Swiss parliament greenlights lawmakers to approve purchase of F-35

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: Agencies
12 Sep 2022 22:31

Switzerland’s decision to buy the F-35A fighter jets has been mired in controversy as military neutrality is the central tenet of Swiss foreign policy.

Swiss parliament greenlights lawmakers to approve purchase of F-35

The Swiss parliamentary committee on security policy on Monday gave the green light to the purchase of 36 US-made F-35A fighter jets for the national army despite resistance from the country's opposition.

"The committee of the National Council [the lower house of the Swiss parliament] has taken into account the report of the Control Committee of the National Council and believes that this report does not contain any elements that question the assessment procedure. Therefore, it requests the Council to agree on the purchase of 36 F-35A fighter jets by 17 votes to eight," the parliament said in a statement.

According to the committee, the Swiss authorities had no other choice but to buy this type of jet as it had shown the best results in terms of effectiveness and costs among the four types of fighter jets the government had assessed.

The purchase of 36 F-35A fighter jets will be further discussed by the lower house of the Swiss parliament on September 15.

In 2021, Switzerland chose the US-made F-35A fighters for the army's needs. The deal provides for the acquisition of 36 fighter jets worth over $6 billion. The Swiss government said F-35s had "the best performance" at a "low price."

The Social Democratic Party of Switzerland and the Green Party opposed the deal by launching the Stop F-35 initiative and started collecting signatures to trigger the referendum. The initiative was signed by 120,000 people before being handed over to the government.

Wir haben die #StopF35 Initiative nach weniger als einem Jahr erfolgreich eingereicht! Wir danken allen herzlich für ihre tatkräftige Mithilfe pic.twitter.com/DfDNJbk4uN
— Stop F-35 (@StopF35) August 16, 2022

In late August, the Swiss government announced the impossibility of holding a referendum on the issue before the expiry of the US sales offer on March 31, 2023. The administration asserted that delaying the replacement of the fleet's 55 ailing planes would have detrimental effects on the country's security.

In light of growing tensions with Moscow, some EU states have already begun to ready themselvse militarily.

On September 7, Polish Deputy Defence Minister Marcin Ociepa said that Poland is seeing serious risks of war with Russia within 3 to 10 years from now, and should profit from the remaining timespan to ready its military forces.

While NATO, in June, conducted military drills coinciding with the decision to increase troop presence in Europe to 300,000, Russia has also been conducting military drills in the baltic sea.

Belarussian authorities likewise announced on September 8 that Belarusian armed forces have begun military drills near the Polish border.

The country started planning the maneuvers after President Alexander Lukashenko accused in July NATO of preparing for a war in Eastern Europe, citing increased activity by the military alliance.