With praise for Boeing CEO, Trump hints at jet deal

President Donald Trump suggested that a larger purchase of Boeing’s F/A-18 Super Hornet may be in the offing, using a tour of the planemaker’s South Carolina factory to send a message to rival defense contractor Lockheed Martin.

“We are looking seriously at a big order,” Trump said Friday of the fighter jet, with another Boeing plane, the newest 787 Dreamliner, looming in the background. “I think we may get there.”

The Defense Department is studying the capabilities of the Super Hornet, designed in the 1990s, against those of Lockheed’s F-35, which is still in development even as it’s being produced. Trump indicated that price differences between the two fighters could sway the Pentagon to replace some orders for the F-35, which the president has criticised for cost overruns and delays, with more purchases of the Boeing jet.

“If the price doesn’t come down, we would,” Trump told reporters. “The F-18’s a great plane and now put a stealth component onto it.” Boeing rose 1.1 per cent to $172.71 at the close in New York, the second-largest gain on the Dow Jones Industrial Average.

Reporters earlier spotted White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus holding a brochure for the F/A-18 XT, a proposed Super Hornet upgrade that could serve as a stand-in as Lockheed ramps up production of the F-35, the Pentagon’s costliest weapons system. Part of the challenge for Lockheed was to create technologies to serve the very different needs of the US Air Force, Marines and Navy.

Defense Secretary James Mattis ordered a review of whether upgraded Super Hornets could provide a less costly alternative for the Navy’s version of the the F-35, which isn’t due to become operational until 2019.