Watchdog reveals F-35’s readiness rates – and they’re not looking good

All three variants of the relatively new F-35 Joint Strike Fighter have failed to hit readiness targets entirely. 

That’s according to a recent report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO), a watchdog agency reporting on federal programs. GAO, which assessed all the nation’s tactical aircraft, found that no fighter planes are doing particularly well at meeting annual mission-capable goals – no Navy or Marine Corps platforms hit that target in the last six years – but the report’s data particularly underscores challenges faced by the F-35, despite maintenance and sustainment costs climbing at an unmatched rate. 

The report, which covers the years 2018-2023, shows Air Force platforms leading the other services in readiness. The service’s F-15C Eagle and F-16C Fighting Falcon were at the head of the pack, meeting readiness targets in three out of the six years assessed. The F-15C and F-16D each met annual mission capable goals for one out of the six years. Mission-capable rates, according to the report, are defined as the percentage of total time when aircraft can fly and perform at least one mission, versus being sidelined in maintenance or out of commission for other reasons.

The beloved A-10, familiarly known as the “Warthog” for the loud 30mm Gatling-style autocannon in its nose, perhaps had the most notable performance success story. Over the six-year span, according to the report, the Air Force only spent 87% of the funds it requested for the aircraft, saving a total of $390 million and spending just under $2.5 billion for operations and maintenance. The A-10 met its readiness goal in the year 2020 – shortly after the Air Force completed a $1.1 billion re-winging project intended to keep at least some of the planes flying into the 2030s.

Yet, that success is unlikely to keep the A-10 airborne beyond that point: as Sandboxx News has reported, the retirement gears are finally turning for the beloved close air support aircraft, sending large batches of the fleet, which numbered 280 at the start of 2024, to long-term storage at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base.

For the F-35, which has exceeded cost estimates since its earliest developmental days, the increase in maintenance spending year-over-year is eye-watering, according to the report’s findings. 

The Air Force’s conventional takeoff and landing F-35A has seen its operation and maintenance (O&M) budget nearly quadruple from 2018 to 2023, but has still exceeded requested spending every year since 2020, data shows. O&M spending has totaled nearly $7.5 billion, or 107% of the requested funds, according to the report.

The Marine Corps’ short takeoff/vertical landing F-35B and the Navy’s carrier-variant F-35C also saw their at O&M budgets increase, albeit at more gradual rates. F-35B spending increased from just over $300 million to more than $600 million annually over the reporting period, and O&M funding for the F-35B, the variant with the fewest aircraft, grew from around $200 million to about $500 million in the same period. The Marine Corps spent 95% of requested F-35 maintenance funds, while the Navy spent 99.5%. In all, the two services spent more than $4.6 billion on F-35 maintenance.

GAO acknowledged that its report was the latest in a series of concerning reports about Joint Strike Fighter readiness: In September 2023 it has pointed out maintenance challenges driving down mission-capable rates; and in April 2024 had found that the Pentagon’s projected F-35 sustainment costs had ballooned from $1.1 trillion in 2018 to $1.58 trillion in 2023. 

“In recent years, DOD has expressed a desire to have more governmental control over sustainment activities,” GAO’s new report states. “However, as DOD seeks to expand government control, it has neither (1) determined the desired mix of government and contractor roles nor (2) identified and obtained the technical data needed to support its desired mix,” it adds. 

Law requires that the F-35’s Joint Program Office transfer the duties of sustainment management, planning and execution to the relevant service secretaries by the start of fiscal year 2028, and Pentagon officials have said they are working on it. 

Related: Marine F-35s fly 5,000 miles, join new UK aircraft carrier

If there’s a bit of good news for the F-35 from the new report, it’s that the Marines’ F-35B was one of only five aircraft variants that saw mission capable rates that increased over the six-year period even while the service spent less than requested. GAO did not release the exact year-over-year changes in readiness rates, because the Defense Department determined that information was sensitive. 

Although only five out of 15 tactical aircraft variants met readiness targets for any of the last six years, this is certainly not a new problem. Historically, only a small minority of military aircraft have consistently met annual mission-capable targets – and none of them are fighters. In fact, in 2020, two years after then-Defense Secretary Jim Mattis launched an initiative aimed at raising aviation readiness rates, the Defense Department quietly moved away from a stated requirement of 80% mission-capable rates across the board in favor of a “more holistic view” of readiness. 

The fact that GAO made no new recommendations, referring instead to past findings about challenges related to maintenance and aging platforms, shows how the military has grown into an acknowledgement that it’s fighting an uphill battle when it comes to meeting its own readiness targets.

Meanwhile, though, the much-maligned F-35 continues to mark milestones on the battlefield. In September, the Navy announced that the carrier-variant F-35C had executed its first airstrikes in combat, hitting Houthi weapons storage facilities in Yemen during a mission launched from the carrier USS Abraham Lincoln.

Feature Image: Sailors and Lockheed Martin personnel move in to chock the wheels of a Navy variant F-35C Lightning II after a sortie at Eglin Air Force Base, FL. The sailors from the Strike Fighter Squadron-101, along with airmen and Marines work directly with the LM maintainers to help put the joint strike fighters in the air. (U.S. Air Force photo by Samuel King Jr.)

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