An Agency of the U.S. Department of defense for military cooperation (Defense Security Cooperation Agency DSCA) 3 Feb 2022 has sent to Congress a notification about the planned upcoming sale Jordan line American intergovernmental program, foreign military sales Foreign Military Sales (FMS) 16 fighter Lockheed Martin F-16V Block 70 new buildings, including 12 single F-16C Block 70 and four double F-16D Block 70. This delivery is approved by the U.S. Department of State. The total cost of the proposed delivery will be $4.21 billion, including training and technical support packages, and a certain amount of air-to-surface guided weapons.
Lockheed Martin F-16A/B Fighting Falcon fighters of the Jordanian Air Force (c) AFP
According to the notification, among other things, the delivery will include 21 sets of AN/APG-83 Scalable Agile Beam Radars (SABR) with AFAR (including five spare ones), six AN/AAQ-33 Sniper Advanced Targeting Pods (ATP) outboard navigation and targeting containers, 100 sets of GBU-31 JDAM 2000 lb guided aerial bombs, 102 sets of GBU-54 Laser JDAM 500 lb guided aerial bombs, 100 sets of GBU-10 Paveway II guided aerial bombs of 2000 lb caliber, 100 sets of EGBU-49 Enhanced Paveway II (EP II) guided aerial bombs of 500 lb caliber.
Jordan, thus, in the case of a contract, will become the sixth recipient of new-built F-16V fighters, after Bahrain, Morocco, Bulgaria, Slovakia and Taiwan. In addition, the delivery of the new-built F-16V is also possible in Turkey. It should be noted that, according to recent reports, the actual deliveries of the new-built F-16V from the production line of the Lockheed Martin Corporation in Grenville will begin only in 2024.
From 1997 to 2017, the Jordanian Air Force received a total of 79 F-16A/B aircraft in service, of which 33 were delivered from the presence of the US Air Force, and 46 from the presence of the Belgian and Dutch Air Forces. In 2014, Jordan sold 13 of the F-16A/B fighters previously received from the United States to Pakistan. Currently, the Jordanian Air Force consists of three squadrons (1st, 2nd and 6th) with a maximum of 59 F-16A/B fighters, previously upgraded according to the MLU variant.
