urbanSTL

The U.S. Air Force awarded Boeing Co. a five-year contract to produce small diameter bombs (SDMs) at its facility in St. Charles.

Under the so-called "indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity" contract, the government can make purchases up to $2.2 billion at set prices over its five-year term. An initial $307 million order under the contract was finalized this week, according to a spokesman.

Six months after winning the first order of new F-15 fighter jets from the U.S. Air Force in nearly 20 years, Boeing’s modernized version of an aircraft introduced a half-century ago took off from St. Louis Lambert International Airport earlier this month.
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In July, the Air Force awarded its first contract for the updated fighter, a $1.2 billion contract for eight jets. The budget Congress passed in December included funding for an additional 12, and U.S. military plans call for as many as 144 in coming years.

“That certainly keeps the line healthy and producing until the end of the decade,” Kumar said.
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Boeing has boosted employment on the F-15 line to about 1,500 direct workers, Kumar said, up from about 1,100 two years ago, and adding about 100 in the last few months alone, as it ramps up to begin filling the U.S. Air Force order. Boeing employs nearly 16,000 people in the region, with about 12,100 in St. Louis County. Others are based out of a missile and munitions plant in St. Charles and a facility in Mascoutah.
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But the future is uncertain.

The Biden administration could change procurement plans. The Air Force could cut orders. There’s talk of a revived F-16 program, built by Lockheed Martin, or even a brand-new sixth-generation fighter, Aboulafia said.  And for some members of Congress — especially senators and representatives from Texas, where the F-35 is assembled — the F-15EX is a threat to F-35 orders.

Some Air Force officials say the renewed F-15 program is necessary to replace an aging fighter fleet and is complementary to the F-35 because it can carry a larger payload than the stealth fighter, according to the Congressional Research Service.

They may also see the F-15EX as a program that helps maintain Boeing’s St. Louis production facility as a critical component of the military-industrial base. Only Boeing’s St. Louis defense facility and Lockheed Martin’s Fort Worth, Texas, factory assemble fighter jets for the U.S. military.

Boeing announced Tuesday that it has begun assembling the U.S. Air Force's new  T-7A Red Hawk training jet, a program expected to keep production lines here busy into the next decade.

In September 2018, Boeing and partner Saab won a hotly contested $9.2 billion contract to build 351 of the jets for the Air Force. Boeing hopes that the jet could eventually be outfitted with weapons and sold to U.S. allies, and the company is in discussions with the U.S. Navy about that branch's potential adoption of the training jet.

Workers at Boeing's north St. Louis County campus will initially assemble about one fighter per month but will ramp up production to as many as four or five per month as the Air Force contract progresses.

Boeing employs nearly 16,000  people in the St. Louis area, with about 12,100 at its St. Louis County defense site.