Lockheed’s pitch to India: F-16s, jobs and a blow to Pakistan
Lockheed Martin’s offer to shift all of its F-16 manufacturing to India comes with an added benefit for Prime Minister Narendra Modi: a strategic win against nuclear rival Pakistan.
The proposal would give India partial control along with the U.S. over which countries are able to purchase F-16 fighter jets and spare parts, according to people familiar with the situation who asked not to be identified. That may allow India to choke off key supplies to Pakistan, which has relied on F-16s as its main aerial defense for decades, if the U.S. allows it do so.
“Some components may be produced only in India,” Abhay Paranjape, director of business development at Fort Worth-based Lockheed Martin Aeronautics, said in an interview about the company’s F-16 proposal.
Asked whether Pakistan would still be able to source F-16 jets or parts elsewhere under the arrangement, Paranjape said questions about foreign military sales policies should be referred to the U.S. government. Roger Cabiness, a spokesman for the Department of Defense, in turn referred questions on the sale of F-16 spare parts to Lockheed.
The strategic element is a key selling point as Lockheed pushes to win an order that may exceed 100 fighter jets, part of Modi’s plan to spend $150 billion on the armed forces and create jobs under his “Make-in-India” policy. A deal would breathe new life into Lockheed’s F-16, an older model than the stealth F-35 warplane, and further boost U.S.-India defense ties at the expense of Pakistan.
“What we are doing is putting India as the center of the supply base,” Randall Howard, director of F-35 international business development at Lockheed, said earlier this month in New Delhi. “Today, there is no potential Pakistan sale.”
U.S. relations with Pakistan have worsened in recent years. Congress in May refused to give subsidies for Pakistan to buy new F-16s, prompting it to consider buying used ones from Jordan instead. The U.S. this month withheld another $300 million in military aid to Pakistan over its failure to take action against terrorists carrying out attacks on American troops in neighboring Afghanistan.
Lockheed’s proposal attempts to turn its greatest weakness — the fact that Pakistan also flies F-16s — into a main reason for India to acquire the jet.
“Since India would house the only existing production line, it would be able to deny Pakistan any further platforms or also have influence on Pakistan Air Force logistics,” said Pushan Das, who follows military modernization at the Observer Research Foundation in New Delhi.
Lockheed Martin, which expects to wind down F-16 production in Fort Worth by the end of next year, has successfully sold the jet for four decades.The proposed facility in India would provide much-needed highly skilled jobs as Modi heads into several important state-level elections in 2017.
“We are not looking at just assembling India’s F-16 here,” Lockheed’s Paranjape said. “We are looking at establishing a complete manufacturing base ecosystem.”
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This story was originally published August 22, 2016 at 5:35 PM with the headline "Lockheed’s pitch to India: F-16s, jobs and a blow to Pakistan."