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[Congressional Bills 118th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 1549 Introduced in House (IH)]

<DOC>

118th CONGRESS
  2d Session
H. RES. 1549

   Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives on contract 
      breaches and other failures under the F-35 aircraft program.

_______________________________________________________________________

                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                            October 22, 2024

    Mr. Gaetz (for himself and Mr. Moulton) submitted the following 
   resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Armed Services

_______________________________________________________________________

                               RESOLUTION

 
   Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives on contract 
      breaches and other failures under the F-35 aircraft program.

Whereas the Department of Defense started the F-35 program in 2001 to develop a 
        fifth-generation fighter aircraft intended to replace a range of aging 
        aircraft in the United States military services' inventories;
Whereas the F-35 Lightning II aircraft is the Department of Defense's most 
        expensive weapon system, with the Department estimating the F-35 program 
        will cost over $2,000,000,000,000 to buy, operate, and sustain over its 
        lifetime;
Whereas the F-35 program is more than a decade delayed and has cost 
        $209,000,000,000 more than originally planned;
Whereas the F-35 program resulted in a Nunn-McCurdy breach in March 2010 after 
        the unit cost of each aircraft grew by more than 50 percent over the 
        original program baseline;
Whereas the F-35 program has revised its baseline schedule four times since 2012 
        due to delays in development;
Whereas the Department of Defense currently estimates the Air Force will pay 
        $6,600,000 annually to operate and sustain each individual aircraft, 
        which is well above the $4,100,000 original target, and the Air Force 
        increased the amount of money it can afford to spend per F-35 aircraft 
        to $6,800,000 per year;
Whereas despite increasing projected costs, no F-35 variant met its performance 
        goals from fiscal years 2019 through 2023 for mission capable rates, the 
        percentage of time the aircraft can perform one of its tasked missions, 
        or for full mission capable rates, the percentage of time during which 
        the aircraft can perform all tasked missions;
Whereas the monthly average readiness rates for the United States F-35 fleet is 
        53.1 percent mission capable and only 29.3 percent full mission capable, 
        far below the Department of Defense target of 90 percent mission 
        capability for the F-35A and 85 percent for the F-35B and C;
Whereas the Department of Defense has consistently failed to invest in adequate 
        depot capacity, which contributes up to a 10-percent reduction in the F-
        35's mission capable rate;
Whereas the Department of Defense sends 73 percent of all F-35 aircraft parts 
        back to industry sources for repairs due to lack of depot capacity, 
        despite depot repairs being twice as fast;
Whereas the F-35 Joint Program Office reported in 2023 that the F-35 fleet would 
        fly 300,524 hours per year, which is a reduction of almost 82,000 flight 
        hours per year or 21 percent from its 2020 Annual Cost Estimate because 
        it is too costly for the services to operate;
Whereas Pratt & Whitney, subcontracted to produce the engine for the aircraft, 
        did not deliver any engines on time in 2023, with an average delay of 
        more than 2 months, and delivered 97 percent of the engines late in 2022 
        and 96 percent of the engines late in 2021;
Whereas the F-35 engine needs to be overhauled more often than originally 
        anticipated, from approximately every 2,000 flight hours to every 1,600 
        flight hours, because the current system does not have enough power or 
        cooling capabilities to support both current and future capabilities;
Whereas Lockheed Martin, the prime aircraft contractor, delivered 91 percent of 
        aircraft late in 2023 and 50 percent of aircraft late in 2022;
Whereas Lockheed Martin is not meeting its goals for the number of hours its 
        workforce spends on scrap, rework, and repair, which occur when 
        production defects result in additional work to fix the defect;
Whereas hardware and software delays associated with the Technology Refresh 3 
        (TR-3) upgrades resulted in the Department of Defense refusing to accept 
        delivery of aircraft from July 2023 through July 2024, until Lockheed 
        Martin was able to deliver a minimally acceptable TR-3 configured 
        aircraft;
Whereas, despite the year-long delay, the TR-3 configured aircraft are not 
        combat capable and can only conduct training missions until Lockheed 
        Martin delivers the full TR-3 capability, which is currently estimated 
        to take 12 to 16 months;
Whereas the TR-3 delays have also subsequently delayed the Block 4 modernization 
        effort for the F-35 aircraft, which is necessary to address new threats 
        that have emerged since the Department of Defense established the 
        aircraft's original requirements in 2000; and
Whereas, in February 2021, General CQ Brown acknowledged the serious issues with 
        the F-35 program and said the Air Force needed to explore new and more 
        cost-effective measures by ``not ruling out starting from scratch. I 
        want to be able to build something new and different, that's not the F-
        16'': Now, therefore, be it
    Resolved, That it is the sense of the House of Representatives 
that--
            (1) Lockheed Martin and its subcontractors' inability to 
        deliver F-35 aircraft with modernized capabilities on time and 
        within projected costs have degraded our military's 
        capabilities and raised the risks for our warfighters;
            (2) Lockheed Martin and its subcontractors are in breach of 
        contract with respect to the deliverables on the F-35 aircraft 
        contract; and
            (3) the Department of Defense has failed to adequately hold 
        itself and Lockheed Martin accountable for the numerous 
        failures within the F-35 aircraft program.
                                 <all>
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