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The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is the most successful and widely adopted fifth-generation fighter, with nearly 1,300 in service globally. The United States military now operates approximately 850 of the multirole stealth fighters, with the United States Air Force being the largest single operator.
However, since its introduction more than a decade ago, the Department of Defense has faced intense criticism over its unprecedented costs, its persistent software delays, and most notably its low operational readiness rates. The current mission readiness rate across the U.S. military fleet sits at just 44%, and the full mission-capable rate fell to just 25%, as the Government Accountability Office warned earlier this year.
The problem with the jet may have gotten so bad that this week, the Pentagon took the unique stance of barring the GAO’s newest report on the F-35 Lightning II.
Bloomberg first reported on Wednesday that the “F-35 JOINT STRIKE FIGHTER: Update on Production and Modernization Efforts” from the government watchdog, which is mandated by Congress and issued annually, won’t be publicly released.
“The report was reviewed by the Department of Defense and is marked CONTROLLED UNCLASSIFIED INFORMATION and there is not currently a plan for public release,” a GAO Office of Public Affairs spokesperson confirmed in an email. Key lawmakers will still have access to the report, but not all lawmakers will receive the full, unredacted version.
The Pentagon declined to comment.
CUI Explained
Controlled Unclassified Information is, as the name suggests, unclassified information the United States government creates or possesses that requires safeguarding or dissemination controls limiting its distribution to those with a lawful government purpose. CUI may not be released to the public absent a further review.
The DoD CUI program, which was established through Executive Order 13556, standardized the safeguarding of information across multiple categories.
It is also broken down into two tiers.
CUI Basic, the default tier, requires standard safeguarding and handling uniformly across the government. CUI Specified requires more restrictive, specialized handling and dissemination controls dedicated by the specific agency.
It is unclear why this report, which is an update to past reports on the F-35 fighter, received the CUI designation.
“This is part of a larger conversation happening across government about Controlled Unclassified Information. CUI is an important tool for protecting sensitive data, but inconsistent application has also become a source of serious frustration,” explained Lindy Kyzer, vice president for content at ClearanceJobs.com, the largest career site for individuals with active federal security clearance.
“If the designation is used so broadly that it prevents independent review of major acquisition programs, policymakers should ask whether the system is being applied as intended,” Kyzer wrote in an email. “CUI, by its definition, is unclassified. If the government has specific reasons to keep that information protected, it’s certainly within its rights to do so.”
Removal Of Public Scrutiny
This is not the first time that the Pentagon has blocked the release of a GAO or other watchdog report. During the Biden administration, the DoD censored several GAO reports, including restricting a 2023 review that criticized the construction schedule reliability for nuclear-armed Columbia-class ballistic missile submarines.
However, this marked the first time in more than 20 years that the watchdog’s annual acquisition review for the stealth fighter was entirely barred from public release.
The Pentagon’s decision to restrict public access to a GAO report on the F-35 deserves serious concern because it removes independent scrutiny from the largest and most expensive weapons program in American history at the very moment when that scrutiny carries the greatest value, warned geopolitical analyst Irina Tsukerman, president of threat assessment firm Scarab Rising.
“The aircraft has absorbed decades of funding while repeatedly missing targets for cost, delivery, software integration, maintenance, readiness, spare parts, and modernization, and the public has every reason to examine whether those problems are improving, worsening, or simply being repackaged through revised expectations,” Tsukerman wrote in an email.
It is also noteworthy that even members of Congress won’t have access to the full version. Only those on four congressional defense committees, including the House Armed Services Committee, the Senate Armed Services Committee, the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense, and the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense, received the report.
“Committee access creates a narrow channel of oversight because members may face restrictions on citing detailed findings during hearings, challenging Pentagon claims with precise figures, or building wider congressional pressure for corrective action. The agency under review has therefore confined the debate to a small group of officials operating under controls that the same agency helped impose,” explained Tsukerman.
CUI Or CYA?
The CUI designation gives the Pentagon wide room to manage what leaves the building because CUI covers unclassified material that receives special handling under federal law, regulation or policy.
There are legitimate applications for a CUI designation, which include technical vulnerabilities, proprietary contractor data, supply-chain weaknesses, cybersecurity information and weapons capabilities. However, its breadth also allows agencies to sweep politically damaging or institutionally embarrassing material into restricted channels without invoking the heavier standards associated with formal classification.
“By controlling access to the report, the Pentagon gains greater control over the public narrative surrounding the program office, the contractor, and future budget requests,” suggested Tsukerman.
In essence, the American taxpayer is now being asked to trust the judgment of the institution whose performance the report was designed to evaluate, even though they cannot inspect the evidence, assess the scope of the restrictions, or determine whether ordinary cost and performance data were bundled together with genuinely sensitive material.
“That arrangement weakens the independence of the oversight process and makes accountability increasingly dependent on the willingness of a small number of lawmakers to challenge the department behind closed doors,” added Tsukerman.
There is also a great danger that this could set a precedent that spreads quickly across the defense establishment. Nearly every major weapons program combines sensitive operational details with information about costs, delays, test failures, contractor performance, unrealistic schedules and poor management.
Tsukerman further warned that high-profile programs across the defense industrial base could all receive similar treatment.
“Once agencies learn that placing restricted material alongside embarrassing program data can remove an entire report from public view, they gain a powerful incentive to structure future reports in exactly that way,” Tsukerman continued.
Without knowing what is in the report, it is impossible to know why it was barred from public release.
“I hope this information was designated as CUI and remains unreleased for a good security reason, and I’ll give the government the benefit of the doubt in not releasing the full report,” added Kyzer. “But that shouldn’t shield them from transparency and accountability. CUI should never be CYA.”
Calls For Release
There are already legitimate concerns that the move to employ the CUI designation on the report is the latest attempt to curtail the role that government regulators play.
A June 2026 GAO report found that congressional watchdogs were routinely denied access to meetings and necessary program data, sidelining oversight of Special Operations Forces acquisitions.
“Congress should require a redacted public version, demand a detailed explanation of every CUI designation applied, and establish a firm deadline for release,” said Tsukerman.
She added that the GAO should also state how much of the report the Pentagon restricted, which portions its auditors believed could be released, and whether the agency agreed with the scope of the department’s claims. “Future defense legislation should require public summaries of congressionally mandated acquisition reviews that preserve aggregate data on cost, schedule, readiness, contractor performance, and recommendations after genuinely sensitive operational details have been removed.” %!s(
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