THE UNITED ARAB Emirates has moved to acquire 30 additional Lockheed Martin F-16 Desert Falcon fighters. On January 23 the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency notified Congress of a possible Foreign Military Sale (FMS) of the jets to the UAE. US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel had first mooted the follow-on 'Viper' sale in April 2013, the deal at that time involving 25 new airframes. The DSCA announcement described the aircraft variant as the F-16 'Block 61', although it remains unclear how this will differ from the F-16E/F Block 60 Desert Falcons currently in the UAE Air Force inventory. While Lockheed Martin has not commented on the new standard, US Department of Defense officials note that the Block 61 will include enhanced radar, avionics, and weapons capabilities. Among the items of equipment listed as part of the initial sale are 40 20mm M61A1 Vulcan guns, 40 embedded GPS inertial navigation systems, identification friend or foe equipment, Joint Mission Planning Systems, and night vision devices. Since the Northrop Grumman AN/APG-80 active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar as used by the Block 60 Desert Falcon is no longer in production, it is expected that the Block 61 will feature a new radar type, likely to be either the Northrop Grumman Scalable Agile Beam Radar (SABR) or the rival Raytheon Advanced Combat Radar (RACR).
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