
Final operational test and planning for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter has been pushed back to mid-2018, about a year later than expected, because of ongoing developmental delays with the aircraft’s final software iteration.The Pentagon had targeted mid-2017 for operational test and evaluation of the aircraft, “but it’s clear we are not going to make that,” Frank Kendall, the Pentagon’s chief weapon buyer, said May 24. Kendall, Navy acquisition chief Sean Stackley and F-35 Joint Program Office head Air Force…