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Should the F-117 stealth fighter be transferred to Israel? Part Two: The solution
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Part Two continues with a potential partial solution:
One quick solution the United States might undertake to immediately restore Israel’s undisputed qualitative edge in the airpower arena in the near term would be to transfer the USAF’s recently retired F117 stealth fighters to the IDF. It will not restore the Israeli advantage over Arab or Iranian operated 4th generation fighters, but it would address the issue of defeating advanced integrated air defense systems to a large extent- weapons systems that will eventually be fielded in the region (if they have not been already). That being said, only an air to air capable 5th generation fighter such as the F-35 or F-22 can address the threat of enemy fighters, but for the time being, the transfer of the F-117 Night Hawk stealth fighter is a good temporary solution.
While this idea may seem sacrilegious to many, the transfer of the F-117 is not a huge step. The United States has already agreed to export to Israel the far more advanced and infinitely more capable F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter- however the F-35 will not be available to the IDF until 2014 at the earliest. The F-35 is still in developmental flight testing and will not be operational for quite sometime. As such, the transfer of the F-117 would provide an immediate boost to Israeli capabilities and would signal a firm US commitment to Israeli security by the Obama Administration.
The F-117 has been replaced in US service by Lockheed Martin’s outstanding F-22A Raptor air dominance fighter with the surviving F-117 aircraft having been relegated to mothballs in the hangars in Tonopah, Nevada, where they were once based. However, the aging strike aircraft are still formidable warplanes. With the introduction of the Raptor, they represent a redundant capability during a time when the USAF has no money to spare.
Being a design that dates back into the 70s, the F-117 is not a particularly advanced aircraft having largely been built from off the shelf components taken from other aircraft. Its faceted design has long since been rendered obsolete by modern computer aided design technologies. Whatever classified technologies that remain onboard the aircraft- which the United States needs to protect- can probably be safely removed prior to any transfer of the aircraft. Along with security arrangements and end-user monitoring negotiated with Israel, this would protect US technology from being passed on to third parties such as China.
With the F-117 in already in storage, a program to transfer the aircraft to the IDF could begin in short order. This would bridge the stealth gap for the IDF until the arrival of the first 25 stealthy multi-role F-35s sometime during the next decade. In fact, the F-117 aircraft might enable the IDF to purchase fewer F-35s while maintaining a significant stealthy long range strike capability. The transfer of the F-117s to Israel for a nominal cost would significantly bolster Israeli capabilities without the full purchase of the currently planned 75 F-35 JSF aircraft for the IDF- which may be too expensive for Israel with the level of customization requested by the IDF (if in fact such modifications are feasible).
Even with the threats that surround Israel, a plane such as the F-22 Raptor is more capability for a much higher cost than is required by the IDF. More importantly, the F-22 was never built for export, it has none of the anti-tamper devices designed to protect sensitive American technologies built into its avionics from theft, duplication, or transfer to a third party- which is critical given the Israeli record on such matters.
Installing such technologies to the Raptor would boost the F-22’s already high cost of 130+ million dollars per unit to somewhere in the realm of 250+ million dollars per plane and may not completely guarantee the security of the aircraft’s sensitive avionics. Additionally, while the Raptor has no equal in the air dominance role- it has rather limited air to ground capabilities even with the scheduled integration of the Increment 3.2 software package in 2011.
The Raptor currently only has the capability to carry two internal 1000 lbs JDAMs. In the future however (around 2011), when it will be able to carry eight SDBs (Small Diameter Bomb) and include a SAR (Synthetic Aperture Radar) radar mapping capability, it will still be less capable in the strike role and have a shorter ranger than the F-35. Granted is the fact that the Raptor will be more survivable due to it’s much greater altitude and speed. Selling the Raptor to Israel would also send a very negative signal to America’s Arab allies in addition to the technology security issues highlighted earlier. Granted also is that transferring the F-117 will not win us any popularity contests either, but it would allow Israel to deal with Iran without direct US intervention.
In short, America’s long standing policy towards Israel has been to guarantee that nations’ qualitative military edge over its largely hostile neighbours. This edge has recently been diminished by the proliferation of new and advanced weapons from the Russians, Europeans and the United States into the theatre. In order to restore the potential capabilities gap in long range strike in a high threat environment that is likely to develop in the area in the near future prior to the arrival of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, the United States should supply surplus F-117 stealth aircraft to Israel.
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