as a possible future weapon for the platform.

The weapon was due to be operational in 2025; however, in November 2021, the UK Government announced that the F-35 might not be fully capable of operating SPEAR-3 until 2028. In May 2025, this was further postponed, with the government announcing that the in service date was expected to be in the early 2030s.

Background

One of the Select Precision Effects At Range (SPEAR) programme's first mentions was in the 2005 Defence Industrial Strategy (DIS). This vaguely described

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