President Donald Trump announced Friday that Boeing will develop the Air Force’s next-generation stealth fighter, which will also fly alongside autonomous drone aircraft. A retired general said the F-47 could prove to be the “most important defense decision” Trump makes, as the aircraft will be critical to how the US wages war.
Now that the Air Force has a contractor to develop and produce its next-generation stealth fighter, the F-47 could prove to be President Donald Trump’s biggest call as commander in chief, a retired general said. Trump said at the White House on Friday that Boeing beat out Lockheed Martin on an award that could eventually yield hundreds of billions of dollars. The announcement came after Frank Kendall, who served as Air Force secretary during the Biden administration, ordered a pause on the program last year to review if it was still needed or had to be modified, essentially punting to the next administration. “The president’s decision to move forward with the F-47, also known as the Next Generation Air Dominance fighter, is likely to be the most important defense decision that he makes during his entire term,” retired Air Force Lt. Gen. David Deptula told Fox News on Friday. That’s because “our entire way of waging war” involves integrating all the services, which depends on US control of the air, he explained.
“No major military campaign can succeed without air superiority,” Deptula, who served as the Air Force’s deputy chief of staff for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, added. Boeing stock rallied 3% on Friday, while Lockheed fell 5.8%. The F-47 award was a vote of confidence in Boeing, which has seen numerous setbacks across its military, commercial, and space programs. The aerospace giant is also competing against Northrop Grumman for the Navy’s next-generation stealth fighter.
The F-47, a so-called sixth-generation fighter that will replace Lockheed’s fifth-generation F-22, will also fly in concert with autonomous drone aircraft. A separate contest for the Collaborative Combat Aircraft is underway between General Atomics and startup Anduril. Meanwhile, Lockheed will continue producing the fifth-generation F-35 multirole stealth fighter for the Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps, and US allies, though some are having second thoughts. Like the F-47, the F-35 is also expected to fly alongside drones, with the fighter jet’s pilot serving as the “quarterback” for a group of aircraft and the drones serving as “wingmen.” And despite losing the F-47 contest, the decision offered some upside for Lockheed, JPMorgan analysts said in a note on Friday. “The silver lining of this award for Lockheed is that the Air Force sees value in manned capabilities at the same time China is ramping its fifth gen fighter production,” they wrote.
That comes after Trump adviser Elon Musk said in November that “some idiots are still building manned fighter jets like the F-35” as he endorsed drones over jets piloted by humans. “And manned fighter jets are obsolete in the age of drones anyway. Will just get pilots killed,” he posted on X at the time. But Russia’s war on Ukraine has highlighted the limits of what drones can do with current technology as they have been vulnerable to jamming and less capable in more complex combat roles.
The US military will continue to need advanced fighters with human pilots who can penetrate into enemy airspace, destroy air defenses, and shoot down opposing aircraft, Stacie Pettyjohn, a senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security, told the Washington Post. “This is one of the US Air Force’s core strengths, so continuing to invest in the high-end aircraft that allows us to do this is key to maintaining an edge over China,” she added.
