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Thailand F-35

Air Vice Marshal Prapas Sonjai, Air Force spokesman, revealed 01 July 2023 the news that the United States refused to sell F-35A aircraft to the Air Force that the Air Force had previously sent a Letter of Request (Price and Availability: P&A) to JUSMAGTHAI to proceed with the procurement process by the Foreign Military Sales (FMS) method from the United States government, which must go through the consideration process and be approved by the US security agencies. Up until now, the Air Force has not received a reply letter for the P&A from the United States, so it is not possible to provide clear details. If the United States responds in either the case of selling to the Air Force or the case of refusing the sale, the Air Force has a risk management plan to support both cases.

The Air Force still insisted on the need to procure aircraft to replace the F-16 fighter jets that are about to be retired, so as not to affect the combat readiness and air defense capability, which is the Air Force's main mission. However, the Air Force is aware of the country's limited budget and will manage resources to achieve the highest value.

Several key U.S. allies already have F-35s, including South Korea, Australia and Japan, and Singapore is set to follow suit. Next in line could be Thailand, America’s long-standing treaty ally in Asia. But analysts say there’s no guarantee that Washington will approve the sale, because of Thailand’s close defense ties with U.S. strategic rival China.

Two of the plane’s three variants, the F-35A and the F-35B, were sent to the biennial Singapore Airshow in 2022, together with a number of other U.S. military aircraft. That’s widely seen as an effort to impress the regional market amid concerns about, in Washington’s words, China’s “coercion and aggression that is most acute in the Indo-Pacific.” The stealth fighter jet, manufactured by U.S. defense aviation giant Lockheed Martin, had been in the news for the wrong reasons after an F-35C crashed on the USS Carl Vinson aircraft carrier in the South China Sea in late January 2022. The U.S. military was in the process of retrieving the plane, which fell to the bottom of the ocean.

The F-35s are still “the most technologically advanced fighters on the market today,” said Richard Bitzinger, senior fellow of the Military Transformations Program at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore. Tim Cahill, Lockheed Martin's senior vice president for global business, confirmed on the sidelines of the Singapore Airshow that Thailand had expressed interest in the F-35 fighter but it’s up to the U.S. government to clear it. Cahill was quoted as saying: "This will be a U.S. government policy decision."

In mid-January 2022, the nation’s cabinet agreed in principle to back the Royal Thai Air Force's plan to procure four new fighters for 13.8 billion baht (US$415 million) in the 2023 fiscal year to replace the air force’s aging fleet of F-16A/B Fighting Falcons. The air force chief, ACM Napadej Dhupatemiya, had previously expressed a strong interest in F-35 stealth fighter jets and seemed confident about the purchase since the aircraft had become more affordable at US$80 million per shot. He said the F-35 had “top notch” performance and the purchase would enable Thailand “to stay in the same league of countries with advanced fighters.”

"Big Pong", Air Chief Marshal Naphadej Thupatemie, commander of the Royal Thai Air Force (Commander of the Air Force) gave an interview with the media about with the possibility and intention to provide the high-performance Lockheed Martin F-35A Lightning II fighter jet. He pointed out the necessity that the United States' F-35 Lightning Two is now an aircraft with excellent performance. All countries have a demand to buy and use it. "If we have a chance to use the F-35 it will raise the level for the Air Force that we have good things to use. And also we go to join a large user community. Buying an airplane has to be world wide to make the transmission parts ready as possible."

"When people ask, I say I'm really interested. If we have an F-35 Used in the army, it will replace a lot of old planes, able to disengage old planes with confidence. But if we choose an aircraft with lower performance than we have. We cannot reliably disengage old planes. because we do not trust because it cannot be replaced."

"Weapons must be of quality, must be The Best, the best that can be obtained. If there are old things, they have to be replaced with new things. because it cannot be defeated. Whenever we have good things in hand Just having it, it's already been used. Some people may think Why did you buy it and not use it? He probably didn't understand just that it was already being used in an abstract way. Therefore it must be terrifying. because of the dread Will be an indication that do not interfere with us... The Air Force must have the ability to fight shoulder to shoulder with friends".

"We don't need a full fleet of 20 or 18, but only half a fleet of 12 or 8 F-35s, and the rest are replaced by these UAVs as sub-teams to accompany the squadron. Think about how much it will save."

Andreas Rupprecht, an expert on China’s military aviation, said the interest in the U.S. fighter jet was surprising “as Thailand has been shifting more towards China in recent years.” Rupprecht said “I would have thought [the Thai air force] would opt for something like the Chinese-made J-10C, especially after the Chinese fighters took part in recent Sino-Thai Air Force joint training exercises”. J-10C is China Air Force’s multirole fighter, 25 of which are being sold to Pakistan.

The supposed purchase of U.S. fighter jets has also met with criticism in Thailand, with some analysts saying it is “more about ulterior motives rather than strategic objectives.” Thitinan Pongsudhirak, a leading political scientist and professor at the famed Chulalongkorn University said “Thai air force interest in F-35s is opportunistic because a military-backed government is in office and the military has been entrenched in power after two coups in 2006 and 2014”. Thitinan said “Unlike Japan, South Korea or Taiwan, Thailand's threat perceptions do not call for the acquisition of advanced F-35s... Thailand has close relations with China, and no border issues with its next-door neighbors.”

Thailand’s growing military ties with China are one of the main reasons why the U.S. would be reluctant to sell their state of the art aircraft to Bangkok, said Ian Storey, senior fellow at the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore. “Thailand is a U.S. treaty ally, so it has a strong case,” argued Storey. “But the Americans would still be concerned that the jet fighter’s sensitive technologies might be compromised due to the Thai military's close links with its Chinese counterpart,” he said.

"The U.S. kicked Turkey out of the F-35 program because it got too cozy with Russia,” said Bitzinger, who linked the termination of the sale of 100 F-35As to Ankara in 2019 to Turkey’s decision to purchase S-400 air defense systems from Russia. A statement by the White House at the time said: “The F-35 cannot coexist with a Russian intelligence collection platform that will be used to learn about its advanced capabilities.”

Bitzinger drew a comparison with Thailand’s hopes to acquire the F-35. “Thailand already buys a lot of Chinese weaponry: frigates, submarines, and tanks are just a few of the latest items that it's bought from China,” he said. “Given even greater concerns over protecting F-35 technologies, I doubt if Washington would be more willing to trust Thailand," he added.

Besides the F-16s and F-5s, the Thai Royal Air Force currently operates 11 Swedish JAS-39 Gripen fighters and aviation experts say Thailand could buy more of those, or the French Rafale, like Indonesia. Jakarta signed an acquisition contract for 42 Dassault Rafale multirole combat aircraft, the first batch of six to be delivered by 2026. Just a few days ago, the Biden administration also approved a nearly US$14 billion arms sale of up to 36 F-15 fighter jets to Indonesia, and that could be an option for Thailand, according to Storey.

The F-35 Lightning II is single-seat, single-engine, multirole combat aircraft with stealth capabilities to evade radar. Of the three variants of the F-35, the F-35A is the least expensive; the F-35B can perform short take-off and landings; and the F-35C – the type involved in the 24 January 2022 crash – is designed to operate from aircraft carriers. Some of Washington’s most trusted allies and partners in the Indo-Pacific have already purchased, or are in the process of purchasing the F-35.

It is possible that the Thai Air Force will order the first four F-35s during the time the price per plane comes down to the desired level. When The Air Force commander has shown strong intentions, it is clear that the next plane to the Air Force, the F-35, is not too far away.

However Air Force procurement still has to go through several steps from now on. Because this is just the beginning of a feasibility study, there are still many steps that need to be taken. There is a procurement committee that is set up to consider the suitability of various technologies, techniques and also to manage the project in accordance with the budget received. It is expected that it will take several more years. Including the time to order and produce the plane, it should take about 10 years, which means that if everything goes through the process, it will be another 10 years to see the F-35 plane with the Royal Thai Air Force. But over the course of 10 years, anything can happen as well.