F-35: oversight committee criticizes government over talks with Washington

No fixed price for the 36 F-35A fighter jets was ever agreed between Bern and Washington. That is the conclusion of a 95-page report by the National Council's Control Committee (CdG-N), which sharply criticizes the Federal Department of Defense (DDPS) and the Federal Council over how the negotiations with the United States were handled.

According to the Committee, the Department and the government should not have assumed that a fixed lump-sum price had been agreed. That price, the report states, was never the subject of a contractual agreement, even though a note had suggested otherwise. The CdG-N says it cannot understand why the DDPS defended this figure so firmly before Parliament.

The criticism also concerns how the negotiations were conducted. The Department did not direct them closely enough, the report says, and the flow of information was inadequate. Before talks with the United States began, a clearly defined negotiating mandate was missing, a gap the Committee considers particularly problematic. The talks were followed by a very narrow circle of people, and at some stages, the Committee writes, even the dual-control principle, the most basic form of oversight, was absent.

The role of Amherd and Savic

The report also examines the role of former defense minister Viola Amherd, who had backed the fixed-price thesis, and that of the former head of the Air2030 project, Darko Savic. Both left their posts in spring 2025, before the scale of the extra costs became clear.

In 2020, voters approved a maximum outlay of six billion francs for the purchase of the 36 F-35A jets. In 2025 it emerged that the price Bern had treated as fixed was not actually guaranteed by the United States. At the end of June last year, the Confederation estimated extra costs of between 650 million and 1.3 billion francs.

Faced with the cost increase, the Federal Council decided to reduce the number of jets to be purchased from 36 to about 30. Covering part of the extra costs still requires an additional credit of 394 million francs, which Parliament has yet to examine.

The case raises questions about oversight of military procurement and about the internal control mechanisms at the Defense Department meant to ensure that spending commitments of this size are verified before being presented to Parliament and to taxpayers.