What the FY2027 request buys
Verbatim from the R-2A exhibit for project 3072 of PE 0604329N. This is the budget justification's own description of work that has not happened yet — the one thing no other level of the budget carries.
Complete F/A 18 operational test events supporting the SDB II Full Rate Production decision, validating weapon performance, platform integration, and mission system readiness. Finalize F 35B/F 35C software required for full SDB II employment, including mission system updates, weapon interface refinements, and regression testing across supported baselines. Complete BRU 61C/A hardware development and execute remaining system qualification testing to confirm compatibility, certification, and readiness for fleet integration.
Funding increase required to complete F-35B/F-35C software integration to accelerate SDB II Initial Operational Capability (IOC), finalize BRU 61C/A development and system qualification, and complete F/A 18 operational test events.
FY2026: the year under way
Prior-year accomplishments and current-year plans from the same exhibit. Context for the FY2027 plan, not a series — an activity partitions its project exactly in the request year, but can under-cover it in earlier years.
Program efforts in FY 2026 focus on continued integration and operational/developmental testing on the F-35B and F-35C platforms. Activities include software integration, flight test execution and resolution of deficiencies identified during prior test events. The program will also begin BRU 61C/A sub-system qualification.
Three years, and no five-year plan
An R-2A activity publishes the prior year, the current year and the budget year. The FYDP outyears exist at project and program-element level and are deliberately absent here rather than inferred. Estimate types are colored and never summed into one figure.
| Fiscal Year | Estimate Type | Amount ($M) |
|---|---|---|
| FY2025 | Actual | 19.2 |
| FY2026 | Enacted | 17.8 |
| FY2027 | Request | 43.8 |
This activity is 68% of project 3072's FY2027 request and 68% of PE 0604329N's. In the request year the activities under a project sum to it exactly; in the current year they under-cover it in about 9% of cases, so an activity's delta can legitimately exceed its parent's and the two must not be compared row to row.
2 activities in project 3072
Every R-2A line of this project, largest FY2027 request first. Linked where the activity has enough of its own narrative to carry a page; the rest are shown in full on the program-element page.