Missile Defense & Weapons

The Philippines Air Force (PAF) is now expected to take delivery of its first Rafael Spyder surface-to-air missile (SAM) system earlier than planned.

As part of Reaction Engines’ continuing push to develop its pre-cooler technology for high-Mach aircraft, missiles and space access vehicles, the company has revealed it is midway through a U.S. Air Force-supported test program aimed at dramatically expanding the system’s performance envelope.

A new Northrop Grumman facility in West Virginia will be sized to deliver up to 600 strike missiles a year after opening in 2024, the company says on

A sprawling complex under arid mountains near the edge of Kirtland AFB here has a renewed life testing cutting-edge technology, more than 70 years after it was built in secret to protect the U.S. president in the event of a post-World War II disaster.

An entire wing of divested Northrop Grumman RQ-4 Global Hawks and some restricted airspace over northern Michigan may soon play a key role in a long-overdue revamp of U.S. hypersonic weapons testing.

A U.S. Space Force mission scheduled to launch June 30 on a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket will kick start a three-year experiment to test a missile warning and tracking satellite prototype.

The U.S. Army has identified a future ramjet-rocket version of the Precision Strike Missile as the long-term solution for the Mid-Range Capability system in the long-range precision fires arsenal.

The Canadian government has launched the definition phase of a project to field a mobile Ground-Based Air Defense system later in the decade.

Contractors are continuing to lay groundwork for their bids for the next U.S. national missile defense program, the Next Generation Interceptor.

Berlin wants to have an electronic attack and escort jamming capability ready before the end of the decade to meet a NATO commitment.

The U.S. Missile Defense Agency has narrowed a competition to build a hypersonic missile interceptor to Northrop Grumman and Raytheon, eliminating a bid by Lockheed Martin to enter the next stage of the Glide Phase Interceptor prototyping program.

A secret contract award to Israel Aerospace industries on June 13 starts a three-year program to field “Standoff In” capabilities.

Missile manufacturer MBDA has unveiled a ground-launched cruise-missile solution to a growing European demand for ground-based deep fires.

Israel Aerospace Industries says it has secured a “multimillion” deal to supply ELL-8222SB Scorpius-SP jammer pods to an unspecified Asian country.

China’s People’s Liberation Army has performed a ballistic-missile defense test, hitting a missile in its mid-course phase.

Trials will measure ability to handle applications such as a long-range artillery shell and a Mach 4 air-launched missile.

A new version of the Switchblade 600 will be demonstrated with artificial intelligence (AI) software that allows the loitering munition to automatically identify targets observed by a sensor.

AeroVironment expects a significant increase in demand for loitering munitions after a U.S. government decision to transfer Switchblade loitering munitions to Ukraine led to a wider export authorization for the armed flying systems.

The U.S. Air Force wants to hear from industry on how to sustain the Sentinel nuclear missile system, including its new re-entry vehicle.

A heat-seeking missile concept proposed by Diehl could feature a datalink to support beyond visual range, air-to-air missile intercepts.

Medium-range and surface-to-air versions of the AGM-179 Joint Air-to-Ground Missile (JAGM) are being developed internally.

NASA takes on UAP study; Three-way weapon competition; Gray Wolf development slows; AFRL building “virtual range” for directed energy

The Air Force Research Laboratory has granted a 10-year, $80 million contract to BlueHalo to build a system that models and simulates directed-energy weapons use in wargames.

Northrop Grumman and L3Harris have been selected to form a three-way competition with previously announced Lockheed Martin for a contract to develop the Stand-in Attack Weapon for the U.S. Air Force.

A lack of available aircraft and range time has delayed the testing of the GBU-53/B StormBreaker small-diameter bomb, with initial operational capability expected to slip, according to a new government assessment.