The F-35 Stealth Fighter ‘Kill Switch’ No One Wants to Talk About

The F-35 Stealth Fighter ‘Kill Switch’ No One Wants to Talk About

The F-35 Lightning II has no kill switch — but Washington still retains enormous leverage over every foreign operator. The Joint Program Office and Lockheed Martin have both confirmed no hidden kill switch exists; building one would be antithetical to the Joint Strike Fighter program’s global partnership model. What the U.S. does control: spare parts, the Operational Data Integrated Network software backbone that replaced ALIS, and the Mission D…