The United Kingdom’s Ministry of Defence (MoD) confirmed that UK F-35 jets intercepted a Russian Tupolev Tu-142 “Bear-F” maritime patrol aircraft after it repeatedly approached the HMS Prince of Wales carrier strike group in the Norwegian Sea.
F-35
The Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor remains one of the world’s most capable air superiority fighters, but its pilots do not use the advanced Helmet Mounted Display System (HMDS) that has become a defining feature of the newer F-35 Lightning II.
Lockheed Martin has received a contract modification worth approximately $74.2 million to finalise the integration of European-developed weapons onto F-35 fighter aircraft operated by the United Kingdom and Italy.
US lawmakers revive the F-35 pitch to Spain after the FCAS collapse, as Madrid weighs Turkey’s KAAN fighter instead.
The US Marine Corps has accepted 6 F-35B jets without radars, fitting ballast in the nose cones to maintain weight and balance. A delayed Northrop Grumman AN/APG-85 radar is the cause, and the Air Force and Navy will face the same situation later this year.
The Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) has completed a landmark weapons testing milestone on the F-35A Lightning II, conducting the first joint Weapon Fill Measurement Vehicle (WFMV) flight test in partnership with the United States Air Force.
Poland welcomes its first F-35A Husarz fighters into service, becoming NATO’s first eastern flank fifth-gen operator.
The US Air Force’s F-35A recorded the highest full mission-capable rate among all F-35 variants in fiscal 2025, yet only 28.5 percent of the jets could perform all assigned missions at any given time, according to a new Government Accountability Office (GAO) report.
USAF F-35A jets arrive at Misawa Air Base in Japan, taking over the Wild Weasel mission for the 35th Fighter Wing.
Unlike older aircraft that expected close-range dogfights, these next-generation jets are designed to destroy threats from long distances while remaining undetected.