The AIM-120 Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missile (AMRAAM) ( ) is an American beyond-visual-range air-to-air missile capable of all-weather day-and-night operations. It uses active transmit-receive radar guidance instead of semi-active receive-only radar guidance; as an active seeker missile, NATO pilots thus use the brevity code "Fox Three" when firing the AIM-120.
The AMRAAM largely replaced the AIM-7 Sparrow as the principal beyond-visual-range air-to-air missile in US inventory. more than 14,000 had been produced for the United States Air Force, the United States Navy, and 33 international customers. The AMRAAM has been used in several engagements, achieving 16 air-to-air kills in conflicts over Iraq, Bosnia, Kosovo, India, and Syria. In the long term, it is expected to eventually be replaced by the long range AIM-260 JATM in US service and the MBDA Meteor in some European countries.
Origins
AIM-7 Sparrow MRM The AIM-7 Sparrow medium range missile (MRM) was purchased by the US Navy from original developer Hughes Aircraft in the 1950s as its first operational air-to-air missile with "beyond visual range" (BVR) capability. With an effective range of about , it was introduced as a radar beam-riding missile and then it was improved to a semi-active radar guided missile which would home in on reflections from a target illuminated by the radar of the launching aircraft. It was effective at visual to beyond visual range. The early beam riding versions of the Sparrow missiles were integrated onto the McDonnell F3H Demon and Vought F7U Cutlass, but the definitive AIM-7 Sparrow was the primary weapon for the all-weather McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom II fighter/interceptor, which lacked an internal gun in its US Navy, US Marine Corps, and early US Air Force versions. The F-4 carried up to four AIM-7s in built-in recesses under its belly.
Designed for use against non-maneuvering targets such as bombers, the missiles initially performed poorly against fighters over North Vietnam, and were progressively improved until they proved highly effective in dogfights. Together with the short-range, infrared-guided AIM-9 Sidewinder, they replaced the AIM-4 Falcon IR and radar guided series for use in air combat by the USAF as well. A disadvantage to semi-active homing was that only one target could be illuminated by the launching fighter plane at a time. Also, the launching aircraft had to remain pointed in the direction of the target (within the azimuth and elevation of its own radar set) which could be difficult or dangerous in air-to-air combat.
An active-radar variant called the Sparrow II was developed to address these drawbacks, but the US Navy pulled out of the project in 1956. The Royal Canadian Air Force, which took over development in the hopes of using the missile to arm their prospective Avro Canada CF-105 Arrow interceptor, soon followed in 1958. The electronics of the time simply could not be miniaturized enough to make Sparrow II a viable working weapon. It would take decades, and a new generation of digital electronics, to produce an effective active-radar air-to-air missile as compact as the Sparrow.
AIM-54 Phoenix LRM The US Navy later developed the AIM-54 Phoenix long-range missile (LRM) for the fleet air defense mission. It was a large , Mach 5 missile designed to counter cruise missiles and the bombers that launched them. Originally intended for the straight-wing Douglas F6D Missileer and then the navalized General Dynamics–Grumman F-111B, it finally saw service with the Grumman F-14 Tomcat, the only fighter capable of carrying such a heavy missile. The Phoenix was the first US fire-and-forget, multiple-launch, radar-guided missile: one which used its own active guidance system to guide itself without help from the launch aircraft when it closed on its target. This, in theory, gave a Tomcat with a six-Phoenix load the unprecedented capability of tracking and destroying up to six targets beyond visual range, as far as away—the only US fighter with such capability.
A full load of six Phoenix missiles and their dedicated launchers exceeded a typical Vietnam-era bomb load. Its service in the US Navy was primarily as a deterrent, as its use was hampered by restrictive rules of engagement in conflicts such as 1991 Gulf War, Southern Watch (enforcing the southern no-fly zone), and Iraq War. The US Navy retired the Phoenix in 2004 in light of availability of the AIM-120 AMRAAM on the McDonnell Douglas F/A-18 Hornet and the pending retirement of the F-14 Tomcat from active service in late 2006.
ACEVAL/AIMVAL The Department of Defense conducted an extensive evaluation of air combat tactics and missile technology from 1974 to 1978 at Nellis AFB using the F-14 Tomcat and F-15 Eagle equipped with Sparrow and Sidewinder missiles as the blue force and aggressor F-5E aircraft equipped with AIM-9L all-aspect Sidewinders as the red force. This joint test and evaluation (JT&E) was designated Air Combat Evaluation/Air Intercept Missile Evaluation (ACEVAL/AIMVAL). A principal finding was that the necessity to produce illumination for the Sparrow until impact resulted in the red force's being able to launch their all-aspect Sidewinders before impact, resulting in mutual kills. What was needed was Phoenix-type multiple-launch and terminal active capability in a Sparrow-size airframe. This led to a memorandum of agreement (MOA) with European allies (principally the UK and Germany for development) for the US to develop an advanced, medium-range, air-to-air missile with the USAF as lead service.
ASRAAM The MOA also saw an agreement to develop a replacement for the Sidewinder, specifically; an advanced 'dogfight' air-to-air missile, capable of better covering the range disparity that would emerge between such short-range missiles and the eventual AMRAAM. This task fell to a British-German design team, with the Germans leaving the project in 1989. The missile would emerge as the British Advanced Short Range Air-to-Air Missile (ASRAAM), entering service in 1998. While the US never adopted the ASRAAM—instead opting to continue upgrading the Sidewinder—the ASRAAM did enter into service with the British, Indian, and Australian militaries. The UK has continued to upgrade the ASRAAM, with the 'Block 6' variant entering service in 2022.
Requirements
By the 1990s, the reliability of the Sparrow had improved significantly, relative to its use in Vietnam, with it accounting for the largest number of aerial targets destroyed in the Desert Storm phase of the Gulf War. However, while the USAF had passed on the Phoenix and its own similar AIM-47 Falcon/Lockheed YF-12 to optimize dogfight performance, it still needed a multiple-launch fire-and-forget capability for the F-15 and F-16. The AMRAAM would need to be fitted on fighters as small as the F-16, and fit in the same spaces that were designed to fit the Sparrow on the F-4 Phantom. The European partners needed AMRAAM to be integrated on aircraft as small as the BAe Sea Harrier. The US Navy needed the AMRAAM to be carried on the F/A-18 Hornet and wanted capability for two to be carried on a launcher that normally carried one Sparrow to allow for more air-to-ground weapons. Finally, the AMRAAM became one of the primary air-to-air weapons of the new Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor fighter, which needed to place all of its weapons into internal weapons bays in order to help achieve an extremely low radar cross-section.
Development
AMRAAM was developed as the result of an agreement (the Family of Weapons MOA, no longer in effect by 1990), among the United States and several other NATO nations to develop air-to-air missiles and to share production technology. Under this agreement, the US was to develop the next generation medium range missile (AMRAAM) and Europe would develop the next generation short range missile (ASRAAM). Although Europe initially adopted the AMRAAM, an effort to develop the MDBA Meteor, a competitor to AMRAAM, was begun in UK. Eventually, the ASRAAM was developed solely by the British, but using another source for its infrared seeker. After protracted development, the deployment of AMRAAM (AIM-120A) began in September 1991 in US Air Force McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle fighter squadrons. The US Navy soon followed (in 1993) in its McDonnell Douglas F/A-18 Hornet squadrons.
The Russian Air Force counterpart of AMRAAM is the somewhat similar R-77 (NATO codename AA-12 Adder), sometimes referred to in the West as the "AMRAAMski". Likewise, France began its own air-to-air missile development with the MICA concept that used a common airframe for separate radar-guided and infrared-guided versions.
Operational history United States The AMRAAM was used operationally for the first time on December 27, 1992, when a USAF General Dynamics F-16D Fighting Falcon shot down an Iraqi MiG-25 that violated the southern no-fly-zone.Bjorkman, Eileen, "Small, fast and in your face", Air & Space, February/March 2014, p. 35. This missile had been returned from the flight line as defective a day earlier. The AMRAAM gained a second victory in January 1993 when an Iraqi MiG-23 was shot down by a USAF F-16C.
On 28 February 1994, a Serbian Republic Air Force J-21 Jastreb aircraft was shot down by a USAF F-16C that was patrolling the UN-imposed no-fly zone over Bosnia. In that engagement, at least three other Serbian aircraft were shot down by USAF F-16Cs using AIM-9 missiles (Banja Luka incident). At that point, three launches in combat had resulted in three kills, resulting in the AMRAAMs being informally named "slammer" in the second half of the 1990s.
In 1994, two USAF F-15 fighters patrolling Iraq's Northern No-Fly Zone mistook a pair of US Army Black Hawk helicopters for Iraqi helicopters, and shot them down. One was downed with an AIM-120, and one with an AIM-9 Sidewinder.
In 1998 and 1999 AMRAAMs were again fired by USAF F-15 fighters at Iraqi aircraft violating the No-Fly-Zones, but this time they failed to hit their targets. During spring 1999, AMRAAMs saw their main combat action during Operation Allied Force, the Kosovo bombing campaign. Six Serbian MiG-29s were shot down by NATO (four USAF F-15Cs, one USAF F-16C, and one Dutch F-16A MLU), all of them using AIM-120 missiles (the supposed kill by the F-16C may have actually been friendly fire, a man-portable SA-7 fired by Serbian infantry).
On 18 June 2017, a US Boeing F/A-18E Super Hornet engaged and shot down a Sukhoi Su-22 of the Syrian Air Force over northern Syria,"US coalition downs first Syria government jet." Retrieved 19 June 2017. using an AIM-120. An AIM-9X Sidewinder had failed to bring down the Syrian jet. Some sources have claimed the AIM-9X was decoyed by flares,"A U.S. aircraft has shot down a Syrian government jet over northern Syria, Pentagon says" . Retrieved 18 June 2017. although the F/A-18E pilot, Lieutenant Commander Michael "MOB" Tremel stated it was unclear why the AIM-9X failed, mentioning no use of flares by the Su-22, saying "I [lost] the smoke trail, and I have no idea what happened to the missile at that point".
Turkey On 23 March 2014 a Turkish Air Force F-16 from 182 Squadron shot down a Syrian Arab Air Force MiG-23BN with an AIM-120C-7.
On 24 November 2015 a Turkish Air Force F-16 shot down a Russian Su-24M strike aircraft with an AIM-120 missile over northern Syria after it allegedly crossed into Turkish airspace.Here's the Reason why Russian Aircraft Keep Dying in Syria , 29 February 2020, The National Interest.
On 1 March 2020, Turkish Air Force F-16s downed two Su-24s belonging to the Syrian Air Force using two AIM-120C-7s.
On 3 March 2020, a Syrian Air Force L-39 was shot down over Idlib by Turkish Air Force F-16s from inside Turkish airspace with AIM-120C-7 at a distance of about . As of 2020, this has been the longest range AIM-120 kill.
Pakistan