U.S.-Japan Codevelopment

Congress has been concerned about the transfer of U.S. technology to Japan through the FS-X codevelopment program, under which the United States and Japan will jointly develop a fighter aircraft and six prototypes. This report looks at (1) the program's status, including cost issues and technology flow to the United States; (2) U.S. government and contractor controls over the release of F-16 technical data to Japan; and (3) the U.S. government's export licensing process for reviewing and approving the release of other FS-X military items to Japan.

GAO found that: (1) FS-X development costs have increased by about 70 percent from the initial 1987 estimate of $1.1 billion, due in large part to aircraft design and configuration changes; (2) Japanese government officials refused to provide information on their FS-X cost estimates; (3) the Air Force estimates that both U.S. and Japanese contractor cost estimates have increased substantially, and further increases are likely; (4) Japanese FS-X technology is not always readily available to the United States; (5) the U.S. government is seeking access to Japan's four non-derived technologies, but has been able to collect a significant amount of data on only one non-derived technology, the FS-X radar; (6) the United States sufficiently controls the release of F-16-related critical technical data to Japan, although there have been isolated instances where documents were released without approval; (7) there were 75 approved FS-X-related munitions licenses, which allowed U.S. firms to market military items to Japan for the FS-X program; and (8) the Air Force has taken steps to consistently include its F-16 System Program Office as part of the FS-X export license review process.