McEntire SC Air Guard won’t be getting F-35 fighter jets ... for now

When Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David Goldfein visits McEntire Joint National Guard Base near Eastover on Friday, it won’t be to announce that the 169th Fighter Wing will be getting new, state-of-the-art F-35 fighter jets.

McEntire has been knocked out of the next two rounds of F-35 deployments because of the relatively young age of its current F-16 fighter jets, a Pentagon spokeswoman told The State. Also, a spokesman for U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-Seneca, who arranged Goldfein’s visit, acknowledged Thursday that the Air Force’s top officer would make no announcements regarding the F-35.

McEntire in 2013 was a finalist for the new jets; but, the F-35s went to an Air National Guard base in Burlington, Vermont, instead. The next two Air National Guard locations will be announced together, probably in the next few months, and are to receive their first aircraft in the early to mid-2020s.

“The strategic landscape as a whole is different now,” Air Force spokeswoman Ann Stefanec said Thursday. “And given all the strategic decisions, (McEntire) was not one of the five chosen now” as finalists.

The finalists are Dannelly Field Air Guard Station, Montgomery, Ala; Gowen Field Air Guard Station, Boise, Idaho; Jacksonville (Fla.) Air Guard Station; Selfridge Air National Guard Base, Detroit, Mich.; and Truax Air Guard Station, Madison, Wis..

The F-35, along with the F-22 stealth fighter jet, will replace practically every fixed wing combat aircraft in the United States’ military during the next 30 years, including Cold War-era aircraft such as the Air Force F-16 fighter, the Navy’s F/A-18 Hornet and the Marines’ EA-6B Prowler and AV-8B Harrier.

The new aircraft are scheduled to eventually replace the F-16s at Shaw Air Force Base – the largest F-16 wing in the country – as well as the F-16s at McEntire and the F/A-18s at Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort.

Beaufort already has received one training squadron of the F-35Bs – 16 aircraft. That number will eventually swell to two training squadrons and two or three squadrons available for deployment, a total of up to 88 jets, perhaps by 2025, Beaufort air station officials said.

McEntire, home of the 169th fighter wing “Swamp Foxes,” was considered the Midlands’ best shot at the jets, because the Air Force’s fifth and sixth locations for the jets will be Air National Guard units and the seventh will be a reserve unit. McEntire’s prospects have now been pushed back indefinitely.

Stefanec said that the McEntire F-16s are some of the Air Force’s newest, built in 1992 and 1993, and that figured into the new F-35 roll out.

McEntire “has a strong mission in the SEAD (suppression of enemy air defenses) and homeland defense missions,” she said. “Shaw and McEntire will be considered as future F-35 bases.”

Graham is a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee. He will be joined by U.S. Rep. Joe Wilson, R-Springdale, a member of the House Armed Services Committee.

No agenda or occasion was given for Goldfein’s visit to the Eastover base. It is listed only as a press availability.

The F-35 jets are called “fifth generation” because of their high level of stealth, high-performance airframes and advanced computers and avionics – as opposed to “fourth generation” fighters that are not stealthy.

The Pentagon has placed orders for 2,443 of the jets, which cost up to $100 million each depending on the model. It is the most expensive military weapons system in history.

Production of the planes has been plagued with delays, cost overruns and critics. According to the Government Accounting Office and reported by The New York Times, the program is seven years behind schedule.

Three models have been developed by Lockheed Martin for the three branches that fly them:

▪  The F-35A for the Air Force, the nimblest and least expensive model designed for take-offs from standard runways.

▪  The F-35B for the Marines, which has vertical and short runway take-off capability.

▪  The F-35C for the Navy, which has larger wings and is more rugged to handle the rigors of taking off and landing on aircraft carriers.

This story was originally published October 26, 2017 at 2:10 PM with the headline "McEntire SC Air Guard won’t be getting F-35 fighter jets ... for now."