Trump swims possible new F-55 campaigns and F-22-upgrade

Doha, Qatar
Reuters
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The United States examine the development of a two-engine combat flugen as a F-55 and an upgrade of his Lockheed Martin F-22 raptor called F-22 Great, said US President Donald Trump on Thursday.

Trump spoke at a meeting of managing directors, including the head of Boeing and GE Aerospace in Doha, one day after the announcement of a series of business qualifications, including an order from Qatar for 160 Boeing trade jets.

Trump referred to the F-55 both as a upgrade to the Lockheed F-35 and as a new development in comments, which seemed to revoke the US giant giant with the best value after he had lost against Boeing to replace the F-22 superfighter.

He also emphasized the role of the new Air Dominance platform with the name F-47, which was recently awarded to Boeing, opened new tabs and the United States at the same time with the upgrading of the stealth fighter to which he is supposed to replace F-22.

“We will do an F-55 and I think if we have the right price, we have to receive the right price that is two engines and a great upgrade on the F-35, and then we will do the F-22,” said Trump.

“I think the most beautiful fighter plane in the world is the F-22, but we'll do an F-22 super and it will be a very modern version of the F-22 fighter plane,” he said.

“We'll go into it pretty quickly,” he added.

Trump has awarded Boeing the contract for the F-47 last month-a replacement for the Lockheed F-22 Stealth fighter with a crew plane flanked by a cohort of drone and as the most American or sixth or sixth generation fighter.

Lockheed Martin, who lost in this next generation of Air Dominance (NGAD) to Boeing and was set off by a separate competition for a new stealth jet of the US Navy, has now decreased plans for a fifth-plus fifth-generation fighter.

CEO James Taiclet informed the analysts last month that Lockheed was looking for the application of technologies that were offered for the F-47 contract for the F-35 and delivered 80% of the skills for half of the costs.

“We will basically take the chassis and turn it into a Ferrari,” he said analysts.

A spokeswoman for Lockheed said: “We thank President Trump for his support for the F-35 and F-22 and will continue to work closely with the government to realize their vision for air dominance.”

Lockheed is in the middle of a delayed technology and software upgrade for the existing generation of F-35 strikers to increase the cockpit display and the processing performance.

Analysts said it was not immediately clear how Trump's list of potential developments was built into known programs and expenditure plans or the time of existing programs.

Nick Cunningham, analyst of the Partners Aerospace agency, said that the F-55 could alternatively refer to the F/A-XX program to replace the aging f/a-18 super hornet fleet of the US Marine with the sixth generation of the sixth generation of the service.

The Marine and the Congress are fighting with the administration to keep the plans in the future, Reuters reported on Wednesday. An announcement by a winning provider was already expected in March.

The financing of the Radar-Evading F-22, which is designed to combat other fighters, has been heavily discussed for years when the Air Force's congress blocked plans to accelerate the retirement in order to concentrate on the blueprint of the next generation, which has become F-47.

Any considerable upgrade to the out-of-production-f-22 would be expensive, while Trump's indication of two engines implies that the F-55 would not be an easy derivative of the one-engine F-35, but implies an ambitious new platform, said analysts.

“Adding an engine to the F-35 makes it a new plane,” said the defense analyst Francis Tusa, based in Great Britain.