, surveillance
and reconnaissance. All that, plus its speed and range speaks for itself. The benefits of interoperability and
networking offered by the F-35 and its proliferation among allies and partners doesn’t bode well for an
enemy of NATO.” (Retired U.S. Air Force Gen. Tod D. Wolters, Former NATO Supreme Allied Commander
Europe; Jan. 10, 2023).
US International Traffic in Arms Regulations (“ITAR”) limit the capabilities of non-US aircraft, or, as
Aerospace Global News commented “the aircraft also lacks a truly open architecture, and the programme
has been heavily ‘vendor locked’”. In 2025, any relaxation of these restrictions looks increasingly unlikely,
with a new US policy of America First appearing likely to challenge the buying assumptions made when
export buyers selected the aircraft. To date, it has encouraged Portugal and Canada to reconsider.

As well as facing a potentially declining F-35 export market, in April, 2025, Lockheed Martin suffered a
further major setback in not being selected to lead the US Next Generation Aerial Dominance (“NGAD”)
aircraft programme (the F-35’s successor), losing out to Boeing. In response, still promoting the view that
the eventual global F-35 fleet will be “around 3,500”, Lockheed Martin believes that it must “build
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exportability into each of these components”. If not leading the 6 Generation then, as Lockheed Chief
Executive Jim Taiclet announced, “My challenge here on my aeronautics team is, let’s get 80 percent of six-
gen capability at half the price” by developing the F-35 into a “Generation 5.5” aircraft.
This approach looks sensible: some of its planned upgrades are already a part of the F-35 programme of
record as part of the Block 4 modernization project. But the US government will have the final say as to
which upgrades will be made available to international F-35 customers and this now looks highly
problematic. In addition, there are sceptics who, according to Jon Lake (Aerospace Global News), “question
whether the F-35 can be meaningfully upgraded, in part because the airframe is too small to accommodate
sensors of sufficient size and power, and in part because of innate power and cooling limitations”.
Lockheed Martin Chief Executive, Jim Taiclet nevertheless remains positive: “Our goal is to make as much
of this capability [exportable] that we can. We try to design [technology] in a way that’s hopefully an easier
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decision for exportability than a harder one.” (Aerospace Global News, 23 April, 2025).
The question is, with the world responding to America First, will there still be an export market for American
advanced combat aircraft after the F-35?

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07/07/2025 Richard Hooke 2025