Boeing has reportedly applied for and received a licence to export its conceptual F-15SE to South Korea. Flightglobal reports an export licence was granted earlier this year following a submission by Boeing on the aircraft’s radar cross section to the US government.
A development of the F-15E, the SE features two internal weapons bays in the each side fuselage conformal tank, canted vertical stabilisers, and low observable coatings to substantially reduce the standard F-15’s large radar cross section. Boeing is expected to fly the new conformal tanks on its F-15E demonstrator later this year, but is unlikely to proceed with a full development program without a launch order from a customer such as South Korea, Japan, Israel or Saudi Arabia.
Saudi Arabia has also been reported as being close to ordering 72 F-15s of an unspecified model to add to its current fleet of about 150 F-15C/Ds and F-15Ss.
