The McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle is an American twin-engined, all-weather tactical fighter aircraft designed by McDonnell Douglas (now Boeing) to gain and maintain air supremacy in all aspects of aerial combat. Following reviews of proposals, the United States Air Force selected McDonnell Douglas's design in 1967 to meet the service's need for a dedicated air-superiority fighter. The Eagle first flew in July 1972, and entered service in 1976. It is among the most successful modern fighters, with over 100 victories and no losses in aerial combat, with the majority of the kills by the Israeli Air Force.

Dubbed the F-15EX, the new variant of the venerable jet offers more modern flight controls, cockpit displays, and radar. It would also pack more firepower, including two dozen air-to-air missiles.

As far as the F-15EX's specifications, sources describe the aircraft as a single seat variant of the latest F-15 advanced Strike Eagle derivative - the F-15QA destined for Qatar - but it will also integrate many of the features and upgrades that the USAF intends (or intended as it may be) to include on its nearly four-decade-old F-15C/D fleet.

It includes a flat-panel glass cockpit, JHMCS II helmet mounted display (HMD), revised internal wing structure, fly-by-wire controls, [and] APG-82 AESA radar, as well as the Eagle Passive Active Warning Survivability System (EPAWSS) electronic warfare and electronic surveillance suite, among other features.

The plane will pack a ton of firepower. Among its configurations will be twenty-two air-to-air missiles, eight air-to-air missiles and twenty-eight Small Diameter Bombs (SDBs), or seven larger two-thousand-pound bombs with the same eight air-to-air missiles. That compares to just eight air-to-air missiles for the F-15C/D Eagle.

Pictured here is a 1:72 scale diecast replica of a USAF Boeing F-15EX Eagle II multirole fighter that was attached to the 96th Operations Group, 96th Test Wing, then deployed to Eglin AFB, Florida, during December 2023. Back Order! Return to stock date: 2026.

Dimensions:
Wingspan: 7-inches
Length: 10-1/2-inches

Release Date: December 2025

Historical Account: "It is Always the Hour" - The 96th Test Wing is a United States Air Force unit assigned to the Air Force Test Center of Air Force Materiel Command at Eglin Air Force Base, Florida. The wing was activated at Eglin in 1994 as the 96th Air Base Wing, the headquarters for all support units on Eglin, the largest installation in the Air Force. In 2012, it absorbed the mission and resources of the 46th Test Wing and added the mission of testing and evaluating weapons, navigation and guidance systems and command and control systems.

The U.S. Air Force Historical Research Agency has determined that the wing's first predecessor was the 96th Bombardment Group, activated in 1942. After training in the United States, the group began bombing missions flying Boeing B-17 Flying Fortresses. It led the first shuttle mission from Great Britain to Regensburg on August 17th, 1943. The group earned two Distinguished Unit Citations for its combat performance. After VE Day, the group returned to the United States and was inactivated. The group was briefly active in the Air Force Reserve from 1947 until 1949.