Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II in the context of "Landing helicopter dock"

The Fleet Air Arm (FAA) is the naval aviation component of the United Kingdom's Royal Navy (RN). The FAA is one of five RN fighting arms. As of 2023 it is a primarily helicopter force, though also operating the F-35B Lightning II carrier-based stealth fighter jointly with the Royal Air Force.

The RAF was formed by the 1918 merger of the RN's Royal Naval Air Service with the British Army's Royal Flying Corps. The FAA did not come under the direct control of the Admiralty until mid-1939. During the Second World War, the FAA operated aircraft on ships as well as land-based aircraft that defended the Royal Navy's shore establishments and facilities.

The Farnborough International Airshow is a trade exhibition for the aerospace and defence industries, where civilian and military aircraft are demonstrated to potential customers and investors in Farnborough, Hampshire, England. Since its first show in 1948, Farnborough has seen the debut of many famous aeroplanes, including the Vickers VC10, Concorde, the Eurofighter, the Airbus A380, and the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II. At the 1958 show, Hawker Hunters of the RAF's Black Arrows executed a 22-aircraft formation loop, setting a new world record.

The international trade show runs for five days. Until 2020, the show ran for a full week with the first five days reserved for trade visitors and the general public attending on the weekend.

Thrust is a reaction force described quantitatively by Newton's third law. When a system expels or accelerates mass in one direction, the accelerated mass will cause a force of equal magnitude but opposite direction to be applied to that system.The force applied on a surface in a direction perpendicular or normal to the surface is also called thrust. Force, and thus thrust, is measured using the International System of Units (SI) in newtons (symbol: N), and represents the amount needed to accelerate 1 kilogram of mass at the rate of 1 metre per second per second. In mechanical engineering, force orthogonal to the main load (such as in parallel helical gears) is referred to as static thrust.

Direct voice input (DVI), sometimes called voice input control (VIC), is a style of human–machine interaction "HMI" in which the user makes voice commands to issue instructions to the machine through speech recognition.

In the field of military aviation, DVI has been introduced into the cockpits of several modern military aircraft, such as the Eurofighter Typhoon, the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II, the Dassault Rafale, the KF-21 Boramae and the Saab JAS 39 Gripen. Such systems have also been used for various other purposes, including industry control systems and speech recognition assistance for impaired individuals.

In current military parlance, a strike fighter is a multirole combat aircraft designed to operate both as an attack aircraft and as an air superiority fighter. As a category, it is distinct from fighter-bombers, and is closely related to the concept of interdictor aircraft, although it puts more emphasis on aerial combat capabilities.

Examples of notable contemporary strike fighters are the American McDonnell Douglas F-15E Strike Eagle, Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet and Lockheed F-35 Lightning II, the Russian Sukhoi Su-34, and the Chinese Shenyang J-16.

A multirole combat aircraft is a combat aircraft intended to perform different roles in combat. These roles can include air to air combat, air support, aerial bombing, reconnaissance, electronic warfare, and suppression of air defenses.

In 1952, the United Kingdom became the third country (after the United States and the Soviet Union) to develop and test nuclear weapons, and is one of the five nuclear-weapon states under the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. As of 2025, the UK possesses a stockpile of approximately 225 warheads, with 120 deployed on its only delivery system, the Trident programme's submarine-launched ballistic missiles. Additionally, United States B61 nuclear bombs have been stored at RAF Lakenheath since 2025. In 2025, the UK announced plans to procure 12 F-35A aircraft capable of delivering B61s.

Since 1969, the Royal Navy has operated the continuous at-sea deterrent, with at least one ballistic missile submarine always on patrol. Under the Polaris Sales Agreement, the US supplied the UK with Polaris missiles and nuclear submarine technology, in exchange for the general commitment of these forces to NATO. In 1982, an amendment allowed the purchase of Trident II missiles, and since 1998, Trident has been the only nuclear weapons system in British service. Four Vanguard-class submarines are based at HMNB Clyde in Scotland. Each is armed with up to sixteen Trident II missiles, each carrying warheads in up to eight multiple independently targetable re-entry vehicles (MIRVs).

Brimstone is a ground or air-launched ground attack missile developed by MBDA UK for the UK's Royal Air Force. It was originally intended for "fire-and-forget" use against mass formations of enemy armour, using a millimetre wave (mmW) active radar homing seeker to ensure accuracy even against moving targets. Experience in Afghanistan led to the addition of laser guidance in the dual-mode Brimstone missile, allowing a "spotter" to pick out specific and the highest priority targets, particularly useful to minimise collateral damage when friendly forces or civilians were in the area. The tandem shaped-charge warhead is much more effective against modern tanks than older similar weapons such as the AGM-65G Maverick missile. Three Brimstones are carried on a launcher that occupies a single weapon station, allowing a single aircraft to carry many missiles.

After a protracted development programme, single-mode or "millimetric" Brimstone entered service with RAF Tornado aircraft in 2005, and the dual-mode variant in 2008. The latter was used extensively in Afghanistan and Libya. An improved Brimstone 2 was expected to enter service in October 2012, but problems with the new warhead from TDW and the ROXEL rocket motor put back the planned date to November 2015. MBDA is studying the use of Brimstone on ships, attack helicopters, UAVs, and from surface launchers. However, it will not be integrated on the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II. Germany, Qatar and Saudi Arabia have purchased the missile. The cost per missile has been quoted as £175,000 each in 2015, or "over £100,000".

The Lockheed Martin Corporation is an American defense and aerospace manufacturer. It is headquartered in North Bethesda, Maryland, United States. The company was formed by the merger of Lockheed Corporation with Martin Marietta on March 15, 1995.

Lockheed Martin operates 4 divisions: Lockheed Martin Aeronautics (39% of 2024 revenues), which includes Skunk Works, the F-35 Lightning II strike fighter, the Lockheed C-130 Hercules military transport aircraft, the F-16 Fighting Falcon, and the F-22 Raptor; Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control (18% of 2024 revenues), which includes the MIM-104 Patriot surface-to-air missile, the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, the M270 Multiple Launch Rocket System, the Precision Strike Missile, the AGM-158 JASSM air-launched cruise missile, the AGM-158C LRASM anti-ship missile, the AGM-114 Hellfire, the Apache fire-control system, the Sniper Advanced Targeting Pod, Infrared search and track, and support services for special forces; Lockheed Martin Rotary and Mission Systems (24% of 2024 revenues), which includes Sikorsky Aircraft such as the Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk, Sikorsky HH-60 Pave Hawk, Sikorsky VH-92 Patriot, Sikorsky CH-53K King Stallion, and Sikorsky SH-60 Seahawk, the Aegis Combat System, Littoral combat ships, Freedom-class littoral combat ships, River-class destroyers, and the C2BMC missile defense program; and Lockheed Martin Space (18% of 2024 revenues), which includes the UGM-133 Trident II ballistic missile, the Orion spacecraft, the Next-Generation Overhead Persistent Infrared, GPS Block III, hypersonic weapons and transport layer programs and the Ground-Based Interceptor.