ISLAMABAD (Kashmir English): Pakistan is set to receive AIM-120 Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missiles (AMRAAM), an arms contract notified by the United States Department of War (DoW) said.
The contract lists Pakistan among the buyers for AMRAAM, which will be sold by Raytheon, a leading US defence contractor, following a modification in the firm’s contract.
With this, Pakistan Air Force (PAF) inches closer to receiving additional missile stocks under United States President Donald Trump’s administration.
According to the US DoW, Raytheon was given a modification (P00026) of over $41.6 million on a “previously awarded contract (FA8675-23-C-0037)” to “firm-fixed-price” for the production of the missile’s C8 and D3 variants.
It added that the modification raises the total cumulative face value of the contract to $2.5 billion from $2.47bn.
“This contract involves foreign military sales to United Kingdom, Poland, Pakistan, Germany, Finland, Australia, Romania, Qatar, Oman, Korea, Greece, Switzerland, Portugal, Singapore, Netherlands, Czech Republic, Japan, Slovakia, Denmark, Canada, Belgium, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Italy, Norway, Spain, Kuwait, Finland, Sweden, Taiwan, Lithuania, Isreal, Bulgaria, Hungary, and Turkey,” the notification added.
It adds that work on the order is expected to be completed by the end of May 2030.
Although it remains unclear as to exactly how many, if any, new AMRAAM missiles will be delivered to Pakistan, the development has triggered speculation about potential upgrades to the Pakistan Air Force’s F-16 fleet.
According to the defence publication Quwa, the AIM-120C8 is the export version of the AIM-120D, the main AMRAAM variant in US service. The PAF currently operates the earlier C5 variant, 500 of which were acquired alongside its latest Block 52 F-16s in 2010.
