The Pentagon announced approval of a $3.5 billion contract to produce thousands of AIM-120 Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missiles (AMRAAM) on Thursday for a number of nations – with Ukraine included.
The AMRAAM is a beyond-visual-range (BVR) and within-visual-range (WVR) active radar air-to-air missile for Ukraine’s F-16 fleet that Kyiv received from its Western allies.
The Pentagon’s Thursday press release noted that the contract was awarded to arms maker Raytheon to produce an unspecified number of AMRAAMs to be delivered by mid-to-late 2031.
“Raytheon, Division of Raytheon Technologies Corp., Tucson, Arizona, was awarded a not-to-exceed $3,500,000,000 firm-fixed-price incentive, undefinitized contract action for Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile (AMRAAM) Production Lots 39 and 40,” it states.
Incidentally, the Raytheon facility for producing the AIM-120 is located at the Tucson International Airport, which includes the Morris Air National Guard Base and the 162nd Wing where Ukrainian Air Force pilots have been receiving transition training to fly the F-16.
The $3.5 billion contract includes “the production of AMRAAM missiles, AMRAAM Telemetry System, initial and field spares, and other production engineering support activities” – and thus the total number of missiles to be made is unclear.
But judging by the $386,000 unit cost for each AIM-120 AMRAAM cited by the US Air Force, the total production via the contract is estimated to reach thousands by 2031.
Ukraine was among the nearly two dozen countries listed as recipients via Foreign Military Sales (FMS), alongside countries such as the UK, Australia, Canada, Denmark, Israel and Taiwan.
It is unclear when the FMS contract with Ukraine was concluded for the AMRAAMs.
Thursday’s update follows a recent U-turn in the Trump administration’s US policy on Ukraine, with President Donald Trump pledging to resume arms sales and military deliveries to Kyiv after his ceasefire proposals were snubbed by Moscow.
As for AMRAAMs, the missiles are a core air-to-air weapon in the arsenal of the NATO-standard aircraft Kyiv received from its Western partners, as they are incompatible with the radars, data links, and other avionics of Soviet-legacy aircraft previously fielded by Kyiv.
The air-to-air missiles have already been employed by Kyiv’s newly acquired F-16 fleet.
In June, a Ukrainian F-16 was seen shooting down a Russian Su-35 fighter-bomber over Russian territory using a long-range AMRAAM.
In February, a Ukrainian F-16 could be seen carrying two AMRAAMs on its wingtips, along with two AIM-9 Sidewinders and air-to-surface ordnance on wing pylons during a ground attack sortie in early February, 2025.