Saturday, December 20, 2014

Today's Insurgencies Are Changing The Market For Military Jets



How ISIS And Boko Haram Could Change The Way Countries Purchase Air Power -- Clay Dillow, Fortune

Textron’s Scorpion recon and strike jet offers cash-strapped countries air power on the cheap. Global events are making it more attractive.

Like spaceships and sports stadiums, military strike jets typically aren’t the kind of things that companies build—much less sell—off the shelf. Take the Pentagon’s new F-35, for instance: Two decades and $400 billion in the making, the F-35 had nine committed customers lined up to buy thousands of aircraft (at between $80 million and $110 million per copy) before Lockheed Martin LMT 0.63% ever started bending metal in earnest. Rarely does a contractor fully develop a military jet on spec.

Read more ....

My Comment: The A-10 does a very good job in providing support for ground forces .... and it is a hell of a lot cheaper than a F-35. But the above military jet shows that the market is big enough for more "players" .... especially if the military jet is cheap and easy to maintain.

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