Spain shelves plans to buy F-35 fighter jets

Spain has shelved plans to buy F-35 fighter jets, manufactured by US aerospace giant Lockheed Martin, El Pais newspaper reported on Wednesday, citing unidentified government sources.

1news.media informs, citing Reuters, the government had earmarked 6.25 billion euros ($7.24 billion) in its 2023 budget to buy new fighter jets.

But the Spanish government’s plan to spend most of the additional 10.5 billion euros for defense this year in Europe made it impossible to acquire US-made fighter jets, the newspaper reported.

Spain’s Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez announced plans earlier this year to increase spending on defense to meet the current NATO target of two percent of gross domestic product and later refused to raise spending to five percent during a summit in June.

Sanchez’s position was heavily criticized by US President Donald Trump, who threatened to impose additional tariffs on the country’s goods.