South Korea to Receive two F-35A Fighter Jets in March

South Korea will receive the first two of the 40 F-35A fighter jets it ordered from the United States in March this year.

"Two F-35As will arrive in South Korea by the end of March. They will be deployed by around April or May," Yonhap quoted a source as saying Sunday.

South Korea has ordered 40 jets in 2014 of which ten of them will be delivered in this year and the remaining before the end of 2021.

Each aircraft is priced at $107.5 million. Seoul plans to place an order for 20 more aircraft.  

The F-35A fighters are designed to evade detection and have the latest electronics suite that can allows them to be effective in well defended airspace. They fly at a top speed of Mach 1.6 and have a range of 2,170 km, carrying up to 8.2 tons of missiles and bombs.

The jets are a part of the South Korea's "kill chain" defense against North Korea's nuclear and missile bases and mobile missile launchers.