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U.S. Marine Corps F-35C Joint Strike Fighters flying from the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln took part in recent operations against Iranian-backed Houthi militants in Yemen, the Pentagon has disclosed. This appears to be one of the first combat outings, if not the first, for carrier-based C variants of the F-35 belonging to either the Marines or the U.S. Navy.
“U.S. Central Command [CENTCOM] forces executed a series of precise airstrikes [on] November 9 through 10 on multiple Houthi weapons storage facilities situated within Houthi-controlled territories in Yemen,” Pentagon Press Secretary Air Force Maj. Gen. Patrick Ryder said at a routine press briefing today. “These facilities housed a variety of advanced conventional weapons used by the Iran-backed Houthis to target US and international military and civilian vessels navigating international waters in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden.”
“The operation involved U.S. Air Force and U.S. Navy assets, to include F-35C fighter aircraft,” Ryder added.
“DOD: U.S. Navy F-35Cs make combat debut along with USAF aircraft in series of targeted operations Nov. 9-10 on Houthi targets in Yemen,” Brian Everstine, Aviation Week‘s Pentagon editor subsequently wrote in a post on X.
Maj. Gen. Ryder appears to have misspoken about the F-35Cs in question belonging to the Navy, as did Everstine (who later corrected himself). A video CENTCOM released today, seen below, shows F-35Cs, as well as an F/A-18F Super Hornet fighter and an EA-18G Growler electronic warfare aircraft, taking off from the supercarrier USS Abraham Lincoln as part of the November 9-10 strikes against the Houthis. The only F-35C unit aboard Lincoln currently is Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 314 (VMFA-314), the “Black Knights.”
During his briefing today, Maj. Gen. Ryder did not explicitly say that this was the first time F-35Cs had been employed in combat. It is possible that this is just the first time Marine C models have flown combat sorties. VMFA-314 may have flown combat missions in the region before now, as well. Lincoln first arrived in the CENTCOM area of responsibility back in August.
What munitions the F-35Cs employed during their sorites against the Houthis over the weekend is also unknown, but the jets in the CENTCOM video do not appear to be carrying any weapons externally. F-35Cs can currently carry 1,000 and 2,000-pound class Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM) GPS-assisted precision-guided bombs, 500-pound class Paveway-series laser-guided bombs, and AGM-154 Joint Stand-Off Weapon (JSOW) precision glide-bombs, as well as AIM-120 Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missiles (AMRAAM), internally
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