USAF's Newest Weapons
The U.S. Air Force’s Newest Air-Launched Weapons: What’s Coming to the Fight
For decades, the image of American airpower was relatively straightforward: fighters carrying air-to-air missiles and precision-guided bombs, while bombers hauled large quantities of conventional weapons deep into enemy territory. That basic formula still exists, but the weapons hanging from—or increasingly hidden inside—U.S. Air Force aircraft are changing rapidly.
The newest generation of USAF munitions reflects a very different kind of war. American aircraft may have to operate hundreds or even thousands of miles from their targets, penetrate sophisticated integrated air defenses, attack moving ships, destroy hardened underground facilities, and fight enemy aircraft equipped with increasingly long-range missiles of their own.
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Just as important, the Air Force has rediscovered an old reality of warfare: quantity matters.
The result is one of the most interesting periods of weapons development since precision-guided munitions transformed air warfare during the late Cold War and Gulf War era. Some of these weapons are already operational. Others are undergoing flight testing or integration, while a few represent entirely new approaches to what constitutes a "bomber."
Here are the most important new and emerging aircraft-delivered weapons in the U.S. Air Force arsenal as of 2026.
ERAM — Extended Range Attack Munition
One of the newest weapons to actually leave an aircraft is the Extended Range Attack Munition, or ERAM.
ERAM represents an increasingly important idea in American weapons development: not every long-range missile needs to be an exquisite, extremely expensive weapon.
The Air Force describes ERAM as a next-generation air-launched cruise missile intended to provide an affordable, precision-guided standoff capability against high-value fixed targets. More importantly, it is being designed with large-scale production in mind.
In January 2026, the Air Force conducted a live-warhead ERAM test at the Eglin Test and Training Range in Florida. The missile successfully completed the test, including full warhead detonation, less than 16 months after the program's initial contract award.
That development speed is nearly as significant as the weapon itself.
For decades, advanced weapons programs have frequently required many years—or even decades—to progress from requirement to operational capability. ERAM is part of an effort to dramatically compress that timeline.
The larger strategic idea is simple: the Air Force needs enough long-range weapons to fight a prolonged high-intensity war without rapidly emptying its missile magazines.
FAMM — Family of Affordable Mass Missiles
If ERAM represents affordable long-range strike, the Family of Affordable Mass Missiles, or FAMM, takes that philosophy much further.
FAMM may ultimately become one of the most important changes in USAF munitions procurement in decades.
Instead of purchasing relatively small numbers of extremely expensive cruise missiles, the Air Force wants weapons that can be manufactured by the thousands.
The FY2027 Air Force budget request calls for 1,000 FAMM weapons in a single year, while longer-range planning envisions production on a much larger scale. The program is also being developed in multiple configurations, including conventionally carried "lugged" weapons and palletized versions that could be deployed from cargo aircraft.
In July 2026, the Department of War announced framework agreements with Anduril, CoAspire and Zone 5 to accelerate testing and qualification of low-cost air-launched cruise missiles for the FAMM program.
The significance is difficult to overstate.
A future Air Force strike package might not consist of a handful of aircraft launching a handful of million-dollar-plus missiles. It could potentially involve dozens or hundreds of relatively inexpensive weapons arriving from multiple directions and overwhelming an enemy's ability to detect, track and intercept them.
It is the airpower equivalent of giving the enemy more problems than he has solutions.
Dragon Cart — Turning Cargo Aircraft Into Missile Carriers
One of the strangest new Air Force weapons concepts doesn't require a traditional bomber at all.
It requires a pallet.
The experimental Rapid Dragon program demonstrated that cruise missiles could be packaged inside palletized deployment systems, rolled aboard aircraft such as the C-130 and C-17, and released through the cargo ramp. Once outside the aircraft, the pallet descends under parachute and releases its weapons.
The Air Force has now moved beyond the experimental phase.
In April 2026, the service announced that the operational follow-on, called Dragon Cart, had officially become a Program of Record. The Air Force Life Cycle Management Center is now responsible for the system, with fielding targeted for 2027.
Rapid Dragon previously demonstrated employment of the AGM-158 Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile from cargo aircraft.
Dragon Cart changes the arithmetic of long-range airpower.
A C-17 will never become a B-21 Raider. It doesn't have to.
Instead, palletized weapons could allow part of America's enormous airlift fleet to become additional launch platforms after air superiority has been established or when operating safely outside enemy air defenses.
The aircraft becomes, in effect, a flying missile magazine.
SiAW — Stand-in Attack Weapon
While ERAM and FAMM emphasize attacking from long range, the Stand-in Attack Weapon, or SiAW, is designed around a different problem.
Some targets are difficult to destroy from far away.
Mobile air-defense systems, missile launchers, command nodes, electronic-warfare systems and other rapidly relocating targets may need to be attacked from inside or near heavily defended territory.
That is where SiAW enters the picture.
In November 2024, an F-16 assigned to the 40th Flight Test Squadron successfully released a SiAW test weapon over the Gulf of Mexico—the first aircraft release of the new missile.
The weapon is intended primarily for the F-35A and other penetrating aircraft capable of getting considerably closer to defended targets than conventional non-stealthy strike aircraft.
SiAW therefore complements long-range standoff weapons.
JASSM and ERAM allow aircraft to attack from outside an enemy's defensive bubble. SiAW is intended for the aircraft that go inside it.
QUICKSINK — Turning JDAM Technology Into a Ship Killer
One of the Air Force's most fascinating recent weapons programs started with something extremely familiar: the Joint Direct Attack Munition.
QUICKSINK modifies relatively inexpensive air-delivered weapons to attack ships.
The idea is to provide an anti-ship capability without requiring every maritime target to be engaged with a much more expensive purpose-built cruise missile.
Early testing used a 2,000-pound weapon. During RIMPAC 2024, a QUICKSINK weapon successfully demonstrated the ability to attack a surface vessel.
Then the Air Force made it smaller.
In 2025, a B-2 Spirit released a new 500-pound QUICKSINK variant during testing at the Eglin Gulf Test Range.
The smaller weapon matters because aircraft can carry considerably more of them.
Later in 2025, B-2s participated in another QUICKSINK maritime strike demonstration with Norway in the High North, with Airmen loading GBU-31 and smaller GBU-38 JDAM-based weapons for the mission.
For a future Pacific conflict, the implications are obvious. An aircraft carrying multiple relatively inexpensive maritime weapons could attack numerous ships or concentrate many weapons against a single formation.
Not every ship requires a cruise missile costing millions of dollars.
Sometimes gravity, guidance and a very bad day at sea are enough.
AGM-158C LRASM — The B-1's Long-Range Ship Killer
At the opposite end of the anti-ship spectrum is the AGM-158C Long Range Anti-Ship Missile, or LRASM.
LRASM is derived from the JASSM family but optimized for maritime strike. It is designed to locate and attack high-value ships while operating in heavily contested environments.
The B-1B Lancer has become the Air Force's principal LRASM carrier.
And the weapon continues to evolve.
In June 2026, personnel at Dyess Air Force Base conducted an LRASM "Event Zero" involving a live AGM-158C connected to a B-1B. The event validated updated aircraft and weapon software procedures and represented another step in rapid integration of the missile with the bomber.
The Air Force has also been dramatically increasing LRASM procurement. Recent budgets have moved the missile from a relatively niche capability toward a much larger inventory.
A B-1 carrying a large load of LRASMs represents something the Air Force did not emphasize during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan: a dedicated long-range maritime strike platform.
That mission has returned in a big way.
GBU-53/B StormBreaker — The Small Bomb That Hunts Moving Targets
The GBU-53/B StormBreaker, formerly known as Small Diameter Bomb II, isn't physically intimidating.
That's part of its advantage.
StormBreaker is a roughly 250-pound-class precision weapon designed to engage both stationary and moving targets. Its multimode seeker combines millimeter-wave radar, imaging infrared and semi-active laser guidance, allowing it to attack targets in poor weather and battlefield obscurants.
Because the weapon is small, aircraft can carry considerably more StormBreakers than traditional 1,000- or 2,000-pound bombs.
The F-15E is already approved to employ it, while integration has been progressing across the F-35 fleet.
StormBreaker represents another important change in air warfare.
The objective isn't always to make a bomb bigger.
Sometimes the better solution is making the bomb smart enough that the aircraft can carry a lot more of them.
Joint Strike Missile — Giving the F-35 an Internal Anti-Ship Weapon
The Joint Strike Missile, or JSM, fills another important gap for the F-35A.
Developed from Norway's Naval Strike Missile, JSM is a long-range precision strike weapon designed to attack both ships and land targets.
Its major advantage is physical.
JSM was designed to fit inside the F-35's internal weapons bays.
That means an F-35 can carry a serious standoff maritime-strike weapon while retaining the aircraft's low-observable configuration rather than hanging a missile externally and increasing its radar signature.
The Air Force has been purchasing JSM as part of its expanding advanced-munitions inventory, alongside JASSM-ER, LRASM and Small Diameter Bomb II.
For an Indo-Pacific fight, stealth aircraft capable of approaching defended maritime areas and launching anti-ship missiles from internal bays would provide commanders with another very difficult targeting problem for an adversary.
AARGM-ER — Hunting Air Defenses
Another major addition headed toward Air Force tactical aircraft is the AGM-88G Advanced Anti-Radiation Guided Missile–Extended Range, or AARGM-ER.
Its job is straightforward and extremely important: destroy the systems trying to shoot American aircraft down.
AARGM-ER is the next-generation successor to the HARM family of anti-radiation missiles. It offers greater range and improved capability against modern integrated air-defense systems.
Although originally a Navy-led program, the weapon is being integrated into the F-35 and has received substantial Air Force procurement funding. The FY2025 request, for example, increased planned AARGM-ER procurement to 128 missiles.
Modern surface-to-air missile systems increasingly use mobility, networking and intermittent radar operation to make themselves difficult to target.
AARGM-ER is intended to make turning on an air-defense radar a dangerous decision.
AIM-260 JATM — The Next Air-to-Air Missile
Not all of the new weapons are pointed at the ground.
The AIM-260 Joint Advanced Tactical Missile, or JATM, is the Air Force's next-generation beyond-visual-range air-to-air missile.
It is intended to supplement and eventually replace portions of the AIM-120 AMRAAM inventory as potential adversaries field aircraft and missiles capable of engagements at increasingly long ranges.
Much of AIM-260 remains classified, including detailed performance information. That is intentional.
But the program is moving beyond being merely a mysterious developmental missile.
The FY2026 and FY2027 budget material shows substantial funding associated with JATM, while a January 2026 notification to Congress concerning a proposed Australian purchase identified the AIM-260 by name and included up to 450 missiles.
The important point isn't a rumored range figure—which should be treated cautiously given the classified nature of the program.
It is that the Air Force is preparing for air combat in which the ability to detect, target and shoot first from extreme range could determine which aircraft survives the encounter.
HACM — Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile
Then there is hypersonic strike.
The Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile, or HACM, is being developed as an air-breathing missile capable of sustained flight above Mach 5.
Unlike a traditional ballistic missile following a relatively predictable trajectory, HACM uses scramjet propulsion and is intended to maneuver during flight.
The Department of Defense's FY2026 weapons documentation identifies the B-52H as an intended launch aircraft, with future integration envisioned for the B-21 and B-52J. The weapon carries a conventional warhead and is intended for rapid attacks against heavily defended, high-value targets.
HACM remains in development, with the Air Force planning to transition toward an acquisition program and initial production following the prototype phase. Development has encountered schedule pressure, but substantial funding continues into FY2027.
If successful, HACM gives commanders something conventional cruise missiles cannot provide: dramatically compressed engagement time.
At Mach 5-plus, the target gets considerably less time to react.
AGM-183A ARRW — Apparently Not Dead After All
For a while, the AGM-183A Air-Launched Rapid Response Weapon, or ARRW, appeared headed for the weapons-program graveyard.
Then it came back.
ARRW is a boost-glide hypersonic weapon. A rocket accelerates the weapon to hypersonic speed before releasing a glide vehicle that continues toward the target at extreme velocity.
After a troubled test program, the Air Force appeared to shift its hypersonic emphasis toward HACM.
But the FY2026 budget changed the picture, explicitly adding funding for Air-Launched Rapid Response Weapons, indicating renewed interest in the system.
That means the Air Force is currently pursuing two different approaches to airborne hypersonic strike: the air-breathing HACM and the boost-glide ARRW.
Whether both ultimately become major operational weapons remains to be seen.
But ARRW is no longer safe to describe as dead.
GBU-72 Advanced 5K Penetrator
Sometimes the problem isn't distance.
It's concrete.
The GBU-72 Advanced 5K Penetrator is a roughly 5,000-pound-class weapon developed to attack hardened and deeply buried targets.
The weapon combines the BLU-138 penetrating warhead with a modified JDAM guidance system and is intended as a more capable successor to older bunker-busting weapons such as the GBU-28.
An F-15E performed the first aircraft release during testing at Eglin in 2021, and subsequent work expanded potential integration with bomber aircraft.
The GBU-72 fills the enormous gap between conventional 2,000-pound penetrating bombs and the massive 30,000-pound GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrator carried by the B-2.
That gives commanders another option when the target isn't simply inside a building.
It is underneath one.
AGM-181 LRSO — The B-52's Next Nuclear Cruise Missile
One weapon in the new generation occupies a category all its own.
The AGM-181 Long Range Stand Off weapon, or LRSO, will eventually replace the aging AGM-86B Air-Launched Cruise Missile in the nuclear mission.
LRSO is being developed as a survivable, long-range nuclear cruise missile capable of penetrating advanced air defenses while allowing the bomber to remain at standoff distance.
The B-52 will be its initial carrier.
Testing remains highly sensitive, but B-52 aircraft have been photographed carrying what appear to be LRSO test articles during flight testing in 2026. The Air Force has generally declined to discuss specific details of those tests.
The missile will eventually form the air-launched portion of America's modernized nuclear deterrent alongside the B-21 Raider and modernized B-52.
The Bigger Story: Range, Stealth—and a Lot More Missiles
Looking at these weapons individually misses the larger transformation.
The Air Force isn't simply replacing old bombs and missiles with newer versions.
It is changing the architecture of airborne weapons.
Weapons such as JASSM-ER, LRASM and ERAM provide long-range conventional strike. JSM and SiAW give stealth aircraft additional options while operating closer to enemy defenses. AARGM-ER attacks those defenses directly. QUICKSINK and LRASM dramatically expand the Air Force's ability to hunt ships. StormBreaker allows aircraft to attack larger numbers of moving targets. AIM-260 addresses increasingly sophisticated long-range aerial threats. HACM and ARRW introduce hypersonic strike.
Then FAMM and Dragon Cart attack an entirely different problem: magazine depth.
A future conflict against a major military power could consume precision weapons at a rate vastly greater than anything experienced during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Having the world's most sophisticated cruise missile doesn't help much if only a small number can be produced each month.
The Air Force increasingly appears to want both ends of the spectrum.
It wants highly sophisticated weapons capable of penetrating the world's toughest defenses—and inexpensive weapons that can be manufactured and launched by the thousands.
That combination could fundamentally change the way American airpower looks.
The B-21 may penetrate enemy airspace carrying advanced weapons internally. F-35s may hunt mobile air defenses with SiAW and AARGM-ER. B-1s may launch LRASMs against enemy fleets. B-52s may remain hundreds of miles away launching cruise missiles and hypersonic weapons.
And somewhere behind them, a C-17 originally designed to haul tanks, helicopters and pallets of cargo could push a rack of cruise missiles out the back door.
For the men and women who have spent their careers loading, maintaining and delivering Air Force munitions, the technology may be changing dramatically.
The basic objective hasn't.
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