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| F-16 Block 70[Courtesy: USAF] |
Lockheed Martin has received a massive, $ 1.12 billion contract from the US government to produce 16 advanced F-16 Block 70 fighting falcons for Bahrain. The undefined contract means that The Royal Bahrainian Air Force will become the first operator of the most advanced, incapable version of the F-16 ever designed.
The latest version of the F-16, officially dubbed the F-16 Block 70 is a thoroughly modern fighter jet. The Original F-16 was introduced in the 1970s, but the new version of this jet is a different beast thanks to the advanced avionics. F-16 Block 70 fighter jet can be deployed in the suppression of enemy air defenses missions, air to ground, air to air combat, deep interdiction and maritime interdiction missions. The aircraft features airborne mission role change capability and can detect and track time-critical hard to find targets in all weather conditions. It also reduces operational costs for the users.
Moreover, unlike the previous versions of the F-16 which were built in Fort Worth, Texas, USA their new vipers are to be manufactured in Greenville, South Carolina, USA. With the production of Lockheed Martin's stealthy new F-35 Joint Strike Fighter ramping up while Fighting Falcon production is ramping down, the company was compelled to move the F-16 production line to a smaller plant that could handle lower volumes. Nonetheless, the move represents a new beginning for the F-16 which is still expected to generate sales over the coming years.
"We value our long-standing relationship with The Kingdom Of Bahrain and look forward to beginning production activities on their first Block 70 aircraft at our facility in Greenville."Susan Oates, the vice president of Lockheed Martin's F-16 program said to the US Air Force news article.
The sale highlights the significance of the growing demand we see for new production F-16s around the globe.
Lockheed Martin has invested significantly in the new South Carolina F-16 plant the company expects that the F-16 production at the site will create somewhere between the 150 and 200 new jobs in Greenville. The company also notes that the F-16 production supports hundreds of US-based Lockheed Martin engineering procurement, sustainment, and customer support jobs and thousands of US supplier jobs. Indeed, 450 US suppliers in 42 states in the US currently support the F-16 supply chain. Lockheed Martin has good reason to be optimistic about further F-16 sales, the Block 70 version of the venerable F-16 is a capable warplane by any measure and draws much of its technology from its more advanced F-35 stablemate. But the currently Corona pandemic may affect the whole fighter jet as well as F-16 production and further orders.
While the F-35 is much more advanced and capable fighter jet than any version of the F-16, not every country needs Joint Strike Fighter or is even cleared to receive this stealth fighter. In those situations, the F-16 might be the most capable fighter aircraft available to those US allies. At the core of the F-16 Block 70 is the Northrop Grumman APG 83 AESA (Active Electronically Scanned Array) radar which is based on technology from the F-22 Raptor and the F-35 and can track 20 targets simultaneously. The radar can also generate one-foot resolution synthetic aperture radar maps and as arranged greater than 160 nautical miles against ground targets.
The jet also has the new state of the art electronic warfare system. To push the aircraft around the sky the Lockheed says the new Block 70 jets features an advanced engine while they didn't specify which engine. Lockheed Martine also boasts about the F-16V's capability to carry a vast arsenal of weapons. The company has more than 36 years of weapon integration experience with the F-16 the company states no other organizations can match this weapons integration experience in concert with the USAF and multiple F-16 foreign military sales customers.
The F-16 will still be flying for decades to come. There are still 3,000 operational F-16s flyings around the world in more than 25 different air forces. At least jets will have to be upgraded to the Block 70 standard as time goes on. The future is still bright for the F-16.
Source:
United States Air Force, Lockheed Martin, USAF News
The author is a student at Department of Criminology, University Of Dhaka.
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