On June 17, General Dynamics successfully completed the first firing of the U.S. Army’s 4.75-inch solid rocket motor, marking a major milestone in the development of tactical rocket artillery. The test was completed at the defense giant’s Camden facility.
By the Arkansas Black Vitality Staff
EAST CAMDEN, Ark. — Feb. 27, 2026 — Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth is scheduled to visit Camden on Friday (today) as part of his nationwide “Arsenal of Freedom” tour, with planned stops at defense contractors General Dynamics and L3 Harris at the Highland Industrial Park in East Camden.
During his visit, Hegseth is expected to highlight the role of American manufacturing in national security and the importance of strengthening the nation’s defense industrial base. During the visit, he will also administer the oath of enlistment to new military recruits in Arkansas.
The Arkansas stop comes as Hegseth wraps up the “Arsenal of Freedom” tour, a call to action focused on boosting U.S. manufacturing and energizing the American workforce. The tour highlights that national security relies on the speed and capacity of the Defense Industrial Base and the workers who support it.
In late January, Hegseth and Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Arkansas, postponed their previously planned tour of the extensive military-industrial complex in Calhoun due to the winter storm that covered the entire state. During this visit, Hegseth and Cotton will be joined by Gov. Sanders and will give brief remarks after the tour.
Hegseth’s nationwide tour, which began in early January, supports President Trump’s “peace through strength” agenda and promotes a new approach to defense acquisition that emphasizes speed, innovation, and a commercial-first mindset, DoD officials said.
The effort involves reducing bureaucratic hurdles and offering long-term contract stability to encourage investment and growth in industry. “The goal is to create a defense ecosystem that is more agile and accountable, capable of delivering the tools our warfighters need, when they need them,” said a DoD advisory.
The significance of Calhoun County’s industrial site has been vital to U.S. national security and the Pentagon’s efforts to rebuild the nation’s depleted weapons and munitions stockpiles, which have been significantly reduced to support Ukraine’s national defense against Russia over the past four years.
Camden production accelerates as Ukraine war depletes U.S. weapons stockpiles
Under former President Biden, each Ukraine security package included ample shipments of Arkansas-made rocket launchers and precision-guided missiles. In 2022, Pentagon officials during the Biden administration also visited the Camden site to visit Lockheed Martin’s Missiles & Fire Control manufacturing facility was ramping up ramp up production of High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS) M142 launchers that were headed to Ukraine.
The HIMARS system is a combat-proven, all-weather, wheeled, precision-strike weapons system that is transportable by air and can launch multiple warheads accurately at its targets. In tandem with the HIMARS mobile rocket launcher, Lockheed workers in south Arkansas also produce the Guided Multiple Launch Rocket System (GMLRS) that includes a variety of rockets and missiles that can accurately hit strategic military targets up to 50 miles away. Besides being compatible with GMLRS, the HIMARS system can also launch other warheads in the U.S. Army tactical missile arsenal.
According to data gathered by Arkansas Black Vitality and the Arkansas Delta Informer, Congress allocated more than $66.5 billion in security assistance to Ukraine during President Biden’s tenure, following Russia’s unprovoked and brutal invasion on February 24, 2022.
During today’s visit, Hegseth and his team of Pentagon advisers will tour the 1300-worker manufacturing sites of General Dynamics and L3 Harris, which in 2023 purchased former Camden defense contractor Aerojet Rocketdyne for $4.7 billion.
As reported by the Arkansas Delta Informer last week, L3 Harris announced on Feb. 16 that it has secured a nearly $400 million contract with the DOD’s Missile Defense Agency to manufacture additional solid rocket boost motors and Liquid Divert and Attitude Control Systems (LDACS) for the Missile Defense Agency’s Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system.
“THAAD is the only U.S. system designed to intercept targets outside and inside the atmosphere, making it a critical part of the United States’ missile defense system,” said Ken Bedingfield, president of L3Harris’ missile solutions business. “THAAD is paramount to the security of this nation and our allies, and we are dedicated to delivering our proven propulsion for years to come.”
In early January, Lockheed Martin and the Department of Defense (DoD) signed a new framework agreement to boost THAAD interceptor production capacity from 96 to 400 per year. Lockheed is the prime contractor for the truck-mounted, mobile defense system, which plays a vital role in U.S. ballistic missile defense and uses “hit-to-kill” technology to destroy enemy threat missiles.
A THAAD battery consists of 90 soldiers, six truck-mounted launchers, 48 interceptors, radar surveillance and control, and a tactical fire control and communications unit.
Along with a multimillion-dollar deal, L3 also broke ground in November , with Gov. Sanders present at its new Arkansas Advanced Propulsion Facilities (AAPF) campus. This large, solid rocket motor (SRM) production site, which is partly funded by a $215.6M cooperative agreement signed in 2023 with DoD to expand and modernize aging Aerojet Rocketdyne facilities, spans 110 acres and is expected to increase SRM manufacturing capacity by six times.
The campus will expand by adding 230,000 square feet of manufacturing and office space to the larger 2,000-acre Camden site, increasing total manufacturing space to over 1.5 million square feet. Program-agnostic equipment and buildings will also allow the company to quickly adjust production to meet current demand and respond to changing customer needs.
However, the largest and most unconventional venture that L3 Harris has undertaken with the DoD is a first-of-its-kind initial public offering to invest in the Melbourne, Fla.-based defense company’s Missile Solutions division through a $1 billion convertible preferred security.
L3Harris said it intends to pursue the IPO in the second half of 2026, creating a newly traded public company “focused on delivering critical propulsion systems at unprecedented speed and scale.”
Since acquiring Aerojet Rocketdyne three years ago, L3Harris has stated that it has made significant investments to transform and expand its production operations and has recently established the Missile Solutions business, integrating all its capabilities to support offensive and defensive missile systems.
The DoD investment, which continues the Trump administration’s market-moving trend of taking stakes in publicly traded companies, will support L3 Harris’s rapid expansion of capacity for the Pentagon’s critical missile programs, such as PAC-3, THAAD, Tomahawk, and Standard Missile, officials said.
Camden’s “Big Three” Defense Contractors
Hegseth, DoD officials, and the Arkansas entourage also plan to visit the manufacturing site of General Dynamics, which, along with Highland tenants Lockheed Martin and RTX, are among the so-called “big five” defense contractors that receive the largest share of the Pentagon’s $1.5 trillion annual budget. Boeing and Northrop Grumman are the other two biggest publicly traded defense contractors in the U.S.
The visit to General Dynamics will also likely include more confidential discussions on restocking the nation’s depleted ammunition stockpile. A year ago, U.S. Army and General Dynamics Ordnance and Tactical Systems announced the opening of a new load, assemble, and pack (LAP) facility for 155 mm high-explosive artillery projectiles at the Highland Industrial Park.
That 155 mm artillery facility represents an $110 million investment for General Dynamics Ordnance and Tactical Systems and is expected to create 185 new jobs at the Calhoun County manufacturing site. Once fully operational, the General Dynamics manufacturing facility’s two LAP lines will produce 155 mm explosives at a rate of 50,000 per month.
In Camden, General Dynamics operations house over 880,000 square feet of manufacturing and storage space and over 100 workers support various U.S. military programs, including the Hydra-70 2.75-inch rocket, Hellfire and Javelin missiles, the Modular Artillery Charge System, and various mortar munitions.
Although not mentioned by Pentagon press officials, the DoD tour could also include visits with RTX officials, which also has operations at Highland’s 19,000-acre military industrial complex. In late 2025, RTX and Hafia, Israel-based Rafael Protection Systems (R2S) secured a major $1.25 billion contract to produce interceptor missiles in south Arkansas for the Israel’s Iron Dome.
R2S, a manufacturing company formed by (formerly Raytheon) and Rafael, will use the new East Camden facility to produce the Iron Dome’s Tamir interceptor and its U.S. version, the SkyHunter Interceptor. Rafael is the original creator of the Iron Dome, a system that has significantly changed air defense globally and protected Israel from aerial and other short-range missile assaults.
Operational in Israel since 2011, Israel’s Iron Dome has consistently demonstrated its effectiveness in combat, intercepting thousands of threats with a success rate over 95%. The new Camden facility represents a total investment of approximately $63 million and is expected to generate up to 60 new jobs in the region.
With current Gov. Sarah Sanders, who served as President Trump’s former press secretary, and her father, former Gov. Mike Huckabee, now the 29th U.S. Ambassador to Israel under the same president, the R2S joint venture could open the door for more economic and defense contracts to the South Arkansas military manufacturing hub.
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