F-35 - The Italian Perspective

News from Italy today.

ROME - The new Minister of Defence, Elisabetta Trenta, announced that Italy “will no longer be buying any F-35 planes” in an interview on the La7 Omnibus program on Friday.

“We have always been critics of the program and not afraid to hide it”, wrote the Minister on Facebook in a post where she shared the interview. “We will no longer invest in new fighter planes, and as for the contracts which have already been signed by the previous executive, we are carrying out a careful evaluation that exclusively takes into account the national interest.”


The only reason for keeping the current contracts would be because “we could find that terminating the contracts costs more than maintaining them. Around the F-35 there is technological activity, important research and of course employment which would be cut in turn. This is why we have to take care with our evaluation.”

http://www.italianinsider.it/?q=node/6962

I watch LA7 very often, that simply never happends.

She infact confirmed Italy commitment to the JSF only few days ago.

Fake news.

If, we had a dollar for every time Italy said they would leave the F-35 Program. All of the members could retire.....

Errrr no?

M5S and some noise from the right party, other than that nothing really.

F35 never been in discussion, not even under Monti's legislature.

Our defense minister said it clearly: Leonardo would go ham with legal actions.

The M5S party is the largest in the current governing coalition and some individual members have some non-traditional defense policy views. In addition to not liking the F-35, this article mentions allowing military members to join a labor union or "syndicate".

http://www.italianinsider.it/?q=node/5355

Here is the current defense minister, who is said to be a member of the M5S party

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elisabetta_Trenta

Nutshell, thanks for clarifying what might be incorrect translations of what the defense minister said in an interview about the F-35.