Lockheed Martin's first F-16 Block 72 completes maiden flight before delivery to Morocco.

The first newly manufactured F-16 Block 72 fighter jet built for the Royal Moroccan Air Force completed its maiden flight at Lockheed Martin’s Greenville facility in South Carolina. The milestone initiates formal flight testing for the aircraft ahead of its scheduled delivery under a broader military modernization initiative. This acquisition expands the nation's tactical aircraft inventory while standardizing advanced avionics and sensor architectures across the fleet.

The Royal Moroccan Air Force's initial F-16 Block 72 two-seat aircraft successfully executed its first flight following a 2019 Foreign Military Sale approval for 25 jets. This program runs parallel to a modernization effort for 23 existing Block 52+ fighters, ultimately expanding the nation's operational F-16 fleet to 48 airframes equipped with AN/APG-83 AESA radars.

Related topic: Morocco remains in talks with the US over possible F-35 fighter jet sale

The F-16 Block 72 combines a 12,000-hour airframe, AN/APG-83 AESA radar, and modernized avionics with the Pratt & Whitney F100-PW-229 engine, and is an export variant, as the U.S. Air Force transitioned to the F-35. (Picture source: Lockheed Martin)

On October 6, 2026, Lockheed Martin announced that the F-16 Block 72 flew for the first time, with the maiden flight conducted by the first aircraft built for the Royal Moroccan Air Force at Lockheed Martin’s Greenville plant in South Carolina. The two-seat F-16D is therefore both the first Block 72 to fly and the first of Morocco’s new Block 72 fleet, and it has now entered flight testing ahead of delivery. Morocco became the variant’s launch customer in March 2019, when the United States approved a possible $3.787 billion sale of 25 F-16C/D Block 72s, including 29 F100-PW-229 engines, four of them spares, and 26 AN/APG-83 SABR AESA radars, one of them a spare. The maiden flight came 7.5 years after that approval and more than three years after the first new-build F-16 Block 70, for Bahrain, flew in January 2023. Morocco is simultaneously modernizing the 23 F-16C/D Block 52+ fighters remaining from its original 24-aircraft fleet, so completion of both programs would increase its F-16 inventory from 23 to 48 aircraft, a 108.7% increase comprising 25 new Block 72s and 23 upgraded fighters.

The Block 70/72, also known as the F-16V/F-16 Viper, grew from two parallel efforts to keep the F-16 relevant after the production for the U.S. had shifted toward the F-35. The UAE ordered 80 F-16E/F Block 60s in 2000, and this variant first flew in December 2003 with major changes including the AN/APG-80 AESA radar, advanced avionics, and flight controls; experience from that program was later fed directly into the Block 70/72, particularly its avionics architecture and flight-control functions. Lockheed Martin then unveiled the F-16V concept in February 2012 as a way to insert a new AESA radar, mission computer, cockpit and avionics architecture into existing F-16s while making the same technology available for future production aircraft. When demand for newly manufactured F-16s continued, particularly from countries seeking a lower-cost alternative or complement to fifth-generation fighters, this F-16V avionics package became the basis of the new-production Block 70/72: Bahrain became the first new-build Block 70 customer in 2017, and its first aircraft flew in January 2023.

The split into Block 70 and 72 follows an F-16 convention dating to the Block 30/32 family, allowing customers to retain the engine family already present in their fleets. Both use essentially the same airframe, AN/APG-83 radar, mission computer, digital cockpit, flight-control architecture, and 12,000-hour structural design life. The principal difference is propulsion, as the Block 70 uses the General Electric F110-GE-129, while the Block 72 uses the Pratt & Whitney F100-PW-229. This engine produces 129.7 kN with afterburner compared with 131.2 kN for the F110-GE-129, a difference of only 1.5 kN or 1.2%. Morocco’s existing Block 52+ fleet already uses the F100 engine, so the Block 72 choice avoids introducing a second engine family and allows the RMAF to retain established maintenance training, tooling, spare-parts stocks and engine-support procedures as its F-16 inventory more than doubles.

The AN/APG-83 represents one of the largest capability changes. This AESA radar can maintain more than 20 target tracks, produce high-resolution synthetic-aperture radar imagery and interleave air-to-air and air-to-surface functions, with a stated reliability and availability three to five times those of legacy F-16 radars. The 6 × 8-inch Center Pedestal Display gives the pilot a larger surface for radar imagery, targeting pod video, color moving maps and tactical information, while the new mission computer integrates weapons and avionics processing. Link 16 extends the aircraft’s information picture beyond its own radar by exchanging tracks and tactical data with compatible fighters, command-and-control nodes and other air, land and maritime units, while IRST provides a passive means of detecting and tracking airborne targets without transmitting radar energy. Optional conformal fuel tanks add 440 U.S. gallons (1,666 liters) of fuel, and the new airframe is designed for 12,000 flight hours, more than 50% beyond earlier production F-16 structural design life.

The numerical effect on the RMAF is equally significant because Morocco is effectively rebuilding its F-16 force around two closely related configurations. Its first acquisition comprised 24 Block 52 fighters, 16 F-16Cs and eight F-16Ds delivered in 2010-2011, of which 23 remain after the loss of one aircraft during operations in Yemen in May 2015. The United States separately authorized an estimated $985 million modernization of those surviving aircraft in March 2019, including the APG-83 and other F-16V equipment, while the parallel $3.787 billion acquisition added 25 newly manufactured Block 72s. The resulting 48-aircraft force would be exactly twice Morocco’s original 24-aircraft F-16 procurement and 25 aircraft larger than its current surviving inventory. New Block 72s would constitute 52.1% of the force and upgraded Block 52+ aircraft 47.9%, but the older fighters therefore gain much of the sensor and mission-system architecture of the new F-16 without becoming structurally identical to Block 72s.

This distinction matters for force generation because Morocco is increasing its fleet of fighter jets while attempting to limit the number of separate configurations that pilots and maintainers must support. APG-83 and Link 16 across both groups can provide a substantially more common sensor and tactical-data baseline, while the F100 engine lineage links the new aircraft to the propulsion infrastructure already supporting the Block 52+ fleet. Viper Shield adds an internal electronic-warfare architecture with a digital Radar Warning Receiver designed to interface with the AESA radar, while Sniper targeting pods and helmet-mounted cueing connect detection and tracking to air-to-air and precision air-to-ground weapon employment. Morocco would consequently gain 25 additional fighters without establishing an entirely separate fighter ecosystem, an important distinction for a fleet of only 48 aircraft because duplicate engine training, tooling, spare inventories and maintenance pipelines would consume personnel and funding that can instead remain concentrated on the F-16 and F-100 families.

Training capacity is already being expanded before the new F-16 fleet reaches full strength. In August 2026, CAE received a contract worth up to $42.103 million for two Moroccan F-16 Block 72 full-mission trainer systems and contractor logistics support, with $37.975 million obligated at award and completion scheduled for April 30, 2029. Each system includes a Block 72 cockpit, instructor-operator station, visual display and computing systems, power equipment, and helmet-mounted display equipment, with work divided between Arlington, Texas, and Sidi Slimane Air Base in Morocco. Two simulators for 25 new aircraft allow conversion, emergency procedures, and tactical training to be conducted without consuming fighter flight hours. Sustainment infrastructure is expanding in parallel through an MRO facility at Benslimane exceeding 8,000 m², initially intended for C-130 Hercules heavy maintenance and modernization but now planned to expand to the F-16. These investments become more relevant when viewed against a fighter inventory rising by 108.7%, because twice as many F-16s require additional pilot throughput, maintenance manpower, scheduled inspections, spare components, and ground support capacity, even where configuration commonality reduces duplication.

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Written by Jérôme Brahy

Jérôme Brahy is a defense analyst and documentalist at Army Recognition. He specializes in naval modernization, aviation, drones, armored vehicles, and artillery, with a focus on strategic developments in the United States, China, Ukraine, Russia, South Korea, Türkiye, and Belgium. His analyses go beyond the facts, providing context, identifying key actors, and explaining why defense news matters on a global scale.