Raytheon has won a $412 million contract to provide hundreds of advanced medium range air-to-air missiles to the Air Force and foreign partners, the Department of Defense announced May 28. Under the terms of the deal, the company will supply 98 AMRAAM AIM-120D missiles to USAF, along with associated training, test, and support equipment, and 213 AIM-120C-7 foreign military sales models and associated equipment to undisclosed nations. As of February, Congress had approved C-7 sales to Greece and Taiwan. The D model is said to have increased jam resistance in the face of adversary electronic attack systems as well as a two-way datalink and GPS-aided navigation.
The Air Force wants to pump more than $12 billion over the next five years into its new affordable long-range missiles program and recently asked industry to push the flights of some of those munitions beyond 1,200 miles.