history In the US, several NASAMS were used to guard air space over Washington, D.C. during the 2005 United States presidential inauguration, and are used to protect air space around the White House. In 2017, Lithuania ordered the NASAMS-3 to improve its own air defense capabilities; two batteries were delivered in 2020. In April 2017, Australia approved a single-supplier-limited Request for Tender (RFT) to Raytheon Australia to develop NASAMS for the ADF short-range ground-based air-defence system. On 20 June 2019, Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace AS (Norway) was awarded a US$185 million contract by Raytheon Australia for delivery of NASAMS components, while Raytheon Australia is the prime contractor to deliver NASAMS to the Australian Government Land 19 Phase 7B program. The Australian version of NASAMS GBAD will use locally made components, Defence minister Marise Payne announced first-pass approval on 10 April 2017. By September 2021, the first two Fire Distribution Centres for the Australian NASAMS had passed factory acceptance tests. By February 2022, the Mk2 canister for NASAMS launchers had been completed; it was planned to deliver three canister launchers in 2022. In 2019, Qatar placed an order for AMRAAM-ER missiles as part of a NASAMS purchase. On 1 July 2022, the United States through the Pentagon announced, as part of an $820 million military aid package to Ukraine, the delivery of NASAMS air defense systems through the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative (USAI) during the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. A US defence official said the existing Ukrainian air defense systems are Soviet-type systems, so over time it will be harder to sustain them. This is part of updating Ukrainian air defence from Soviet-era to a modern one. The systems being supplied may come from Norwegian stocks and may be retired units. On 29 July 2022, the US DoD disclosed that it had started the formal process of acquiring two NASAMS batteries of 12 mobile launchers, each having six missiles, for Ukraine. On 24 August 2022, the US DoD announced that it would provide six additional NASAMS units "with additional munitions" to Ukraine under the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative (USAI). The Pentagon said in late September 2022 that the NASAMS would start to be delivered in "two months or so". The initial NASAMS batteries for Ukraine arrived in early November 2022. The Pentagon stated that NASAMS had a 100% success rate during the Russian missile strikes on 15 November 2022, and