Pentagon Arms F-35 With "Breakthrough" Stormbreaker Attack Bomb
The Stormbreaker bomb is capable of tracking and destroying moving targets in all kinds of weather conditions from ranges as far as 40-nautical miles.
KRIS OSBORN, WARRIOR MAVEN - CENTER FOR MILITARY MODERNIZATIONJAN 4, 2024
By Kris Osborn, President, Center for Military Modernization
The US Air Force is arming its entire fleet of F-35s with the cutting edge Stormbreaker bomb capable of tracking and destroying moving targets in all kinds of weather conditions from ranges as far as 40-nautical miles.
In development for years, the now operational Stormbreaker arms the F-15E and F/A-18 and is currently testing on all three variants of F-35s. Beginning as the Small Diameter Bomb II, the Stormbreaker has been a pioneering and ground-breaking, air-launched weapon engineered with a “tri-mode” seeker enabling it to track targets with infrared, laser and millimeter wave technology. The weapon is also one of the early iterations of how two-way data links can be engineered into an air dropped weapon to better enable in-flight course correction and an ability to hit moving targets.
For these reasons, Stormbreaker is described by Raytheon engineers as a “network-enabled weapon that can engage moving targets in all weather conditions using its multi-effects warhead and tri-mode seeker.” This kind of progress with Stormbreaker is part of why the Air Force just awarded Raytheon with a deal to build as many as 1,500 of the bombs. The arrival of the weapon in greater numbers follows a year of 28 successful test drops in 2023 and the expansion of the Stormbreaker across the Pentagon’s fleet of attack aircraft.
https://warriormaven.com/air/pentagon-arms-f-35-with-breakthrough-stormbreaker-attack-bomb
