At the recent Italian elections, the 5 star movement, a populist party, managed to win 32% of the votes, becoming by far the biggest political party in Italy.

The party has long been against what they consider excessive public spending, and has long had it's sights on the F-35 which they consider a massive waste of public finances. With approximately a third of all Italian votes, chances of them taking office as part of a government coalition are pretty high. And even if they don't, they gained twice as many votes as the next biggest party, so even the opposition will be hard pressed to ignore the call from the voters.

In May a parliament member for the 5 star movement, Tatiana Basilio stated "There will be no ifs or buts about leaving the F-35 program". The party is strongly in favour of focusing on the Eurofighter Typhoon only.

https://www.defensenews.com/global/euro ... ars-power/

JetBuddy wrote:

The Italian election results are interesting, and in line with the "populist" political wave going over Europe at this time.

I don't think the F-35 plans are in jeopardy though, as Italy is one of three places where the F-35 is being produced (as far as I know). The program provides a lot of high technology jobs. Political parties always say a lot of things during the elections, but when they take their seats reality sets in and they are always forced to reconsider many of their promises.

These people aren't your ordinary politicians though (they forbid career politicians among other things), and they have stated their hostility towards the F-35 since 2013 at least. They seek to end politically created jobs like the F-35 project, that's more or less one of the main points of the party.

VSMUT wrote:

These people aren't your ordinary politicians though (they forbid career politicians among other things), and they have stated their hostility towards the F-35 since 2013 at least. They seek to end politically created jobs like the F-35 project, that's more or less one of the main points of the party.

They can do it of course. And then pay the penalty. There is an actual contract in place with monetary penalties. They pay and lose jobs.

Tugg

VSMUT wrote:

At the recent Italian elections, the 5 star movement, a populist party, managed to win 32% of the votes, becoming by far the biggest political party in Italy.

The party has long been against what they consider excessive public spending, and has long had it's sights on the F-35 which they consider a massive waste of public finances. With approximately a third of all Italian votes, chances of them taking office as part of a government coalition are pretty high. And even if they don't, they gained twice as many votes as the next biggest party, so even the opposition will be hard pressed to ignore the call from the voters.

In May a parliament member for the 5 star movement, Tatiana Basilio stated "There will be no ifs or buts about leaving the F-35 program". The party is strongly in favour of focusing on the Eurofighter Typhoon only.

https://www.defensenews.com/global/euro ... ars-power/

Still, I don't think this is particularly noteworthy. Military aircraft always have four dimensions to their performance, the fourth one being politics. If one aircraft is seen to be supported or aligned with a particular side of politics, then it is in grave danger if the other sides should win power in an election. Cost is less important than politics.

Story's not so short and clear.

We had a big bribes scandal (one of many, btw) in the early 1970's involving Defence, Prime Minister, et similia; and Lockheed F-104 and C-130.
F-104 bribes scandal spread all over Europe, by the way.

We're at it again, many taxpayers think - mainly because we've invested *a lot* in the Eurofighter program, and the EFs aren't in service since that long.

Interesting story, that cannot find anymore, as it was published by a newspaper that no longer exists: maintenance costs for the EF2000 skyrocketed from one day to another, with any particular reason. Journalist went deeper in analyzing the costs voices, and many of the "generic use" parts (titanium screws, bolts, etc) raised by 100%, 200% and 1000% in some cases.
Thanks to those moves, Defence Reports will highlight that EF's maintenance costs too much - and buying new planes will be cheaper.

I'll try to recover that news article but I've little hope - it passed through Renzi's censorship...

Tugger wrote:

VSMUT wrote:

These people aren't your ordinary politicians though (they forbid career politicians among other things), and they have stated their hostility towards the F-35 since 2013 at least. They seek to end politically created jobs like the F-35 project, that's more or less one of the main points of the party.

They can do it of course. And then pay the penalty. There is an actual contract in place with monetary penalties. They pay and lose jobs.

Tugg

One could argue that the Eurofighter creates more jobs at less cost while capabilities are sufficient for Italy's needs.
It's not much of a cost saving though...

Waterbomber wrote:

One could argue that the Eurofighter creates more jobs at less cost while capabilities are sufficient for Italy's needs.
It's not much of a cost saving though...

It would be a hard cost claim to justify. Italy doesn’t manufacture all the components of the Eurofighter, they only have a 21% workshare on the program although they obviously have a production line for their own aircraft. Given they will also manufacture the vast bulk of their F-35 fleet and have the opportunity to manufacture hundreds more for other nations, as well as gain component contracts for the overall program, the contribution of the F-35 to the Italian economy for the next 20 years, and potentially overall, likely dwarfs that of Eurofighter. Then consider the Eurofighter from the Italian line will likely only manufacture 25-50 more aircraft and Italian Industry will only be able to support a global fleet of approx. 600 aircraft while the F-35 fleet is expected to reach 3000+. We also know that the primary operators of the Eurofighter are already looking at its replacement while the primary operator of the F-35 plans to operate the aircraft until nearly 2070…