The Pentagon has awarded Lockheed Martin an US$879 million contract to supply weapons equipment for the F-35 Lightning II fighter fleet.
According to information from Defence Blog, the agreement, announced by the Naval Air Systems Command on May 18, covers essential components that allow the aircraft to deploy missiles and bombs in combat.
The package includes missile launchers, bomb racks, weapon systems, wing pylons and adapter hardware used across the three versions of the F-35 operated by the United States Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps, as well as aircraft intended for partner countries and foreign customers. Without these systems, the fighter would not be able to launch weapons, regardless of its sensors and stealth capabilities.
The contract covers production Lots 18 and 19 of the F-35 program, currently being manufactured at Lockheed Martin’s facility in Fort Worth, Texas. Work is expected to be completed by February 2030. The two lots are part of a larger agreement signed in September 2025 for the production of up to 296 aircraft, under a contract valued at around US$24.3 billion.
More than half of the value of this new contract will be financed by international customers. Approximately US$472.8 million corresponds to orders from program partner countries and nations that acquired the F-35 through the US government’s Foreign Military Sales (FMS) system.
A key part of the contract involves integrating new capabilities from the Block 4 standard, a broad modernization package for the F-35 that includes more than 80 classified and unclassified upgrades. Among them is the “Sidekick” system, developed by Lockheed Martin itself, which increases the fighter’s internal capacity from four to six air-to-air missiles without compromising the aircraft’s stealth characteristics.
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