Pentagon blocks public release of F-35 report for first time in 20 years

For the first time in more than 20 years, the US Department of Defence has blocked the public release of a congressionally mandated annual report on the costly and controversial F-35 fighter jet programme.

The non-partisan Government Accountability Office (GAO) disclosed that this year’s Defence Department (also referred to as the Pentagon) assessment of the US$1.6 trillion programme was designated as containing Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI), preventing the report from being released publicly, Bloomberg reported.

According to Bloomberg, the annual assessment has long served as a key source of insight into the world’s most expensive and technologically advanced defence programme. This year, however, only the title of the June 25 report has been made public: “F-35 Joint Strike Fighter: Update on Production and Modernisation Efforts.”

“The GAO has covered the F-35 acquisition annually since Congress mandated reviews beginning in 2005,” said Jon Ludwigson, director of the agency’s Contracting and National Security Acquisitions Office, who oversaw the report.

“This is the first year that any of our acquisition reviews has been determined to contain CUI” and therefore restricted from public release, he said.

Although withheld from the public, the report was provided to members of Congress serving on the four defence committees and continues “on our path of providing an update to the defence committees on the progress of F-35 modernisation.”

Built by Lockheed Martin, the F-35 is the most expensive weapons platform in US history. The programme has repeatedly faced criticism over spiralling costs, delays in aircraft and engine deliveries, setbacks in software upgrades, and components wearing out sooner than anticipated.

Last year’s GAO report concluded that the F-35 programme “continues to overpromise and underdeliver.”

By Nazrin Sadigova