Finland's Lapland Air Command to get first F-35 fighter jets in 2026

Finland’s first F-35s will be based up north, Report informs via The Barents Observer.

The announcement to base the first F-35 multirole aircraft up north was made by the Finnish Air Force on Friday.

“The Air Force’s F-35 fleet will be commissioned first to the Lapland Air Force in Rovaniemi in 2026,” Air Force Commander Brigadier General Juha-Pekka Keränen said.

The airbase is located on the Arctic Circle, seven kilometers north of Rovaniemi City Centre, and is Finland’s northernmost base with fighter jets.

It was last December Finland announced it had chosen to buy 64 of the F-35 to replace the current fleet of F/A-18 Hornets. The first F-35s will arrive at Rovaniemi in 2026 and all 64, including those to be based further south in Finland, will be in operation by 2030.

With Finland’s decision to join NATO, the cross-border strength of the Alliance’s fleet of F-35s in northernmost Europe will be significant. Norway, which already has received 34 of 52 aircraft, has its main airbase at Ørlandet in the south, but a few of the planes are on so-called Quick Reaction Alert (QRA) for NATO at Evenes airbase north of the Arctic Circle.