USAF's next-gen fighter faces budget cuts: Cheaper F‑35 alternative explored

In the first half of July, the United States Air Force (USAF) announced that the Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) fighter program may face financial problems due to budget constraints for the 2025 fiscal year. Although the US Armed Forces are the wealthiest service of this kind in the world, they still cannot use financial resources without limits.

USAF Secretary Frank Kendall stated that the future NGAD might require program reorganization and changes in technical requirements to reduce costs. One future 6th generation fighter is expected to cost $300 million USD, while the contemporary, lighter F-35A costs almost $100 million USD.

One idea for cutting costs is to forgo the expensive ($4.4 billion USD until 2023) revolutionary Next Generation Adaptive Propulsion (NGAP) engine, planned to offer high performance with low fuel consumption.

Despite the challenges associated with the B-21 Raider (new strategic bomber) program and LGM-35A Sentinel (new intercontinental ballistic missile – both forming two segments of the American nuclear triad), the USAF must retain the ability to continue the equally important NGAD program. Currently, however, it has been somewhat frozen to verify some requirements.

Kendall stated that it is necessary to look for simpler, cheaper solutions in some areas, or in other words: compromises. This way, NGAD would avoid the fate of the F-22A Raptor, a revolutionary machine whose costs reduced the order from 750 to less than 200 units. The Raptor was to replace the more numerous F-15, but the aging Eagle is still in production, and the innovative machine is not.

The NGAD is not just an aircraft (referred to as the NGAD platform) but an entire system. The next-generation fighter is to operate within a complex ecosystem, supported by various drones, cooperating with other manned aircraft (especially the F-35) and support planes (AWACS, etc.). In this regard, there could also be some simplifications.

So far, it has not been announced which capabilities the successor to the F-22 might forgo. This is likely the main subject of ongoing discussions and consultations. This offers a glimmer of hope, as in June some Pentagon representatives predicted the possible end of the NGAD program for financial reasons.

Nonetheless, the USAF must prepare for the potential effects of giving up the efficient (20-25% less fuel consumption) NGAP engines, especially given the challenges requiring long ranges in the Pacific theater of operations. Some American commentators consider re-engining in the future, possibly using Rolls-Royce engines.

The potential abandonment of NGAD could lead to a dangerous situation for American manufacturing capabilities. The USAF could end up with only one company designing and producing fighters: Lockheed Martin. NGAD (and the similar F/A-XX, successor to the F/A-18 Super Hornet) was supposed to be an opportunity for other manufacturers, especially Boeing, which is already struggling with other problems.

At the end of July, USAF Chief of Staff Gen. David Allvin presented the concept of a lighter machine, referred to as "build to adept," meaning it would be easy to introduce modifications as needed. This is just a theoretical concept of a light fighter (actually a multi-role aircraft), about which little is known except that adaptability to new battlefield conditions is more important than high survivability (important for many older machines, but also NGAD).

Gen. Allvin suggested the necessity of widely using digital engineering and 3D printing during the development and production of the new aircraft. The airplane in the conceptual drawing strongly resembles the F-35, maintaining its overall structural layout, except for differently configured air intakes and likely smaller dimensions.

It would still be a quite advanced machine but much cheaper. This way, the aircraft could be replaced with a more modern variant (or even model) more often than today at similar costs. It would also allow the mass introduction of the aircraft into service, increasing the overall size of the USAF's combat component—this is supposed to be the answer to the relatively numerous Chinese Air Force.

The idea is not new. The possibility of relatively fast replacement or at least easy modernization of the aircraft is how NGAD started. According to one early concept, the F-22 was to be replaced by many not very numerous types of highly specialized machines. According to the then US Air Force leadership, this was supposed to allow cost reduction, which even then (around 2020) did not sound very credible.

The idea of a lighter fighter, complementing the "workhorse" F-35 and the "top" NGAD, is also not new. In 2021, the USAF expressed the need to purchase a "generation 4.5" fighter cheap enough to replace the mass-produced F-16s (unfortunately not managed within the F-35 program) and offer performance sufficient even for the future battlefield (requiring an open mission system architecture, for example).

The natural candidate seemed to be the trainer Boeing/Saab T-7 Red Hawk, which could become the basis for developing a light combat machine (just as the Korean KAI FA-50 is derived from the T-50 trainer). However, the USAF has not shown interest in such a solution. It appears that the USAF wants an aircraft that is both a genuine combat aircraft and cheaper—in a way, that aircraft was supposed to be the F-35A. Despite exceeding the original financial assumptions due to the excessive complexity of the JSF program (especially the costly F-35B version), it almost managed to achieve this.

Can you have your cake and eat it, too? No, but perhaps the USAF will find a reasonable compromise over time, as long as the lighter fighter program is not abandoned before it even starts. Past experiences do not inspire optimism.

The idea of a light, cheap fighter jet is certainly attractive, as at significantly lower costs, the user receives only slightly lower capabilities, at least on paper. Thus, it is unsurprising that this concept returns repeatedly like a boomerang and almost always ends in two ways: those who preferred to buy genuine combat aircraft and those who bought light and cheap fighters ended poorly in combat.