F-35 Prices Drop 8 Percent In $7 Billion Deal

The Pentagon and F-35 maker Lockheed Martin have agreed on the terms of a deal for the Defense Department to buy two lots of F-35s for $7 billion.

The big question now is the average price per plane for each tranche (LRIP 6 and 7). While we’ve confirmed with two sources that the deal is as Reuter’s Andrea Shalal-Esa has reported it, no one has yet squealed on the money question.

This will be the number that JSF critics probably will fasten on. The last batch (LRIP 5) of 32 F-35s went for $3.8 billion.

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