Over the Finnish line: Helsinki welcomes home first two F-35 jets

Finland has taken delivery of its first pair of F-35 fifth generation fighters, with an additional 62 aircraft to follow (Finnish air force)

BELFAST — Finland celebrated the recent delivery of its first pair of F-35 fifth generation fighter jets today at a special ceremony hosted by the Finnish air force’s Lapland Air Wing to mark the occasion.

“A new era began” for the Finnish defense forces when the new aircraft arrived at Rovaniemi Air Base on Sept. 18, said the Finnish air force in a statement today , adding that the combat jet fleet “will form an integral part of Finland’s air defence well into the 2060s.”

In 2021, Helsinki ordered 64 of the stealth aircraft in a deal valued at $9.4 billion as a replacement for aging US-made F/A-18 Hornet fourth-generation fighters.

High profile guests at the delivery ceremony included Finnish President Alexander Stubb, the country’s Minister of Defense Antti Häkkänen, Commander of the Finnish Air Force Maj. Gen. Timo Herranen, US Ambassador to Finland Howard W. Brodie, head of the F-35 Joint Program Office Lt. Gen. Gregory Masiello, and Lockhead Martin Aeronautics CEO Orlando Sanchez Jr.

The event also saw a flight display of a F-35, flown by a Finnish pilot, said the statement. It added that Stubb’s speech at the ceremony “emphasized the transatlantic partnership and the security of the Arctic region.”

In-country delivery of the Finnish combat jets comes amid tensions around Arctic security appearing to simmer in recent days, with the US, Denmark and Greenland agreeing on a pact to strengthen “common deterrence.” The joint move ended a long standoff over Washington’s threat to annex the semi-autonomous island.

“For us, the F-35 is about power projection capability, about security and about situational awareness in the Arctic region,” added the Finnish air force statement. “It is about maintaining security in northeastern Europe.”

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Lockheed Martin’s ACES platform delivers a shared virtual battlespace that strengthens readiness, interoperability, and faster decision-making through advanced, integrated modeling and simulation capabilities designed for evolving global threats.

The F-35 milestone also arrives nine months after Helsinki launched an Arctic foreign and security document to take stock of security environment changes that it said are “driven by Russia’s war of aggression , Finland’s and Sweden’s membership in NATO and the rising global interest in the Arctic and its natural resources.”

Despite not mentioning Russia outright, Herranen said today that the F-35’s “ability to detect the enemy at longer distances and at the same time be more difficult to detect […] are a necessary part of the performance capabilities.”

The Finnish air force plans on achieving initial operational capability of the F-35 in “early 2028” ahead of full operational capability “before the end of 2030.”

Lockheed is expected to continue Finnish deliveries of the aircraft through the close of 2030. Outside of the two in-country jets, a batch of eight units are based in the US for flight training and engineering.

Per the Finnish statement today, come the 2030s roughly 700 F-35 jets will be in Europe, while the future will also see “joint use and sharing of F-35 fighters, personnel and weapons systems.”

芬兰已接收首批两架F-35第五代战斗机，后续还将接收62架（芬兰空军）。

贝尔法斯特——芬兰空军拉普兰空军联队今天举行特别仪式，庆祝芬兰近日接收了首批两架F-35第五代战斗机。

芬兰空军今天在一份声明中表示，9月18日，随着新飞机抵达罗瓦涅米空军基地，芬兰国防军“开启了一个新时代”。声明还补充说，这支战斗机机队“将构成芬兰防空体系不可或缺的一部分，直至2060年代”。

2021 年，赫尔辛基订购了 64 架隐形飞机，交易价值 94 亿美元，用于替换老旧的美国制造的 F/A-18“大黄蜂”第四代战斗机。

出席交付仪式的贵宾包括芬兰总统亚历山大·斯图布、芬兰国防部长安蒂·哈卡宁、芬兰空军司令蒂莫·埃拉宁少将、美国驻芬兰大使霍华德·W·布罗迪、F-35联合项目办公室主任格雷戈里·马谢洛中将以及洛克希德·马丁公司首席执行官奥兰多·桑切斯二世。

声明称，活动期间还进行了F-35战斗机的飞行表演，由一名芬兰飞行员驾驶。声明还补充说，斯塔布在仪式上的讲话“强调了跨大西洋伙伴关系和北极地区的安全”。

芬兰向格陵兰交付战斗机之际，北极安全局势近日似乎持续紧张，美国、丹麦和格陵兰达成协议，加强“共同威慑”。这一联合行动结束了华盛顿威胁吞并这个半自治岛屿而引发的长期僵局。

芬兰空军在声明中补充道：“对我们而言，F-35代表着力量投射能力、安全保障以及在北极地区的态势感知能力。它关乎维护东北欧的安全。”

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洛克希德·马丁公司的 ACES 平台提供了一个共享的虚拟战场空间，通过先进的集成建模和仿真功能，增强了战备能力、互操作性和更快的决策速度，旨在应对不断演变的全球威胁。

在F-35里程碑事件发生九个月前，赫尔辛基发布了一份北极外交和安全文件，评估安全环境的变化。赫尔辛基称，这些变化是“由俄罗斯的侵略战争、芬兰和瑞典加入北约以及全球对北极及其自然资源日益增长的兴趣所驱动的”。

尽管没有直接提及俄罗斯，但赫拉宁今天表示，F-35“能够在更远的距离上探测到敌人，同时自身更难被发现[…]，这是其性能能力的必要组成部分”。

芬兰空军计划在“2028 年初”实现 F-35 的初始作战能力，并在“2030 年底前”实现全面作战能力。

预计洛克希德公司将继续向芬兰交付该型飞机，直至 2030 年底。除芬兰境内的两架飞机外，还有八架飞机驻扎在美国，用于飞行训练和工程维护。

根据芬兰今天发表的声明，到 2030 年代，欧洲将拥有大约 700 架 F-35 战机，未来还将出现“F-35 战斗机、人员和武器系统的联合使用和共享”。