Growing tensions with NATO over the U.S. stance on Ukraine and President Trump’s escalating trade war now jeopardize a crucial aspect of the alliance’s airpower strategy, as member countries indicate they could walk away from plans to purchase F-35 fighters.

The F-35 is currently operated by the U.S. and 19 allied nations — including some non-NATO members such as South Korea, Japan, Australia and Israel. But several NATO members are now preparing to acquire dozens of new F-35 to replace their aging fleets that include aircraft from the U.S., Europe and even Cold War-era Soviet-made fighters.

However, on Thursday, Portugal’s defense minister pointed to "the recent U.S. stance in the context of NATO" as a factor in rethinking the replacement of 28 F-16s with F-35 Lightning IIs. Meanwhile, in one of his first actions as prime minister, Canada's Mark Carney called for a review of his country's decision to purchase a total of 88 F-35s — a contract worth more than $13 billion. Germany's order for 35 of the planes has also been thrown into question.

The concept of the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program, which eventually became the F-35, dates back decades: the U.S. would lead development of an aircraft to be used across NATO. With air force, naval and marine variants, the plane would have advanced stealth capabilities and cutting-edge sensors, radar and avionics that could perform in air-to-air combat, ground-attack and reconnaissance roles. The F-35 has been plagued by massive cost overruns and technical problems during development. Ultimately, however, it has emerged as what some argue is the best combat aircraft in the world.

"The F-35 is a really good plane that has best-in-class insurgency capabilities and low observability," says Richard Aboulafia, managing director at Aerodynamic Advisory, an aerospace consultancy. If NATO abandons it, "that capability will be lost," he says.

There are advantages for NATO to use the same plane

The advantages for allies sharing the same aircraft design include a single communications platform, common "hardpoints" for carrying NATO munitions, the ease of training pilots and maintenance crews, and the ability to share spare parts.

"It is easier to fight with allies when you use the same equipment," says former Texas Rep. Mac Thornberry who was a key defender of the F-35 project while in Congress. He says the real significance of U.S. allies backing away from the F-35 "would be a further deterioration in the cohesiveness of NATO, which is what our adversaries would like to see."

Lockheed Martin, the prime contractor for the F-35, said in a statement to NPR that it values its strong partnership with the Canadian Air Force and Portuguese Air Force, but referred questions on foreign military sales to the U.S. government.

For the countries reconsidering the F-35, one possible alternative is the Swedish-built Saab JAS-39 Gripen, a less stealthy but faster and longer-range aircraft that is less compatible with NATO systems. It has the additional advantages of being much cheaper to buy than the F-35, with lower operational and maintenance costs.

Margaret Kosal, a former Defense Department official who is an associate professor at Georgia Tech's Sam Nunn School of International Affairs, views the sudden uneasiness over the F-35s as a symptom of growing distrust within the alliance since Trump took office.

"I see it as a potential canary in the coal mine, signaling a lack of confidence in the U.S.," she says.

Fear of a ‘kill switch’

Amid the controversy, media outlets across Europe have expressed concern over a "kill switch" that could be used by the U.S. to disable F-35s, even as European defense officials have sought to quash the rumors. Earlier this month, Belgium's chief of defense, Gen. Frederik Vansina, insisted that the F-35 "is not a remote-controlled aircraft," while Switzerland's department of defense said such a device is not possible.

Even if the "kill switch" is a myth, the rumors likely show an absence of trust, Aboulafia says. "You know, there's also the possibility that people are looking at this plane and saying, 'Heck yeah, not only do we not want to give the U.S. money, but we're also concerned about them cutting off support in the event of some kind of conflict.' "

Given the view in Europe that Trump is abandoning NATO in favor of the Kremlin, in a hypothetical future conflict with Russia, Europe might worry that the U.S. could cut off spare parts and updates for the F-35, Aboulafia says.

Meanwhile, the F-35 — which the Government Accountability Office projects will cost the U.S. more than $2 trillion throughout the program's lifespan — has also faced growing criticism at home.

On X, Elon Musk, whose efficiency team has been looking for places to cut federal government spending, has called the F-35 an "expensive & complex jack of all trades, master of none" and posted a video of drone swarms, commenting, "Meanwhile, some idiots are still building manned fighter jets like the F-35."

Aboulafia calls Musk's assertion that the F-35 could be easily replaced by remotely piloted aircraft "a complete fantasy for so many different reasons," pointing out that Musk "used, as an example, a fleet of short-range quadcopters that would make it about 30 miles before falling out of the sky." Trump, in the past, has also been critical of the plane.

Washington Democratic Rep. Adam Smith, the ranking member on the House Armed Services Committee, has also called out the F-35 project for cost overruns. He says of the plane: "It's like getting a quarterback in the NFL. You kind of got to have one, but you really hate to wind up overpaying for mediocrity."

Even so, Smith says "it will make it harder if we're looking for partners in a fight and they don't have the same" platform.

The U.S. is also rethinking the F-35

Seth Jones, president of the defense and security department of the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), acknowledges that "the U.S. itself is rethinking the purchase of F-35s" due to "questions about whether the future is really unmanned and autonomous platforms."

Would NATO be able to fight without the advantages inherent in operating a single type of aircraft such as the F-35?

"It will have a negative impact," Georgia Tech's Kosal says. "But it won't significantly degrade" capabilities.

Jones says the F-35 has "extraordinary capabilities" that would be difficult or impossible to replicate in existing aircraft.

"[It] has the ability to move inside of a Chinese or Russian anti-aircraft access denial bubble with stealth capabilities for both the collection of information, as well as to fire" either conventional or nuclear munitions.

Still, he says, if NATO countries are now committed to spending more on defense — something Trump has long demanded — sourcing warplanes in Europe might make more sense to them. Jones points to Portugal, which hasn't yet added any F-35s to its arsenal.

"If we start to see more of a European defense identity, particularly for Portugal, [it] may be a more logical decision … to pull something off of European production line, rather than have to resort to the U.S."

Copyright 2025, NPR

Collected from Minnesota Public Radio News. View original source here.