Japan and the United States agreed on 28 October 2026 to establish a final assembly and inspection facility in Japan for the Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missile, or AMRAAM, according to the Japanese Defence Ministry's meeting record.
The agreement came during talks between Defence Minister Shinjiro Koizumi and US defence chief Pete Hegseth in Cebu, Philippines, with Koizumi announcing it at a news conference that evening, according to the ministry transcript; international coverage followed around 29 October.
An assembly agreement with open details
The Japanese ministry describes the proposed facility as a final assembly and check-out, or FACO, operation; it does not identify a municipality, plant operator, construction start, production start, contract price or annual output in its account of the ministerial agreement.
Koizumi described AMRAAM as important for the F-35 and said the arrangement would support equipment procurement by both countries and Japan's industrial base, according to the news-conference transcript; he did not announce a particular AMRAAM variant or a first delivery date.
Air & Space Forces Magazine reported that the Pentagon's meeting summary welcomed Japan's industrial-capacity efforts and continued coordination on critical munitions, without mentioning the AMRAAM plant; the public accounts do not establish that a factory is under construction or a production contract has been signed.
Building on earlier industrial cooperation
The July 2024 bilateral joint statement had already called for expanded co-production opportunities for AMRAAM and Patriot PAC-3 MSE, including work on technology release, procurement quantities, timelines and financing; the new announcement follows that earlier effort rather than beginning missile cooperation from scratch.
An October 2024 DICAS statement, issued through the bilateral Defence Industrial Cooperation, Acquisition and Sustainment forum, called for a feasibility study covering AMRAAM production activities in Japan and their lead times, distinguishing industrial planning from an established production line.
At the latest meeting, the Japanese ministry also recorded agreement to share technical information needed to expand SM-3 Block IIA output under the Operation Supercharge initiative; that separate missile-production measure is not a statement that SM-3 missiles will be made at the proposed AMRAAM facility.
Export rules remain a separate requirement
Japan's April 2026 government explanation of revised transfer rules says overseas transfers of finished defence equipment are allowed in principle, while retaining case-by-case scrutiny and end-use controls; describing the country as maintaining an unchanged blanket ban would therefore misstate the published policy.
The government explanation says arms transfers are restricted to partners with relevant agreements, generally exclude countries where combat is taking place, and require Japanese consent for onward transfers; approval of a factory does not itself announce permission for every possible export destination.
The 28 October meeting record therefore establishes ministerial agreement on an AMRAAM assembly and inspection capability in Japan, but contains no customer allocation, financing breakdown or operating schedule; those omissions limit what can currently be said about the facility's implementation.