Brazilian Air Force denies interest in F-35 and seeks to incorporate more Gripens

The Commander of the Brazilian Air Force denied that the FAB plans to purchase the Lockheed Martin F-35 multi-role fighter, and stated that it is looking to acquire an additional batch of SAAB Gripen.

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The statement came after comments circulated that the Brazilian Air Force (FAB) wanted to supplement the fleet of SAAB Gripen E/F fighters, which have not yet become operational, with other aircraft, with the aim of not relying on a single vector, something that existed previously with Mirage III/2000s and F-5 Tiger.

According to Defesanet, an active officer reported that one of these options would be the F-35, the first fifth-generation multi-role fighter, and the only aircraft with «stealth» radar technology that has a vertical take-off and landing version (F-35B VTOL).

The project to have all this on a single platform, albeit split into three versions (standard «A», vertical take-off «B» and naval «C») made the F-35 project the most expensive in U.S. history.

With the program’s recent wins in the new aircraft competition in Canada and Switzerland, beating out Gripen NG bids, there has been much talk of possibly reducing the price of the F-35 through cost dilution and larger-scale production.

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According to the site, the official said that «Lockheed Martin (manufacturer of the F-35) is offering the aircraft on the international market for about the same price as the Swedish fighter.»

The news surprised many, as the F-35 will still be expensive, especially in operating cost, and if the FAB opted for the cheapest fighter of the last three options (among which were the Boeing F-18 Super Hornet and the Dassault Rafale), why go back to the initial selection where the F-35 was and had already been discarded due to its price?

In this regard, the website Poder Aéreo spoke with the Air Force Commander, Air Brigadier Carlos de Almeida Baptista Junior, who denied the alleged information.

For the Commander, the decision taken by the Aeronautical High Command is definitive and of clear knowledge to all, and for him the focus now is «to seek the contracting of a second batch of Gripen […] of 30 aircraft, still without defining the quantity between E (one pilot) and F (two pilots)».

As reported by our partner site Aeroin, even before the Gripen selection the force had always wanted something similar to the 43 F-5 Tiger fighters it currently has, as well as to partially or fully replace the 54 AMX ground attack aircraft.

However, budget constraints have always prevented the purchase of more aircraft, always remaining below the ideal, which for many is above 60 and in a utopian scenario would approach 120. To meet this goal, the FAB has even cut back on the tactical transport KC-390, manufactured by Embraer.