U.S. 'Paper Aircraft' Spawning Trade Wars.

• Author: Erwin, Sandra I.
• Position: Strike Fighter

The U.S. joint Strike Fighter is not scheduled to start rolling off the assembly line for at least a decade. But it already is viewed as a threat to European fighter aircraft programs.

To be sure, the JSF has not entered any fighter competitions around the world. The prototypes developed by competing contractors Boeing and Lockheed Martin have not even left the ground. But the expected size and scope of the JSF program has prompted European aerospace leaders to take verbal preemptive strikes against the U.S. aircraft, which could become a threat to future sales of Europe's flagship warplane, the Eurofighter.

The JSF was designed to fulfill U.S. Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps, and U.K. Royal Navy warplane requirements in the next century. If the program moves forward as planned, about 3,000 aircraft will be built over several decades. The Eurofighter is a four-nation program that currently is slated to deliver 620 aircraft for the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy and Spain. The first production-class Eurofighter is scheduled to leave the factory in August 2001, officials said. It will be available for international customers by June 2002.

It would seem odd to make JSF and Eurofighter peer competitors because JSF was designed to become a workhorse tactical fighter for the U.S. Air Force. For the U.S. and U.K. navies, it will be a carrier-based fighter-bomber. For the Marine Corps, it will he a vertical takeoff and landing platform, which will replace the Harrier. Eurofighter, on the other hand, is a multi-role air superiority fighter that would be comparable to the U.S. F-15.

So why do Europeans believe Eurofighter sales could be jeopardized by the emergence of JSF in the international market?

Based on comments made by European industry officials during last month's Farnborough international air show, in the United Kingdom, it appears that the answer lies in the age-old market principle that one should establish a competitive advantage as early as possible.

The makers of Eurofighter--Germany's DASA, Britain's BAE Systems, Italy's Allenia and Spain's CASA--are competing today for sales of up to 250 aircraft in various countries, said Cesare Gianni, a vice president of Eurofighter International.

Gianni accused the U.S. government and U.S. contractors of pressuring nations to withhold decisions on fighter purchases until the JSF becomes available. In Norway, for example, a contract award for several dozen aircraft was suspended, according to...