Boeing Says New Fighter in Development

Boeing Co. said Thursday that it is developing a versatile fighter jet for the 21st Century that could be used by three branches of the armed services and, if built, would put Boeing back in the lead of a major fighter plane program for the first time since the 1930s.

Boeing said the plane could be adapted for conventional Air Force use, for Navy aircraft carriers and for vertical takeoffs and landings by the Marine Corps.

“We envision this plane as a low-cost, lightweight aircraft that could replace many aircraft” used today, including Lockheed Corp.’s F-16, that will need replacing after 2010, said Peri Widener, a spokeswoman for Boeing’s military aircraft group.

Defense Secretary Les Aspin, in his recently completed “bottom-up review” of future Pentagon needs, urged various military branches to try to buy planes with mostly common components as a way to save taxpayer money.

It was mostly that report that prompted Boeing to go public with its proposed jet, which has been in development for two years, Widener said. She declined to reveal what Boeing has spent on the aircraft so far.

Whether the plane gets built is an open question, because the Air Force and Navy historically have failed to find a plane acceptable to both services. Future changes in the White House and in Pentagon priorities are other hurdles.

In order to make the plane adaptable and affordable, Boeing said it would use lightweight composite materials--now found in radar-evading stealth planes--and modular construction. That would enable different versions of the jet to come off the same assembly line, the company said.

The disclosure by Seattle-based Boeing, the world’s largest maker of passenger jets, caught some analysts off guard. But they said it is not unusual that Boeing would be working on such a plane, given its aviation expertise, financial resources and involvement on such current fighters as the Air Force’s stealth F-22.

“I would have been surprised had Boeing not had something under way for this future generation” of fighters, said Michael Rich, a defense specialist at Rand Corp., a Santa Monica think tank.

Boeing’s announcement also signals that the company will challenge Calabasas-based Lockheed and McDonnell Douglas Corp. as the primary builders of fighter planes in the future. Boeing is saying that “it wants to be No. 3 in the game,” said Richard Aboulafia, an analyst at the consulting firm Teal Group in Fairfax, Va.