Pakistan Air Force will spend $49 million on mid-life upgradation of its F-16 fleet with Advanced Integrated Defensive Electronic Warfare System (AIDEWS) under the Foreign Military Financing (FMF), according to defence sources.
The US had agreed in 2008 to provide FMF to Pakistan to perform mid-life updates for the existing F-16 fleet in response to Pakistan's concerns over threat from India. It was also decided that this mid-life update for the F-16s could only be performed in a third country.
Pakistan would pay $80 million to perform the updates in Turkey. The third country was selected as the US had expressed concerns about basing the F-16s in Pakistan due to concerns about potential technology transfer to China, sources said. The US agreed as it was more interested in the use of F-16s by Pakistan for counter-terrorism purposes along the Af-Pak border.
At present, the ITT Corporation (NYSE: ITT) has been awarded the contract to provide a pod-version of the AIDEWS. The Corporation will supply its AN/ALQ-211 (AIDEWS) pod to Pakistan, which is upgrading older F-16s for commonality with newer Block 52 aircraft from Lockheed Martin that started delivering in 2010. The sale of AIDEWS pods to Pakistan was requested in 2008.
ITT will provide 18 ALQ-211(v) 9 pods, an upgrade over the previous ALQ-131 electronic countermeasures pod on the aircraft. The V9 pod provides digital radar warning, high-power jamming, threat geolocation and situational awareness, using line replaceable units interchangeable with LRUs from internal AIDEWS systems on international F-16s.
The system provides fighter pilots with situational awareness and protection against radar-based threats, including modern surface-to-air and air-to-air weapon systems. This export version of the pod incorporates the same hardware configuration from ITT's AIDEWS, currently flying with five international customers.
The new contract will provide for the flight qualification of the pod-mounted variant of AIDEWS for the F-16s. AIDEWS has been selected to equip F-16 fighters operating with by six international air forces; ITT has already delivered 134 AIDEWS systems, out of 160 systems ordered.
The foreign military sale, contracted through Robins Air Force Base, Georgia, was authorised this summer, but only recently announced by ITT. The company also expected a letter of offer and acceptance to be signed with Oman, which last year requested 18 F-16 Block 50/52 aircraft with AIDEWS included among systems. AIDEWS is named as an optional electronic countermeasure pod for the upgrade of 145 F-16A/Bs operated by Taiwan's air force. Some 1,500 F-16s would be candidates for the V9 pod.
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