Poor attempts to spin the Australian public about the troubled F-35 program

Here is another look at some F-35 news from the locals.

It is difficult to keep a straight face and read this. What is just as interesting is that not much of it goes challenged in the media. Two things that go together: a faulty fifth-estate and a faulty fifth-generation fighter. OK, three things when you add the dysfunctional strategic thinking from senior Defence officials.

Let us look at some of the words; interesting they are; both strong and weak language from the top F-35 salesperson and his partners in the art of the Ponzi scheme.

The Defence Materiel Organisation's head of air combat capability, Air Vice-Marshal Kym Osley, said the grants scheme could help Australian companies win work worth potentially "billions of dollars."

To date, few if any of the rent-seekers understand the meaning of the word “potential”. All they saw in the PowerPoint briefing years ago was the $9 billion dollar figure thrown around. The rest is history. None of this has to do with providing Australia with an effective weapons system to protect its area of strategic interest.

"So far nearly 30 Australian companies have won work on the JSF Program worth more than US$250 million.'

Wow. Many years on; and $250M plus. I wonder how Quickstep feels about all the delays in the program that are costing them and the rest of the worldwide supply chain, real money?

"Long-term agreements have also been made with a number of the JSF prime contractors and their suppliers that are expected to deliver considerably more work potentially in the billions of dollars."

There is that word again.

On Tuesday, Lockheed Martin's head of the JSF program, Tom Burbage, moved to assure the federal government that the troubled aircraft program the largest in US military history was now on track and delivering on promised capability.

"Flight testing is on track, we're pretty much on track with our software deliveries and we're on track with our production metrics," he said after briefing senior government officials.

That is a lot of track. How about being “on-track” in the past? Here is a lot of missed schedule that did not happen.

How about this outrageous spin from Mr. Burbage in 2007?

Mr Burbage, who has held meetings in recent days with both Dr Nelson and Labor defence spokesman Joel Fitzgibbon, denied reports the JSF had fallen behind schedule and was suffering from cost blowouts.

We all know how that turned out. But back to the present day article.

Mr Burbage said he was confident the federal government remained committed to the JSF program despite Canberra's failure to sign off on an order for 14 jets worth $3.2 billion.

No failure from Mr. Burbage, his crew and his cheerleaders. None at all.

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