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| Lockheed Martin F-35 fighter jet |
By Jun Ji-hye
The failure to receive key technologies from Lockheed Martin for the KF-X project to locally develop fighter jets by 2025 has underscored the nation's heavy dependence on United States weapons, analysts said Tuesday.
For now, the continuation of the 8.5 trillion won project as scheduled seems almost impossible because the U.S. government refused to allow Lockheed Martin to hand over four core technologies related to the F-35 stealth fighter to Korea.
The transfer of a total of 25 technologies including the four -- active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar, infrared search and track (IRST), electronic optics targeting pod (EOTGP) and RF jammer -- was agreed as an offset program when Korea signed a 7.3 trillion won deal with Lockheed in September last year to buy 40 F-35s.
Kim Dae-young, a senior research fellow at the Korea Defense and Security Forum, said, "What is happening now was predictable from the beginning. The government was too complacent because it has relied on U.S. technologies and did not make efforts to develop its own."
Kim said Korea is compared to its neighboring country Japan that has accumulated its own technologies and is developing its own stealth fighter, ATD-X.
The absence of the technologies has forced the Korean government to beg for something, even though it has paid an astronomical amount of money to the U.S. to buy the F-35.
As for the KF-X project, Defense Minister Han Min-koo sent a letter to his U.S. counterpart last month to ask for cooperation in the smooth transfer of the remaining 21 technologies from Lockheed. Officials said that Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se also plans to ask for cooperation from his U.S. counterpart soon.
However, a source familiar with the matter said, "The transfer of the remaining 21 technologies is uncertain too."
Rep. Ahn Gyu-baek of the main opposition New Politics Alliance for Democracy (NPAD) said during a parliamentary audit last week, "The U.S. government's approval of the export of the 21 technologies has also been delayed."
Despite the dismissive attitude and unfair treatment to a "customer" that has paid a lot of money, U.S. weapons systems have dominated the nation's defense environment since the 1970s.
According to a report from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, a Swedish think tank on security affairs, 80 percent of weapons that Korea imported from 2008 to 2013 were produced in the U.S.
The Army's tactical missile systems was made by Lockheed, while the Air Force's F-15Ks and Peace Eye early warning and control aircraft were produced by another U.S. defense giant Boeing.
Such domination is expected to continue for the time being.
The DAPA is currently conducting another negotiation with Lockheed on the Air Force project to upgrade its KF-16 fleet after the initial contract worth 1.75 trillion won with multinational company BAE Systems was canceled.
In order to complete the Korea air and missile defense and the kill chain preemptive strike systems, Seoul also needs to import Lockheed's PAC-3 antiballistic missiles and Northrop Grumman's Global Hawk very-high-altitude unmanned aerial vehicle.
The terminal high altitude area defense, which the U.S. is hoping to deploy on the Korean Peninsula, is also made by Lockheed.
Military officials often cite the interoperability with the existing systems as to why Korea has depended on the U.S. weapons.
"Dependence on U.S. weapon systems originates from a number of complicated situations such as division and tension between the two Koreas, the Seoul-Washington alliance, pressure from the U.S., and the lack of domestic technologies," said a military official on condition of anonymity.
But experts say overdependence on Washington could weaken the nation's military independence and result in economic losses if the nation continues to be dragged by the U.S. during the process to purchase weapons.
"The government should refrain from being hasty to produce tangible results in a short period of time, and create a long-term road map to develop domestic technologies because not only the U.S. but most countries are reluctant to transfer their technology," said Kim.
Follow Jun Ji-hye on Twitter @TheKopJihye
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