RhienMetall - Air Defense Systems
EUROSAM GIE - "EUROSAM is the leading French-Italian Joint Venture in Europe that designs, produces, sells, exports and maintains, long range ground and naval based air defense systems."
European Ground-Based Air Defense Programs
European Capabilities
Europe’s defence industry has a number of champions in the field of anti-aircraft missiles. First and foremost is MBDA, a joint subsidiary of Airbus (37.5%), BAE Systems (37.5%) and Leonardo (25%), resulting from the merger of Matra BAe Dynamics, Aerospatiale Matra Missiles and Alenia Marconi Systems.
After winning a large contract from France and Italy for missiles of the Aster family signed at the end of the year (approximately EUR 2 Bn), MBDA signed for the supply of CAMM medium-range missiles to Poland. The European missile builder has already secured more orders amounting to EUR 4 Bn in four months.
Thales produces high-quality radars and Command and Control (C2) capabilities for air defence systems, in addition to well-known missiles such as StarStreak and LMM. Germany has the support of Diehl, which produces the IRIS-T missile and its land-based version, in both short- and medium-range variants.
Added to this, in April 2022, Diehl and Hensoldt decided to intensify their cooperation. Swedish manufacturer Saab produces the RBS70, which includes its NG version. The company also offers radar such as the Giraffe 1X multi-mission 3D. In partnership with Raytheon, Norway’s Kongsberg has been developing the National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile System (NASAMS) whose model 3 is already fully operational.
Lower Layers of Air Defense
The return of the threat of so-called high-intensity conflicts has revived very short-range air defence (VSHORAD) programmes, a good example of which is the Skyranger 30, produced by Germany’s Rheinmetall Air Defence. Denmark announced on 16 May 2023 that they had selected this piece of equipment.
The turret is equipped with a radar, infrared sensors, and a laser rangefinder. The armament is an Oerlikon KCE 30 × 173 mm automatic cannon that fires Advanced Hit Efficiency and Destruction (AHEAD) air bursting munitions, each of which releases 160 tungsten projectiles. The 1,200 rpm gun is extremely precise, allowing it to engage small aerial targets such as drones.
The Thales rapid fire cannon is also a solution to counter armed drones and loitering ammunition. The system results from a Thales partnership with Nexter. Its 40 mm Case Telescoped Armament (CTA) cannon has the compactness of a 25 mm cannon and provides heavy firepower up to 4,000 m, with a reduced logistics footprint compared to a conventional cannon of the same calibre.
It took 25 months to overcome the layered defense NATO spent 8-10 years to emplace. Had the war with Russia which NATO planned for lasted a year or less, NATO could have won that war. However, Russia has now grown from 377K active forces worldwide against Ukraine’s 1.2m under arms to 1.1m against Ukraine’s (ZELINSKI PROVIDES THE NUMBER). Accroding to Ukraine they still have 1.2m under arms plus the 600k they have added since the war began.
Now that the layered defense is gone, we will see how long it is before France’s 2000 soldiers are gone.