McCain Moves to Block Funding for F-22 Fighters

Here he goes again. McCain is again siding with the Democrats and the Obama Administration and calling for more cuts in the funding for advanced F-22 jets. These are front line aircraft capable of avoiding enemy radar and equipped with the latest electronic jamming devices. These cuts come at a time when China is going full bore ahead with its development and production of first line jet aircraft. This joint strike aircraft is a vital part of United States strategic defense program. McCain an ex-fighter pilot himself seems to have forgotten the value of defensive and offensive fighters---this plane is capable of both.



WASHINGTON -- Sen. John McCain, in an unusual alliance with the Obama administration, moved Monday to eliminate $1.75 billion recently inserted into the proposed 2010 defense budget for more fighter jets from Lockheed Martin.

The Arizona Republican, along with Michigan Democrat Carl Levin, filed an amendment to cut the extra money for seven more F-22's. The Senate Armed Services Committee last month narrowly approved the additional funding requested by Georgia Republican Saxby Chambliss.

McCain and Levin, the committee's chairman, voted against the additional funds. The full Senate may vote on the defense spending bill this week. The House last month voted to include a $369 million down payment for 12 additional fighters to its version of the defense bill.

The White House reiterated its threat to veto legislation that includes money to continue production of the radar-evading jets beyond the current request of 187 planes.

"We do not need these planes," President Barack Obama wrote in a letter to McCain and Levin Monday. "To continue to procure additional F-22s would be to waste valuable resources that should be more usefully employed to provide our troops with weapons that they actually do need."

McCain, who last year lost his bid for the White House to Obama, on the Senate floor said he will strongly recommend the administration veto the defense bill if lawmakers don't act to end F-22 production.

Supporters of the F-22 have said capping production at 187 aircraft is too risky with potential adversaries like Iran, North Korea and China looming.

McCain disputed such arguments. Focusing on timely delivery of the Joint Strike Fighter, also built by Lockheed Martin, is in the best interest of the country and will be a weapon system that can meet future threats, he said.

In a separate letter to Senate leaders Monday, Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the Joint Strike Fighter is "more capable in a number of areas such as electronic warfare and combating enemy air defenses."

Chambliss and other lawmakers who represent districts where F-22 production jobs are at stake have lobbied hard to keep the program. Lockheed's primary manufacturing plant is in Georgia, but key parts of the plane also are made in Texas and California.

McCain said the rationale for keeping a weapon system should never be about job creation, but about defending the nation.

The extra money would extend production of the F-22 beyond the 187 aircraft that Gates says are needed. Gates has argued that buying any more of the jets, which cost $140 million a piece, will undermine the Pentagon's ability to increase the size of U.S. ground forces and purchase gear for fighting unconventional wars against insurgents.