Seoul seeks to buy 20 more F-35 stealth fighters

Seoul seeks to buy more next-generation fighters

Posted : 2017-12-21 15:41

Updated : 2017-12-21 18:05

By Jun Ji-hye

South Korea has embarked on a project to buy the nation's next-generation fighters (F-X), the state-run Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA) said Thursday.

It is widely seen as a move to buy 20 more Lockheed Martin F-35 stealth fighters in addition to 40 jets that Seoul agreed to buy in 2014. On Nov. 7, U.S. President Donald Trump said, after his summit with President Moon Jae-in in Seoul, that South Korea will be ordering "billions of dollars" of U.S. weapons.

The DAPA said the agency is currently working to select a company that will carry out the preliminary research on the F-X project. Such research is the primary stage of the weapon system acquisition project and will determine how the project will proceed.

"The preliminary research is expected to begin in February and run for about six months," a DAPA official said, asking not to be named.

He noted that it would take about three years for the agency to finally choose the type of aircraft, adding, "It is premature to say which aircraft will be imported."

However, military sources said it is highly likely for the nation to choose the F-35s again, citing Moon's agreement with Trump as well as the superior capability of the jet itself.

When Trump agreed with Moon in September to lift the limit on the maximum weight of warheads to be mounted on South Korean ballistic missiles, it was also speculated by many that the agreement did not come free, and Washington apparently wanted something from Seoul in return.

In September 2014, the DAPA finalized a plan to purchase 40 F-35 stealth fighters with a total budget of 7.3 trillion won. The unit cost of each aircraft was 120 billion won.

At the time, Boeing's conceptual F-15 Silent Eagle and the European Aeronautic Defense and Space Company's Eurofighter Typhoon had vied with Lockheed Martin's F-35.

Initially, South Korea planned to introduce 60 high-tech combat planes with a budget of 8.3 trillion won, but the government later said it had decided to buy 40 F-35s first, saying it would decide later when to buy the remaining 20 based on changes in the national security situation. But the main reason at the time was reportedly the difficulty in allocating the additional funds.

Since then, calls for buying more high-tech fighter jets have been consistently raised amid North Korea's repeated nuclear tests and launches of ballistic missiles.

In its latest in a series of provocations, the North fired what it claimed was a new, more powerful intercontinental ballistic missile capable of carrying a larger nuclear warhead and reaching anywhere on the U.S. mainland last month.

Original post: koreatimes.co.kr

F-35 Lightning II: Details