The Sky Warden’s Israeli variant will combine IAI’s mission techniques, {hardware} and software program.
Israel will purchase a personalized variant of L3Harris’ Sky Warden mild assault plane, which shall be domestically designated the Blue Sky Warden, based on a MoU (Memorandum of Understanding) signed between L3Harris and Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) on Oct. 15, 2025. The variety of plane Israel plans to amass is at present not identified.
A part of the Israeli Mild-Assault Plane Program, the plane could have “Israel-specific” software program, {hardware} and mission techniques designed and developed by IAI, based on the joint launch by L3Harris and IAI. After supplying and integrating its mission gear, IAI may even “lead flight checks and airworthiness campaigns with the Ministry of Protection and the Israeli Air Drive.”
The Sky Warden is a missionized spinoff of the Air Tractor AT-802U cropduster. Referred to as the OA-1K Skyraider II by the U.S. AFSOC (Air Drive Particular Operations Command), the plane was developed in response to the command’s Armed Overwatch program in 2022.
AFSOC revealed the ‘Skyraider II’ designation for the plane in the course of the Particular Air Warfare Symposium on Feb. 27, 2025. The title revives the legacy of the rugged and versatile A-1 Skyraider, which served from 1946 by the early Eighties.
L3Harris-IAI settlement
The press launch by L3Harris included among the many Israel-specific capabilities IAI’s “open-architecture mission laptop.” The assertion quoted IAI’s president and CEO Boaz Levy, who known as L3Harris a “long-standing and trusted associate with whom we’ve profitable partnerships on a number of fronts.”
“By combining IAI’s cutting-edge techniques and experience in mission techniques integration with L3Harris’ Sky Warden platform, we’re delivering a tailor-made answer that meets the evolving wants of the Ministry of Protection and Israeli Air Drive,” mentioned Levy.
“This strategic partnership with IAI permits us to supply a tailor-made variant of our Sky Warden to fulfill Israel’s operational and industrial wants,” mentioned Jon Rambeau, President, Built-in Mission Methods, L3Harris. “The Sky Warden light-attack plane delivers the best-in-class endurance, payload and survivability wanted for airborne ISR and different missions.”
Simplify and act. Widow mission execution software program simplifies advanced information into a typical working image, permitting customers to tailor their interface and obtain enhanced situational consciousness. Study extra: pic.twitter.com/LlafVAdw15
— L3Harris (@L3HarrisTech) October 11, 2025
L3Harris’ and IAI’s different areas of collaboration embrace the Phoenix CAEW&C (Conformal Airborne Early Warning and Management) plane primarily based on the Bombardier International 6500 enterprise jet. South Korea selected the Phoenix CAEW&C as its subsequent airborne radar on Sep. 30, following a aggressive bidding.
The Israeli firms are the builders of the EL/W-2085 CAEW AESA (Energetic Electronically Scanned Array) radar utilized by the Phoenix in addition to the usual CAEW, which is in service in Israel, Italy (as E-550A CAEW) and Singapore. This plane relies on the Gulfstream G-550 enterprise jet.
The collection of the Sky Warden plane additionally comes after L3Harris introduced on Aug. 27, 2025, an expanded manufacturing facility for the plane in Waco, Texas. Nonetheless, the U.S. SOCOM (Particular Operations Command) lowered its annual procurement for the OA-1K.
Air & Area Forces Journal reported solely six plane have been funded in Fiscal 12 months 2026, down from the beforehand deliberate 12, itself lowered from 15 plane in FY2025. The command’s general program of file, nonetheless, stays 75 plane.
Tactical use
The selection of Israeli avionics, sensors and mission techniques on the Blue Sky Warden additionally has a precedent within the nation making certain heavy customization of U.S. merchandise with its applied sciences. A major instance stays the F-35A, domestically designated the F-35I after it acquired unidentified Israeli-made applied sciences, making Israel the one nation to have modified the stealth fighter.
Complementing modifications are additionally current on the Israeli Air Drive’s F-15I Ra’am and F-16I Sufa to assist networking, information sharing and interoperability with the F-35Is. The Blue Sky Warden would even be extra suited to decrease depth operations in permissive, uncontested environments, as an alternative of the outsized F-15s and F-16.
The following struggle received’t anticipate a runway. It calls for an plane that may launch from wherever, join throughout the battlespace in actual time, & ship decisive results – all with a smaller footprint & decrease price. Study extra about Sky Warden: pic.twitter.com/iVS92LeEKs
— L3Harris (@L3HarrisTech) Could 7, 2025
A closely modernized turboprop CAS plane outfitted with superior optical, communications and focusing on sensors permits for extra exact reconnaissance-strike operations, avoiding collateral injury. With two highly effective optical sensors, the Wescam MX-15 and MX-20, on the port-side wing’s MMSP (Multi-Modal Sensor Pod) – assuming the Blue Sky Warden would retain that functionality, the plane could be suited to medium-altitudes, all-weather, day/evening ISR-strike roles.
Ought to the necessity come up, it could additionally assist to optimally use bigger and heavier platforms just like the F-15, F-16 and the AH-64 Apache by serving as a focusing on information relay level nearer to the motion.
Get an inside have a look at Sky Warden plane, the confirmed baseline for @AFSpecOpsCmd’s OA-1K Skyraider II. Study extra: pic.twitter.com/q5DcQMKgYF
— L3Harris (@L3HarrisTech) September 19, 2025
Weapons payloads and classes from present wars
It’s adequate to say the platform might have been recognized after classes learnt within the three years of operations in opposition to Hamas within the west, the Houthis within the south and Hezbollah within the north. Primarily, the Skyraider II’s capability to hold two seven-round LAU-131 A/A pods with APKWS II rockets permits cheaper interception of Houthi One-Method Assault drones, as an alternative of the bigger F-15s, F-16s or Apache helicopters.
Because it now seems, even A-10s within the CENTCOM (Central Command) AOR (Space of Accountability) have been used in opposition to drones, exhibiting how the associated fee asymmetry nonetheless persists between the threats and the platforms used to cease them.
The likelihood that the Blue Sky Wardens would fireplace the Israeli Spike NLOS (Non-Line of Sight), instead of the AGM-114 Hellfire, additionally can’t be dominated out. Evidently, the developmental testing of the OA-1K Skyraider II at Eglin AFB, Florida, from late June may even assist its speedy operationalization with the Israelis, with available testing and efficiency information.
