Finland Ordering 150 AIM-9X Sidewinders

AIM-9X Sidewinder The Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) has notified Congress [PDF format] that the Government of Finland has requested a possible sale of up to 150 AIM-9X Sidewinder Missiles, 11 AIM-9X Dummy Air Training Missiles, and 40 AIM-9X Captive Air Training Missiles. The estimated cost is $100 million, and the prime contractor will be Raytheon Systems Corporation of Tucson, AZ. The AIM-9X is the latest version of the Sidewinder short-range air-air missile (SRAAM). Upgrades include has improved acquisition range and a higher-performance seeker dome, wide off-boresight capability that creates a bigger ‘targeting cone,’ better counter-countermeasures and background discrimination thanks to its 128 x 128 infrared focal plane array (instead of the AIM-9M’s single element IR detector), and day or night capability. It uses the same motor, warhead, and fuze as the AIM-9M and is of similar size and weight, but has a new airframe design with less drag, thrust vectoring for improved maneuverability, and field reprogrammability. AIM-9X is comparable to other 4th generation SRAAMs like the Israeli Python 4, British ASRAAM, French MBDA MICA IR, German/European IRIS-T, and Russian R-73 aka. AA-11 Archer (The Israeli Python 5 may be in a class all by itself at the moment, though […]