The Dutch Defence Ministry intends to work with local shipbuilder Damen Naval for the naval platform and with Thales for the above-water warfare system, though it still needs to reach agreement with the companies, the government said. The four existing air-defense frigates will be replaced one by one, with the first new vessel expected to be operational in 2036.

The current Zeven Provinciën-class frigates came into service between 2002 and 2005 and would need to be replaced in the 2030s, according to the ministry. In addition, modern weapons such as hypersonic anti-ship missiles and a proliferation of relatively simple systems such as drones have created a growing threat to naval vessels.

“The current frigates will be at the end of their lifespan in the next decade,” the ministry said in a statement. “The ships’ armament with anti-air missiles is also due for renewal. These projects are therefore being combined.”

The Dutch government is in discussion about cooperation with other European countries seeking to replace frigates, in particular Denmark, Germany and Norway, but has yet to reach any concrete agreement, the ministry said in its letter to parliament. Cooperation could include joint development and construction, as well as joint purchasing, training and maintenance, it said.

“The Netherlands is taking the lead on these ships, but we would welcome other countries joining us,” Van der Maat said in a video statement.

First delivery is scheduled for 2034 at the latest, with the final of the four new air-defense frigates becoming operational in 2041. That means the current fleet will continue to sail for two more years than initially planned, according to the ministry.

Van der Maat’s letter to parliament sets out the requirements for the new frigates, with budget discussions and project approval requests to follow in coming years.

The Netherlands plans to reuse some equipment being installed to modernize its existing air-defense frigates, including two new Active Phased Array Radars and four 127mm cannons against surface targets. The radar and fire control system in the works for two new anti-submarine warfare frigates will be further developed for the new air-defense vessels.

The replacement frigates will have layered air defense, with a preference for various ranges to be covered by missiles from the same manufacturer, the ministry said. The vessels will additionally be equipped with Tomahawk cruise missiles, as well as with Kongsberg’s Naval Strike Missile.

The new frigates “will have long-range weapons at their disposal, enabling them to attack important enemy targets inland from a great distance,” Van der Maat said. “This way, the Netherlands can fulfill its role as a seafaring nation and make an important contribution to safety at sea.”

The frigate replacement is the ministry’s biggest maritime project, with a budget for the vessels of more than €2.5 billion, and an additional €1 billion to €2.5 billion investment for the weapon systems. The budget assumes the bare hull will be built elsewhere in Europe, as is the case for the new anti-submarine warfare frigates, though local construction isn’t ruled out, the ministry said.

The new ships will also include defense against hypersonic weapons, which is not part of the budget due to still being in development, the ministry said. The Netherlands is part of the Hypersonic Defence Interceptor Study project, led by pan-European missile maker MBDA.

The defense ministry is replacing most of its major naval surface combatants in the next 15 years, which it said will significantly improve Dutch maritime capabilities, while the resulting industrial cooperation will “provide a powerful boost to European strategic autonomy and the Dutch defense industry.”

The project is linked to the $9.6 billion jet procurement contract reached between Finland’s MOD and the American company Lockheed Martin in February 2022. The deal covers the delivery of 64 F-35s to the Finnish Air Force.

The building of the aircraft assembly facility forms part of the contract’s so-called stage one industrial component. The umbrella project required the signing of a lease for a suitable assembly plant development site. This was found near the town of Nokia. The site lease was signed in January between the Finnish Defence Forces and Defence Properties Finland, the state organization tasked with managing properties and assets owned by Finland’s defense administration.

Construction work on the engine assembly building is slated to commence during the second half of 2024. Under the terms of the industrial deal struck between Finland and Lockheed Martin, engine maintenance at the facility in Nokia will continue throughout the entire life cycle of the Air Force’s F-35 fleet.

“Industrial cooperation tied to the F-35 agreement will generate critical maintenance and repair expertise for Finland’s indigenous defense industry. This includes performance areas like reliability of maintenance. The agreement will also create significant know-how in Finland for F-35 engine assembly and testing,” Defence Minister Antti Häkkänen said.

The assembly plant will operate in close collaboration with the regional aircraft hub in Tampere run by Patria’s aviation division. An estimated 100 personnel will work in various assembly roles at the facility.

The government owns 50.1% of Patria, and the Norwegian company Kongsberg controls the remainder. Patria itself owns half of the Norwegian defense contractor Nammo.

The F-35s are set to replace the Air Force’s ageing McDonnell Douglas F/A-18 Hornet jets. These planes are scheduled to retire by 2030. The first batch of the F-35s on order are due for delivery and then deployment to Arctic air bases in Finland’s Lapland region by 2026.

The industrial cooperation component of the F-35 acquisition deal is expected to be scaled up in stages by 2030. The broadening of the industrial agreement may include the production or assembly in Finland of certain parts and systems used in the aircraft.

The Air Force has already tested the F-35′s suitability and adaptability to operate in extreme weather conditions, especially in Arctic areas of Finland during the country’s long winters that feature limited daylight.

In recent exercises, the service routinely used stretches of “closed highway” in Arctic and sub-Arctic regions as temporary airstrips. The Air Force is currently running such maneuvers as part of the weeklong Hanki drills in the north of the country, which are to continue until March 2.

The 74-page whitepaper, which the service unveiled during its annual symposium this week and which builds on a similar document published four years ago, details planned procurements out to 2037.

“The Air Force is aware of [the importance of] long-term development planning and spending of the national budget to achieve maximum value,” said the service’s commander, Air Chief Marshal Panpakdee Pattanakul.

Indeed, part of the whitepaper’s raison d’être is to stake claims for long-term funding as its aircraft inventories age. For instance, the 2020 version stated the fighter fleet had an average age of 26 years, a figure that continues to increase.

But the government’s procurement process is disjointed, according to Greg Raymond, an expert in Asia-Pacific affairs at the Australian National University. He cited factors like political instability, inadequate strategic planning, annual rather than multiyear budgeting measures, and weak civil oversight that allows each armed service to makes its own decisions.

In the latest whitepaper, the Air Force gives priority to a medium-range air defense system possessing a minimum 30-nautical-mile range from fiscal 2025 to fiscal 2028. Afterward, from FY33 to FY37, the service plans to carry out a second phase for a medium- or long-range air defense system.

From FY28 to FY32, the force plans to buy a short-range air defense system boasting gun-, missile and laser-based weapons. Credence is given to counter-drone systems, too, and a nine-year project to procure these is to commence in 2025.

The service is also eyeing 12-14 new fighters to replace the F-16 jets of 102 Squadron based at Korat. The procurement is scheduled to take place from FY25 to FY34, two years later than originally planned. The squadron’s F-16s from the late 1980s are to retire by 2028.

Two contenders have emerged for the aircraft requirement: Lockheed Martin’s F-16 Block 70/72 and Saab’s Gripen.

“We’re confident the F-16 Block 70/72 will complement the RTAF’s existing F-16 fleet and deliver the advanced 21st century security capabilities and performance needed to address Thailand’s most pressing defense requirements,” a Lockheed spokesperson told Defense News.

Thailand ordered its first Gripen C/D fighters in 2008. Following a January 2021 contract, the aircraft were upgraded to what the manufacturer calls the MS20 configuration.

Robert Björklund, who markets the Gripen to Thailand for Saab, told Defense News the existing fleet is integrated into the Saab-supplied Link T data system and that the aircraft provides its user with “a very wide range of weapon options, including its highly effective RBS15 anti-ship missile.”

A second fighter replacement project for 12-14 aircraft is slated for FY31 to FY35 to replace F-5E/F jets of 211 Squadron at Ubon that are to retire around the end of the decade. An identical number of fighters are needed to replace F-16A/Bs of 403 Squadron at Takhli from FY37 to FY46.

Thailand tries to maintain relations with several competing nations, including the United States, China, Russia and India, the whitepaper noted. Thailand previously purchase materiel from China, such as armored vehicles, air defense systems and a submarine.

Asked whether the Royal Thai Air Force would consider buying a Chinese fighter like the J-10CE, Raymond said the service values its relationship with the U.S. and likeminded allies too much to do so. He noted that Thai-U.S. relations have “largely stabilized,” despite the latter denying the former’s request to buy F-35A jets last year.

“They wouldn’t want to see themselves placed on the outer [circle] in terms of not getting invitations to things like [exercise] Pitch Black in Australia. I tend to think they’d be perhaps more careful about getting Chinese aircraft than the Thai Navy was about getting a submarine,” he said.

The whitepaper also detailed an effort starting this year to refurbish C-130H Hercules transport aircraft. The 2020 version recommended the service buy 12 replacements, but that idea was dropped.

As for pilot training, last year’s delivery of 12 T-6TH trainers allowed the Air Force to retire its Pilatus PC-9 fleet last month. New Zealand-built CT-4E trainers are to retire in 2031, so basic trainers will be needed from FY33. New lead-in fighter trainers are also sought from FY25, with Thailand already operating the South Korean T-50TH in this role.

The new whitepaper also emphasized unmanned technologies. One effort underway is the Thai-developed M Solar X solar-powered drone. Loitering munitions are also schedule for purchase by 2026, as are medium combat drones from FY26 to FY29 and high-altitude pseudo-satellites from FY24 to FY35.

The Air Force also mentioned procurement programs for micro- and nano-drone swarms from FY26, and a research and development effort for weaponized tactical drones from FY29.

And two Saab 340B Erieye airborne early warning aircraft are to receive enhanced command-and-control capabilities, with their dorsal-mounted radars to be replaced. This would take place from FY26 to FY29.

The government’s FY24 defense budget bill calls for a 198 billion baht (U.S. $5.5 billion) fund, of which $1 billion is for the Air Force. The service has already applied for an allocation of approximately $530 million for a first batch of four fighters.

Turkey has sought to lock down the sale, which includes 40 new F-16s made by Lockheed Martin as well as modernization kits for 79 fighter jets in its current fleet, for several years. The State Department finally approved the sale when Turkey ratified Sweden’s NATO membership after stalling for more than a year.

Sen Rand Paul, R-Ky., on Thursday forced the vote on the resolution to block the sale, citing “significant human rights issues, arbitrary killings, suspicious deaths of person in custody, torture, arbitrary arrests and continued detention of tens of thousands of persons.”

“I also remain deeply concerned about the negative strategic implications of this proposed sale, given Turkey’s reckless military actions in recent years,” Paul said on the Senate floor ahead of the vote.

Paul noted that a U.S. F-16 shot down a Turkish drone in October in northeast Syria, where American troops back Kurdish-majority forces Ankara considers a terrorist organization. He also pointed to Turkey’s deployment of F-16s to Azerbaijan in 2020 during its war with Armenia over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region.

Senate Foreign Relations Chairman Ben Cardin, D-Md., defended the sale on the floor after greenlighting it last month.

“I consulted closely with the highest levels of the Biden administration about this transaction over several months,” said Cardin. “I believe they share my concerns, and I believe we are making progress.”

Cardin argued Russia’s invasion of Ukraine presented a strategic imperative for Sweden’s NATO accession as well as the need to modernize Turkey’s capabilities within the alliance. He said the sale would upgrade Turkey’s “aging F-16 fleet to a more capable model, a model that is compatible with the United States.”

“Turkey is key to the defense of the southern flank of NATO,” said Cardin. “It is host to a major U.S. military presence, and Turkey’s F-16 fleet contributes to NATO, including in the Black Sea, which is critical to our national security.”

The State Department also approved an $8.6 billion sale of F-35 stealth fighter jets to Greece last month at the same time it greenlit Turkey’s F-16 purchase.

The U.S. expelled Turkey from the F-35 co-production program in 2019 over Ankara’s purchase of the S-400 missile defense system due to fears Moscow could use its advanced radar system to spy on the stealth fighter jets.

The U.S. and Italian firms signed a memorandum of understanding to “evaluate cooperation opportunities in the tiltrotor technology domain,” they said in a statement Thursday.

That cooperation will get underway in earnest with a NATO Next Generation Rotorcraft Capability concept study, where Leonardo will take the lead on a tiltrotor architecture proposal with Textron’s Bell in support, the firms said.

The agreement follows a long partnership between the firms on the BA609 tiltrotor program, which ended in 2011 when Bell pulled out, leaving Leonardo — then known as Finmeccanica — to push on with the effort.

Bell went on to win the U.S. Future Long-Range Assault Aircraft program in 2022 with its V-280 tiltrotor, while Leonardo has kept faith with the BA609, now known as the AW609, albeit moving slowly with development. Officials have cited the lack of government development cash as a reason.

With a target of 2025 for certification for its tiltrotor, Leonardo officials were less than enthusiastic when the Italian Air Force encouraged them to team with Lockheed Martin and Boeing on their Defiant-X coaxial rotor helicopter.

When the Defiant was beaten out in the FLRAA competition by Bell’s tiltrotor, Leonardo officials felt vindicated in sticking with tiltrotor technology.

”Now we are the only European company with a tiltrotor close to certification, primarily for civil application but which can be converted to military applications,” said Leonardo CEO Roberto Cingolani on Thursday.

Cingolani was speaking during a presentation of Leonardo’s preliminary results for 2023, which showed it delivered 185 helicopters during the year, up from 149 in 2022. Electronics orders were up by 15.9%, buoyed by orders from the U.K. for new MK2 radars for its Eurofighters.

Leonardo’s U.S. unit DRS saw revenues rise 4.9% to $2.8 billion. Overall group revenue rose 3.9% to €15.3 billion (U.S. $16.5 billion).

At the presentation, Cingolani said talks were back on with German electronics firm Hensoldt about a joint venture. Leonardo purchased a 25.1% stake in the firm in 2021, but declined to participate in a capital increase in December and saw its stake in the firm drop to 22.8%, prompting suggestions its interest in the tie-up was fading.

”We didn’t participate in the capital increase because the German government and the previous top management of Hensoldt didn’t say clearly whether the possibility of a Leonardo-Hensoldt alliance or joint venture was still open,” said Cingolani.

“A few weeks ago the new CEO of Hensoldt came to Rome, and we had a long and constructive discussion and he told me they are reconsidering a joint venture,” Cingolani added. “Now we are studying what we can do together.”

CHRISTCHURCH, New Zealand — The Indian government is closer to buying a multibillion-dollar package of cruise missiles, air defense weapons, surveillance radars and fighter jet engines following approval from the country’s highest decision-making body on security affairs.

At a Feb. 21 meeting, the Cabinet Committee on Security approved the four procurement projects cumulatively worth about 350 billion rupees (U.S. $4 billion).

According to local media reports quoting government sources, the approved items were BrahMos cruise missiles for the Navy, air defense guns for the Army, ground-based air surveillance radars and new engines for the Air Force’s MiG-29 fighters.

Approval by the committee, which Prime Minister Narendra Modi chairs, is a necessary step along the Defence Ministry’s contractual pathway.

Local media reported the BrahMos missile deal would be signed in March. The consolidated contract would include some 220 weapons to arm Indian frigates and destroyers — the largest-ever individual BrahMos order for India.

The contract will reportedly involve a mix of standard 290-kilometer-range (180-mile-range) and extended 450-kilometer-range (280-mile-range) BrahMos missiles, of which 75% is locally made.

“The BrahMos is expected to considerably enhance the potential for surface-to-surface attacks by Indian Navy ships, especially with extended-range missiles,” Rahul Bhonsle, a director of the New Delhi-based consultancy Security Risks Asia, told Defense News.

India is also exporting BrahMos missiles to the Philippines under a deal worth about $375 million signed in January 2022. Atul Rane, who leads the missile manufacturer BrahMos Aerospace, said last year the company has set a goal of exporting $5 billion worth of BrahMos weapons by 2025.

The committee also approved the purchase of Sudarshan air defense systems from private firm Larsen & Toubro — an acquisition worth approximately $844 million. The Army would use the systems, which feature radars and 40mm guns, to protect its installations and the country’s border areas.

The Sudarshan approval followed an October 2022 request for procurement seeking 141,576 ammunition rounds to accompany 220 guns, including pre-fragmented, programmable proximity fuses and smart rounds.

The Sudarshan is also competing in an Air Force competition for 244 close-in weapon systems.

“Air defense guns have assumed importance because of the overall weak air and missile defense profile with dated equipment, with the Indian Army in particular, and the add-on threat from drones,” Bhonsle explained.

The Indian Army relies on antiquated Bofors L/70 and ZU-23-2B towed guns, and their replacement has become urgent given the emerging threat of drones and loitering munitions.

Larsen & Toubro is also set to provide the air surveillance radars, worth about $723 million. India is prioritizing better radar coverage of its northern and western borders to guard against Chinese and Pakistani aircraft, respectively. Augmenting the existing radar network in phases, the Air Force will operate the new indigenous sensors.

And Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd. is to manufacture new RD-33MK engines for MiG-29 fighters in collaboration with Russia, with the project worth about $639 million.

These projects underscore India’s attempts to maximize indigenous input. The Make in India economic policy seems to be gaining groud, Bhonsle said.

“However, it should be noted there is also considerable foreign collaboration involved in many of the projects, as up to 50% or more is permissible under existing rules for acquisition,” Bhonsle added.

Deliveries are scheduled for the years 2024 to 2031. Poland intends to use the system to operate its Patriot missile launchers, which are part of the Wisla medium-range, air-defense program, and the Narew short-range equivalent, which relies on MBDA’s Common Anti-Air Modular Missile, or CAMM.

The acquired systems will be used for six Wisla batteries and 23 Narew batteries, the country’s defense ministry said in a statement

Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz, Poland’s deputy prime minister and national defense minister, signed the contract during an official ceremony on Feb. 29. “We will be the second country, after the United States, to have this system, an integrated command system,” he said.

Kosiniak-Kamysz was sworn in on Dec. 13 as a new Cabinet replaced the ousted government of the right-wing Law and Justice party.

Poland’s Oct. 15, 2023, parliamentary election, which paved the way for a change in government, prompted U.S. manufacturer Northrop Grumman to host an event with top executives in Warsaw in November to advertise the program during the transition.

With the purchase now secured, it appears that the new defense leadership here will stick to the previous government’s procurement schedule for the key components of the Wisla and Narew programs.

The U.K. arms of Belgian-based company Rhea and American firm Lockheed Martin won separate contracts, cumulatively worth £4 million (U.S. $5 million).

The deals were announced Feb. 14, although both contractors have worked on their potential offerings since mid-2023, when they were selected from six firms initially tasked to undertake work on what is known as Project Beroe.

The amount of money involved may be small, but the outcome of the research and development work by the two companies could be key, according to Commodore David Moody, the head of capability at UK Space Command.

“This is a pivotal moment for UK Defence and the UK Space Sector as we develop software and partnerships that will determine the future of how we manage our activities in space,” Moody said in a statement released at the time of the announcement. “This project will enable us to define and understand how we will control and optimise the use of our satellites in a safe and sustainable way and is an important part of UK MOD’s future satellite aspirations.”

The 20-month-long contracts are scheduled to conclude in March 2025. There is no public timeline regarding the possible acquisition or future development phases of the software.

Existing British satellite control is focused around the Skynet 5 communications spacecraft network but Project Beroe is expected to enable satellite taskings from a much wider group of government entities and satellite types, individually or in concert.

Project Beroe is not directly related to Skynet and will support future non-Skynet satellite constellations like the low-Earth orbit ISTARI and Minerva programs.

Together, ISTARI and Minerva are to form the building blocks of a low-Earth orbit ISR capability for the British military.

ISTARI is a 10-year, £968 million program planned to deliver a multi-satellite system supporting surveillance and intelligence gathering for military operations.

Minerva is a £127 million project to develop four concept demonstrator satellites: Titania, Tyche, Oberon and Juno.

Tyche, which is the first of the four to launch, is scheduled to enter orbit this year. The Minerva group is meant to demonstrate the ability to autonomously collect, process and disseminate data from British and allied space assets, and this will inform how the ISTARI project moves forward.

Both programs are part of a planned £6.4 billion fund spread out over 10 years, as announced by the MoD when it rolled out its space defense strategy in 2022.

At a cost of about £5 billion, the lion’s share of that spending will go toward the procurement of a new generation of satellites and ground facilities under the Skynet 6 program.

Airbus is already building the first of those satellites, known as Skynet 6A, and a further competition is underway to provide a new generation of narrowband and wideband satellites under the Skynet 6 banner.

Defense News reported earlier this month that Banco do Brasil declared its intention to stop financing defense companies, citing governance and sustainability policies.

The U-turn follows a meeting held Feb. 26 involving the bank’s president, Tarciana Medeiros; Brazil’s vice president and the minister of development, industry, commerce and services, Geraldo Alckmin; the minister of the civil house, Rui Costa; and the defense minister, José Múcio Monteiro.

“The decision will prevent losses to companies in the sector that were at risk of losing contracts and will contribute to the sustainability and autonomy of the Defense Industrial Base,” the Ministry of Development, Industry, Commerce and Services said in a statement this week.

The ministry noted the latest decision reinforces the importance of structured financial policies that ensure “not only the economic viability of companies but also national security and sovereignty.”

If the bank had gone through with its initial plan, the move would have impacted many Brazilian defense players and the Proex program — a government mechanism, managed by the bank, that provides resources for domestic companies exporting goods and services.

The Brazilian defense contractor Mac Jee has celebrated the decision.

“The Mac Jee Group believes that this measure is a crucial step towards the sustainability and autonomy of our Defense Industrial Base,” the company said in a statement. “The initiative also ensures the preservation of vital contracts for companies in the sector, contributing to the generation of foreign exchange and jobs in the country, in addition to strengthening national security and sovereignty.”

Banco do Brasil declined to comment for this story.

The German vessel, newly arrived in the theater of operations, fired two Standard Missile-2 interceptors at the U.S. drone, but both missed, as German military news website Augengeradeaus first reported.

The attempted shoot-down came after a query with nearby allies about the status of the drone, which flew without a transponder turned on that would allow coalition forces to identify it as friendly, according to the report.

“We can confirm that a U.S. MQ-9 Unmanned Aerial Vehicle was targeted in the Red Sea Feb. 27,” a U.S. defense official told Defense News, adding that the aircraft was undamaged and continued its mission.

“CENTCOM is in close coordination with the EU and Operation Aspides to investigate the circumstances that led to this event and to ensure safe deconfliction of airspace,” the official added, using shorthand for U.S. Central Command, the command overseeing American operations in the Middle East.

Germany’s air defense frigate Hessen received parliamentary approval to partake in the European Union’s Operation Aspides last week while already underway to the Red Sea. It is joining a collection of allied warships organized under the EU auspices or the U.S.-led Operation Prosperity Guardian to protect marine traffic in the vital cargo route from drone and missile attacks by the Yemen-based Houthi militia.

The group’s fighters are targeting civilian ships claiming support for Hamas in its war against Israel.

A German military spokesman declined to comment on the incident, pointing instead to comments by German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius on Feb. 27 in which Pistorious confirmed the downing of two hostile drones and two failed attempts to intercept an additional, unspecified aircraft.

The F-35A purchase would be on top of earlier orders for 12 F-35Bs from the American defense company Lockheed Martin.

Addressing Parliament during Wednesday’s budget deliberations, Defence Minister Ng Eng Hen said his ministry wants to take advantage of the competitive price of the F-35As, which are now “comparable” to Boeing’s F-15 jets.

“We have to de-prioritize other projects for this opportunity, but we’ve done our calculations and we think this is the best time to put orders for F-35As,” he said, adding that accelerating the F-35 acquisition plan will put the Republic of Singapore Air Force in the “premier league.”

F-35As are built for conventional takeoff and landing, have dependable endurance, can carry higher capacity payloads, and provide more operational flexibility, Ng explained.

Both the “A” and “B” variants are suitable for Singapore’s limited land spaces, the ministry has noted.

Singapore ordered four F-35Bs in a 2020 deal worth an estimated $2.75 billion, then added eight more F-35B units in 2023. The aircraft are on track to arrive during the 2026-2028 time frame.

If Parliament approves the current F-35A acquisition, Ng said the additional fighter jets would arrive by 2030, the same year Singapore’s military plans to retire its F-16 fleet. By the end of the decade, the Air Force would operate a combined fleet of F-15SG, F-35A and F-35B fighter jets.

The ministry has also proposed a SG$20.2 billion (U.S. $15 billion) defense budget — an increase from last year’s SG$17.98 billion (U.S. $13.36 billion) allocation.

For several years Singapore has steadily allocated around 3% of its gross domestic product for defense spending, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute think tank. This consistency has allowed the country to upgrade its aircraft fleet as well as modernize existing platforms.

The military had undertaken a massive modernization push set to materialize in 2040.

“Today we are reaping dividends of the sum we put up steadily over the past 20 years [on defense spending],” Ng said.

Singaporean leaders during the budget deliberations expressed concerns over Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine, the Israel-Hamas war, and economic disagreements between the U.S. and China.

“We are all concerned that the U.S. and China can clash over Taiwan, and if that happens it will be a very bleak Asia for a very long time,” Ng acknowledged. “I want to make clear that if ever something similar happens to us here in Singapore, [the Ministry of Defence and the Singaporea Armed Forces] do not plan to depend on another country to come to our rescue.”

Anduril, serving as the prime contractor, plans to deliver “a modified, autonomy-ready Uncrewed Ground Vehicle (UGV) based on Hanwha’s proven Arion-SMET platform, which has already demonstrated its performance in highly-relevant and varied environments in the Indo-Pacific, including the latest Foreign Comparative Testing with the U.S. Army and Marine Corps in Hawaii,” the companies said in a Feb. 29 statement.

The Army chose General Dynamics Land Systems’ Multi-Utility Tactical Transport, or MUTT, for its SMET unmanned ground system in a first increment of the program. The $162.4 million contract, awarded in October 2019, would wrap up at the end of October 2024. GDLS won another follow-on contract in 2020.

Now the service has opened bids for the second increment of the program intended to carry gear and light payloads to decrease the burden to soldiers in the field. The Army is pursuing two major robotic combat vehicle platforms simultaneously: the Robotic Combat Vehicle meant to fight alongside Stryker and Bradley vehicles, and the SMET, which is likely to accompany lighter formations.

Anduril and the U.S. arm of South Korean defense firm Hanwha will also be working with Forterra, formerly RRAI, to incorporate its AutoDrive vehicle autonomy solution “to enable complex on and off-road maneuvers,” the statement reads.

“By combining Anduril’s electronics and software, Hanwha Defense USA’s proven hardware, and Forterra’s proven off-road vehicle autonomy stack, the partnership will bring speed, flexibility, and advanced capabilities to dismounted infantry,” Zach Mears, head of strategy at Anduril, said in the statement. “With a simplified user interface powered by Lattice, users will be able to quickly and easily command and control the S-MET to support lethal effects at the tactical edge.”

Lattice is Anduril’s software originally designed to counter drones and other threats, but has wider applicability for sharing battlefield information and data at a tactical level. Anduril is also teamed with American Rheinmetall Vehicles in the XM30 Mechanized Infantry Combat Vehicle competition underway to eventually replace the Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicle, bringing its Lattice capability to that effort as well.

The capability, Anduril states, will allow soldiers to operate the vehicle, manage payloads and communicate simultaneously in “complex environments.”

The team is focused on load-carrying, power generation capacity, reduced sustainment, survivability and a modular architecture for a wide array of payloads, the release details.

The robotic vehicle will have a low acoustic signature, “ensuring that it serves as an asset, not liability on the modern battlefield,” the statement adds.

Other expected competitors are Teledyne FLIR, GDLS, Rheinmetall, with teammate ST Engineering, and HDT.

Teledyne FLIR announced its bid in October at the Association of the U.S. Army’s annual conference.

The Army has tightly held details on the competition such as the timeline for evaluating and choosing winners and what comes after and has not posted any solicitations on the public domain for federal contract opportunities, Sam.gov.

The service is focused on rigorous experimentation with robots and emerging technology to develop integrated fighting formations of both humans and robots. The Army calls it “human-machine integration” and is evaluating exactly how robotic technologies can be coupled with the best of what humans can bring to the table on the battlefield.

The latest military package bound for Ukraine, announced this month by the German government, included over 120,000 artillery projectiles of the Soviet-standard caliber. The Berlin government specified that the deliveries were coming from industry stocks financed with public funds.

Local newspaper Der Spiegel reported that rounds were ordered from Bulgaria, a key producer of this type of ammunition in Europe.

“Most of Ukraine’s artillery is still from the Soviet era – standards were 122mm, 130mm and 152mm, so getting more of this caliber ammunition for Kyiv is valuable,” Mark Cancian, senior adviser for the international security program at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, said.

Ukrainian forces still rely on older equipment, including the D-30 or 2S1 Gvozdika howitzers, which can only fire non-NATO rounds.

At the Munich Conference, the President of the Czech Republic, Petr Pavel, said his government was also able to source nearly one million rounds from abroad, including 800,000 of the 155mm type and 300,000 of the 122mm type.

He added that the ammunition could be sent swiftly to the embattled country if funding was secured from other allies.

“Buying ammunition on the world market makes a lot of sense because of limits on what Europe and the U.S. can produce – Washington has done a lot of that already, having provided 200,000 152mm, 40,000 130mm, and 40,000 of 122mm type,” Cancian said.

A recent report by the CSIS think tank noted that shortages of Soviet-standard shells – 122mm and 152mmm – have gradually decreased the value of Soviet-era artillery.

While the United States has scouted the globe to buy this type of ammunition, Cancian says that some states may just be more inclined to sell it to nations other than the U.S.

“There are likely some countries who will sell to the Czech Republic but not the U.S. and who may also want to remain anonymous,” he said.

Nick Reynolds, research fellow for land warfare at the London-based RUSI think tank, said Ukraine should still strive to convert its artillery equipment to the NATO standard over time, as newer munitions are superior in explosive power, range and accuracy.

But, he added, “the scale of the war and the material requirements are enormous. Ukraine is firing 155mm shells and wearing out 155mm barrels far faster than either can be produced in Europe.”

One stopgap option would transfer additional weapons from U.S. stocks without funding to replenish that equipment. Another option uses the Excess Defense Articles program to send U.S. equipment to third-party countries that then send older weapons to Kyiv.

The European Union is also stepping up its assistance. It passed $54 billion in economic support for Ukraine after Hungary dropped its opposition.

But none of these stopgap measures to staunch the bleeding come close to the influx of arms for Kyiv that Congress could unlock if it passes the $95 billion foreign aid bill for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan.

“The consequence of not doing so is likely Ukraine’s defeat,” Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., told Defense News last week after returning from a congressional delegation to Europe. “There is not a plan B there. There’s certainly more that Europe could do, but there are certain weapons systems that only the United States can provide and maintain. And there is a hard limit to the amount of resources Europe can put in if the United States chooses to leave the coalition.”

Ukrainian officials also attributed Russia’s recent conquest of Avdiivka to the lack of available weaponry when Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., led a congressional delegation to the war-torn country last week.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., has refused to hold a vote on the foreign aid bill, which includes $48.3 billion in additional military assistance for Ukraine. The Senate passed the bill 70-29 earlier this month over objections from former President Donald Trump, the likely Republican presidential nominee.

Congress passed a cumulative $113 billion in military and economic aid for Ukraine after Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, but has not provided additional funding since December 2022.

Biden hosted congressional leaders at the White House on Tuesday, where he joined Democrats and outgoing Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., in pushing Johnson to pass the bill.

In the meantime, the Pentagon is weighing whether it should use roughly $4 billion left of drawdown authority to continue arming Ukraine from U.S. weapons stockpiles, even though it does not have the money to replenish those inventories without the foreign aid bill, CNN reported Wednesday.

The Pentagon did not directly address deliberations about transferring additional weapons without replenishment funding.

“The [Defense Department] continues to urge Congress to pass a supplemental to support Ukraine in its time of need and to replenish our stocks,” Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Garron Garn told Defense News in a statement.

The Pentagon used its last $1 billion in Ukraine replenishment funding to backfill U.S. stockpiles in December, with the White House noting that would be the last remaining assistance, absent congressional action.

“At issue here again is the question of impacting our own readiness, as a nation, and the responsibilities that we have,” Pentagon press secretary Gen. Patrick Ryder said last month. “While we do have that $4.2 billion in authority, we don’t have the funds available to replenish those stocks, should we expend that. And with no timeline in sight, we have to make those hard decisions.”

The remaining $4.2 billion in Ukraine transfer authority stems from an accounting error the Pentagon made last year. The error prompted Pentagon Inspector General Robert Storch to announce an audit of the valuation of weapons sent to Ukraine.

Excess Defense Articles

Another, more limited option involves third-party countries transferring Soviet-era equipment to Ukraine in exchange for more U.S. weapons through the Pentagon’s Excess Defense Articles program. The program also allows the U.S. to send equipment that helps countries transition away from Russian arms.

“The United States is providing security assistance to partners such as Ecuador and Zambia to help them transition off Russian equipment, but there’s more we can and must do,” the assistant secretary of state for political-military affairs, Jessica Lewis, said in December.

Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa said in January that the U.S. would send $200 million in refurbished weapons to help fight cartels in exchange for “scrap” equipment. But Noboa backtracked last week after Russia imposed a ban on Ecuadorian banana and clove imports.

“To our surprise, the United States has publicly stated that this equipment will be used in the armed conflict in Ukraine, and we do not want to be part of it,” Noboa said.

The Greek newspaper Kathimerini reported in January that the U.S. is providing Greece with equipment through the Excess Defense Articles program, including two C-130H aircraft, three Protector-class ships and 60 Bradley armored fighting vehicles.

“Greece has provided substantial military assistance to Ukraine, including Soviet-era BMP infantry fighting vehicles, artillery and small arms,” the U.S. State Department told Defense News. “We thank the government of Greece for its generosity and encourage additional donations, in the future.”

The Defense Security Cooperation Agency, which oversees the Excess Defense Articles program, has not updated the public list of transfers since 2020, despite a congressional requirement that it do so. As such, it’s unclear what other countries are receiving U.S. weapons through the program.

The agency told Defense News it expects to update the list within “several weeks” but did not explain why updates stopped in 2020.

Noah Robertson contributed to this report.

Faced with an aggressive Russia, a war of attrition in Ukraine and uncertainty about U.S. reliability, anxious European allies are accelerating their defense spending. This year they are to collectively meet NATO’s target of spending 2% of gross domestic product on defense. And they have logged nine consecutive years of growth in their defense budgets.

Spending more, however, doesn’t necessarily mean spending well. NATO’s 2% goal is important as a baseline input metric, but it is unlikely to be enough to ensure that Europe strengthens its defenses before Russia reconstitutes its depleted forces. To assure that defense resources are spent well, some clear output metrics are needed to define what Europe’s military capabilities should be.

As the alliance continues its most urgent task — helping Ukraine win — it must address this important longer-term challenge of rebalancing trans-Atlantic defense. Doing so will mean squaring a triangle: ensuring Europe’s capacity to better defend itself against Russia and manage crises along its southern periphery; addressing European aspirations for greater strategic autonomy; and maintaining confidence that the United States can adequately uphold its commitments in both the North Atlantic and the Indo-Pacific region.

We have called squaring this triangle “achieving European strategic responsibility.”

In the past, Europe has sought “autonomy” without providing adequate defense resources, while the United States has wanted greater European defense contributions without diminishing U.S. influence. These tensions have been exacerbated by inadequate cooperation between U.S. and European defense industries.

NATO’s 75th anniversary summit in Washington this summer provides an opportunity to reconcile these two perspectives and find a new strategic balance. To do so, European allies should focus on achieving two military capability or output goals as quickly as possible.

First, Europe should build its conventional military capabilities to a level that would provide at least half of all the forces and capabilities — including the strategic enablers such as strategic lift, air-to-air refueling and operational intelligence — required to deter and, if needed, to defeat a major-power aggressor.

Should a conflict simultaneously break out with China in Asia and with Russia in Europe, the United States may not be able to deploy adequate reinforcements to Europe. European allies need to be able to pick up the slack.

Second, European allies should develop capabilities to conduct crisis management operations in Europe’s neighborhood without today’s heavy reliance on U.S. enablers. The European Union’s goal to develop the capacity to generate an “intervention force” of 5,000 individuals who could deploy beyond EU boundaries is a small yet useful start. Much more is needed.

Meeting these two output goals would allow Europe to become the first responder to most crises in its neighborhood, acting through NATO, through the EU or through ad hoc coalitions of the willing. It would permit the United States to shift some of its forces and strategic focus to the Indo-Pacific region without significant reduction in the capabilities needed to deter Russia.

To achieve these two output goals, NATO allies could agree at the summit to use NATO’s Defense Planning Process to create a minimum level of military ambition necessary to attain European strategic responsibility. European allies and Canada should firmly commit to investing sufficient resources to ensure that within a few years they can meet 50% of all of NATO’s minimum capability requirements. Similar informal goals already exist; now they should be formalized and implemented at the summit.

Doing half of what’s needed within the alliance is an absolute minimal requirement for Europe to attain strategic responsibility. It assumes the Europeans can still count on the Americans. But if former President Donald Trump wins the November election and reneges on America’s NATO commitments, doing half will not be nearly enough. So Europe should not delay a moment longer. A delay could be fatal, as Russia is on a war footing, has attained significant combat experience and will reconstitute its drained forces as quickly as possible.

Achieving strategic responsibility for Europe will require more — not less — trans-Atlantic consultations. New mechanisms for NATO-EU coordination and industrial cooperation will be needed. Now is the moment for the U.S. and Europe to shed their contending views and to make European strategic responsibility a win-win for both sides of the Atlantic.

Hans Binnendijk, formerly a senior director for defense policy on the U.S. National Security Council, is a distinguished fellow at the Atlantic Council think tank. Daniel S. Hamilton, formerly a U.S. deputy assistant secretary of state, is a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution think tank. Alexander R. Vershbow, formerly a NATO deputy secretary general, is a distinguished fellow at the Atlantic Council.

The government’s “Enhanced Lethality Surface Combatant Fleet” review, released Feb. 20, advocates for a flotilla of 26 warships, more than double the 11 hulls the service currently possesses. The government has accepted the recommendations except for one regarding the continuation of an upgrade for aging Anzac-class frigates.

“The size, lethality and capabilities of the future surface combatant fleet ensures that our Navy is equipped to meet the evolving strategic challenges of our region,” Chief of Navy Vice Adm. Mark Hammond said in a statement following the report’s unveiling.

Jennifer Parker, an expert associate at the National Security College within the Australian National University, told Defense News the force could achieve its new goal, even if “plans of this magnitude are going to have challenges.”

The plan

To supplement its forthcoming nuclear-powered submarines, to be acquired under the AUKUS agreement with the U.K. and U.S., the future surface combatant fleet will feature nine so-called tier 1 destroyers and frigates, 11 smaller tier 2 frigates, and six optionally manned vessels.

Tier 1 vessels will comprise three existing Hobart-class air warfare destroyers — to receive an upgrade to the Aegis combat system and the installation of Tomahawk missiles — and six new Hunter-class anti-submarine frigates. BAE Systems was originally supposed to produce nine frigates, with the first to be commissioned in 2034.

Parker, a former naval officer, said the most significant problem for the service is a looming capability gap, as the first-of-class Anzac frigate will not sail again, and a second is set to retire in 2026, meaning the Navy will have nine total warships by the end of this decade.

“Most predict an increased period of risk in the late 2020s, and that is where Australia has the capability gap,” Parker said, noting the the service should consider how to maximize its remaining capability and operational availability during this time.

With this pending shortfall, the review recommended commissioning 11 general-purpose frigates at least the size of the Anzacs to “provide maritime and land strike, air defence and escort capabilities,” the government explained in a summary of the report.

Australia plans to procure the first three frigates from overseas, with the remainder constructed in Henderson, Western Australia. The Navy has narrowed contenders to Germany’s MEKO A-200, Japan’s Mogami class, South Korea’s FFX Batch II/III, and Spain’s Alfa 3000. The government will make a selection next year, with the first delivery scheduled in 2030.

The planned six large optionally crewed surface vessels are based on an American design and feature 32 missile cells. Built in Henderson and destined to enter service from the mid-2030s, Parker said these are not traditional surface combatants because “their role will be to extend the magazine capability” of other ships.

Although Defence Minister Richard Marles said they would be crewed, Parker predicted they could end up as unmanned platforms.

“There are legal issues with lethal autonomous weapons and operating uncrewed surface vessels, so until those legal issues are overcome, the Australian government wasn’t about to announce that we’re going to have some sort of floating magazine that can launch missiles,” she said.

Apart from surface combatants, the review proposed a fleet of 25 “minor war vessels” for constabulary tasks. These include six Arafura-class offshore patrol vessels, or OPV, slashed from the original 12 that Luerssen Australia is constructing.

“The OPV is an inefficient use of resources for civil maritime security operations and does not possess the survivability and self-defence systems to contribute to a surface combatant mission,” the review stated.

The money

Marles said the entire plan is “fully funded” thanks to an additional AU$11.1 billion (U.S. $7.3 billion) allocated over the next decade, including AU$1.7 billion (U.S. $1.1 billion) in the next four years.

Parker said this amount is “probably feasible,” but added that the Treasury plans to only increase defense spending from 2027 to 2028. “I don’t know how they’re going to be able to resource those things without increasing defense spending in May,” she explained.

But even with the budget allocation, it doesn’t mean the Defence Department can spend that money, she said.

“They still need to go through the approval processes for that specific project,” she added. “I think the challenge is they need to convince the Australian public that defense requires increased spending.

Marles had promised defense expenditure would move from an anticipated 2.1% of gross domestic product by 2030 to 2.4% by that time, but Parker said that is insufficient to fund so many naval acquisitions.

The people

Amid the plans for new construction, a new shipbuilding plan is due later this year.

Parker noted many questions remain over that sector’s workforce, but a nationwide approach addressing education, migration and infrastructure factors would help.

But another challenge is crewing. The Defence Department planned to raise the number of military members by 2,201 in the 2022-2023 time frame, but instead it suffered a net loss of 1,389 uniformed personnel.

The MoD will drop the use of the terms initial operating capability and full operating capability on spiral development programs. It will instead refer to new equipment as reaching “minimal deployable capability” as it is handed over to the military, procurement minister James Cartlidge told Parliament Feb. 28 in a statement about acquisition reforms.

“In a world where our adversaries are threatening to out-compete us in capability terms, we have no choice but to reform acquisition — or see our military competitiveness diminished,” Cartlidge told Parliament.

The changes to spiral development evaluation is one of five key areas of what the British call the Integrated Procurement Model.

Other areas of procurement marked for change include a greater emphasis on the exportability of equipment being purchased; more integrated requirements for the armed service and the breaking down of organizational stovepipes; earlier engagement with industry on future requirements; and new checks and balances to ensure better decisions at the start of programs.

Cartlidge said the key to the reforms is delivering new equipment more quickly.

In the future, “rather than striving for perfection before delivering to the frontline, capabilities at 60%-80% of their full potential will be provided to the user, allowing early application, and subsequent improvements to reach their full potential,” Cartlidge said. “We will pursue spiral development by default.”

Cartlidge told lawmakers the MoD’s new procurement model is being introduced starting next month, with the primary aim avoiding programs like the Ajax armored vehicle and the Crowsnest airborne early warning radar, which he described as “over-complex, over budget and over time”.

“For contractual reasons, existing programs will continue under their current procurement mode,” he added. On April 8, “we will publish our new spiral development playbook so that extant programs which can adopt spiral features will be empowered to do so.”

In a document supporting the procurement reform announcement, the MoD said by the end of this year it will have assessed the defense equipment portfolio to identify opportunities to apply spiral development to new and already underway programs.

John Louth, an independent defense analyst here, said “good enough, rather than perfect, is smart in terms of obtaining an early capability that can be matured and moved through the technology readiness levels.”

“The caveat though is that with the speed of technological change, you may never achieve a full operating capability,” he added. “That may be a good thing, we may never want to freeze requirements in an old style, full operating capability, but always strive to develop and enhance the equipment as technology matures.”

The memorandum of agreement, inked during the Singapore Airshow last week, includes the integration of Honeywell’s TPE331 turboprop engine into the Sikorsky S-70M Black Hawk GFA-type transport helicopters. PTDI will assemble the helicopters at Bandung under a manufacturing license for the Indonesian Defense Ministry.

In August, PTDI and Sikorsky, a subsidiary of Lockheed Martin, entered into an industrial arrangement for the ministry to procure the Black Hawks. PTDI did not disclose the number of helicopters under the deal with Sikorsky in August, but the ministry revealed during the air show that the contract covers 24 helicopters.

The agreement between PTDI and Honeywell also includes the localization of maintenance, repair and overhaul services for Honeywell’s avionics and mechanical systems as well as the manufacturing of a harness assembly.

While the helicopters have yet to be completed, Honeywell is working with PTDI to provide technologies to elevate and sustain the aircraft, according to Sathesh Ramiah, vice president for Honeywell’s defense and space business in the Asia-Pacific region.

PTDI wanted to minimize maintenance periods for the helicopters and ensure they meet the needs of the armed forces, Ramiah told Defense News. “That’s something we signed and continue to work with PTDI in terms of expanding other technologies from the sustainment side.”

The two companies have previously collaborated on the Indonesian Air Force’s CN-235 twin-engine transport aircraft and CN-212 medium cargo aircraft manufactured under license by PTDI.

“Let me be clear, because I can see the way things are going on social networks and in the media, it’s not about sending troops to wage war on Russia,” French Armed Forces Minister Sébastien Lecornu said in a hearing of the National Assembly’s defense committee Tuesday night.

Sending troops to Ukraine was among topics discussed during a meeting of 27 countries in Paris, Macron said Feb. 26, adding there was no consensus, but nothing should be excluded. His comments triggered a flurry of denials by countries including Germany, the U.K. and the U.S. while Moscow warned of direct conflict with NATO should the alliance deploy troops to Ukraine.

The countries gathered in Paris discussed “how to do things differently” in terms of aid to Ukraine, and a number of ideas were put on the table, notably around mine clearing in Ukraine and local training of troops, Lecornu said during the hearing. There was no consensus on those two ideas in the meeting, he said.

Rather than training Ukrainian troops in Poland, one possibility discussed was training on Ukrainian territory, away from the frontline, according to the minister. Ukraine will face greater training needs for troops who will be conscripted “in the near future,” Lecornu said.

More than 20 NATO countries have been training Ukrainian troops in the U.K., the United States, Spain and elsewhere. The French armed forces have been training troops from Ukraine in France and in Poland.

Lecornu said there are “areas where things can still be done,” including around military advisers. Saying that he was “being careful” as the hearing was public, the minister noted other countries have previously had “major military advisors” in Ukraine, which is “not exactly” what France did there, but something it has done in other countries in the past through partnerships.

The French minister said Germany delivering Taurus cruise missiles would help Ukraine, but it’s up to the German government to make that decision. He said the British and French deliveries of Storm Shadow and SCALP missiles had not resulted in a “logic of escalation.”

“Deep strikes are an element of differentiation for the Ukrainians,” Lecornu said. “They make it possible to hit military command centers, logistics centers and Russian ammunition warehouses, so these are obviously valuable technologies. Would the Taurus be valuable? The answer is yes, because it offers the same capabilities as SCALP or Storm Shadow.”

“But once again, Germany is sovereign in the way it decides,” Lecornu said. “This is also why we intend to remain sovereign in the way we decide on our arms exports, so everyone will be able to understand it.’’

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has rejected the proposal of giving Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine, arguing the weapons’ operation would make Berlin a more active participant in the war than its previous military aid donations, worth billions of euros, already have.

Meanwhile. Lecornu said Nexter, the French arm of KNDS, had boosted production of 155-millimeter artillery shells to 3,000 a month. He said the company is investing in machinery and reopening an additional production line, and the minister said he has “good hope” that France’s production will increase to 4,000 to 5,000 shells a month by the end of 2024.

The Skyranger 30 weapons stations will be mounted onto the Bundeswehr’s Boxer armored fighting vehicles. In the German setup, the system contains a sensor suite, a 30-millimeter cannon and Stinger surface-to-air missiles. It promises the ability to engage fixed-wing and rotary-wing aircraft as well as drones and cruise missiles. Additionally, the Bundesweh, Germany’s armed forces, will be able to network it with other air defense assets.

The order contains one prototype and 18 production vehicles, with an option for 30 further vehicles. Rheinmetall said it would deliver the Bundeswehr’s prototype by the end of the year.

The German acquisition, worth €595 million, is part of the military’s project to develop an integrated air defense system for close- and short-range protection. The Skyranger 30 platform is to play an integral role in this endeavor, the manufacturer said in a press release.

Just a month ago, on January 25, a consortium made up of Rheinmetall, Diehl and sensor manufacturer Hensoldt was tasked by the German government to develop this capability for the Bundeswehr for a total of €1.2 billion ($1.3 billion).

The contract was “aimed at implementing the necessary solutions for networking individual components, integrating the IRIS T-SLM air defense system, establishing interoperability and extending the interception range to the short range,” Diehl Defense said in a January statement. To this end, the Skyranger 30 system will be able to work both autonomously and in communication with other systems, according to the manufacturer.

Germany has put itself in a leading role on the continent when it comes to air defense thanks to Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s European Sky Shield Initiative, announced in August 2022. The initiative now counts 21 countries following the recent announcement that Greece and Turkey intend to join. ESSI was launched in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the heavy use of drones and cruise missiles to damage critical civilian infrastructure in the conflict, which highlighted European vulnerabilities.

With this latest move, Germany hopes to strengthen its position as a “role model for ground-based air defense,” Rheinmetall said. The 2010 retirement of the country’s Gepard self-propelled anti-aircraft guns for cost-cutting purposes left a gap in the German army’s capabilities which this new acquisition is meant to fill.

Just days earlier, the neighboring government in Vienna – another ESSI member – had been the first country to confirm it would acquire the new Skyranger 30 system, which is a quarter lighter than its predecessor, meaning it can be mounted on Austrian army vehicles. Austria will be acquiring 36 Skyrangers for their Pandur EVO armored vehicles for a total of €1.8 billion ($1.95 billion).

Rheinmetall said the company expected more orders to follow. Hungary tasked the German manufacturer with integrating the Skyranger system with its Lynx KF41 vehicles in December of last year, while Lithuania and Denmark are considering acquisitions of their own, according to the company.

Editor’s note: Due to an editing error, the original version of this story misreported the value of the Skyranger contract. It is roughly €600 million.

The Direction Générale de l’Armement announced in a Feb. 27 release that it has ordered 3,000 multispectral Barracuda camouflage nets from the Stockholm-based defense company.

“Saab’s subcontractor, the French SME Solarmtex, based in Vierzon, France, will carry out their manufacturing and assembly,” the release said.

The order is valued at $21.6 million and the nets are expected to be delivered between 2024 and 2026 to the French Army and the Air and Space Force.

According to the DGA release, the mesh will enhance the discretion of brigade, combined arms and vehicle battle groups as well as other sensitive targets by masking their visible, infrared and radar signatures.

Detection by way of electromagnetic emissions, and subsequent targeting, is a constant danger faced by Ukrainian forces in their defense against Russian invaders.

Saab’s nets are the culmination of a two-year development program between the company, DGA and the Technical Section of the Army (STAT) to meet the French forces’ requirements.

In September, the Swedish company told Defense News that it had integrated its Barracuda camouflage net with a new feature that would change how troops communicate by allowing selected radio-frequencies to pass through the mesh.

“It is integrated with material that acts as a low-pass filter, allowing the selected radio-frequencies of their choice to pass either way through the camouflage screen while also protecting soldiers against higher ones of electromagnetic waves used by radar systems,” Johan Jersblad, senior development engineering at Saab told reporters then during online briefing.

At the time, the Ultra-Lightweight Camouflage Screen-Frequency Selected Surface (ULCAS-FSS) was not yet in service, as it was only unveiled at the 2023 DSEI defense exhibition in London. The intention was to eventually mass-produce it in Sweden.

The U.K. expects to award a contract in 2025 to build the new helicopters, the ministry said. According to a March 2022 government document about major defense projects, the deal could be worth nearly £1.2 billion (U.S. $1.5 billion).

“The New Medium Helicopter will provide essential support to our military operations, and we’re pleased to have reached this next important stage of the program,” Defence Procurement Minister James Cartlidge said in the news release. “The program’s competition includes essential criteria that are key to securing vital rotary wing operational independence, allowing us to respond swiftly to emerging threats in a highly contested world.”

This program is expected to deliver up to 44 medium-lift support helicopters that can operate in all environments and perform up to five different jobs that were previously covered by different types of aircraft, the ministry said, including carrying out both combat and humanitarian missions. This is expected to streamline the U.K.’s vertical lift capabilities, providing more efficiency and operational flexibility, the ministry added.

The U.K. branches of Airbus Helicopters, Leonardo Helicopters and Lockheed Martin are expected to submit bids now that the British military has released its invitation to negotiate.

The potential to export these helicopters to other countries will be an important element the U.K. will consider as it evaluates bids, the ministry said. Other issues to undergo consideration include the helicopters’ design, production and manufacturing process.

“The New Medium Helicopter contract will secure the vital operational independence we require, as well as investing in U.K. skills for the long term, and demonstrates the U.K. government’s commitment to the Defence and Security Industrial Strategy,” the ministry said in its release.

The winner of this contract will replace the Army’s Puma helicopters, as well as the country’s aging Bell 412, Bell 212 and Airbus Dauphin helicopters.

Lockheed and its subsidiary Sikorsky plan to submit the Black Hawk helicopter for the New Medium Helicopter program. Sikorsky president Paul Lemmo said at the Paris Air Show in June 2023 that it was considering setting up a Black Hawk final assembly line in the U.K. to strengthen its bid for the program. A final assembly line on the European continent — likely Poland — is also an option, Lemmo added.

Airbus has teamed up with Boeing to pitch the H175M for the program, which it would build in Wales. The H175M would be a militarized version of Airbus’ commercial H175 helicopter.

Italian firm Leonardo is eyeing its AW149 helicopter for its own bid, saying the construction style allows for the aircraft to better survive small-arms fire.

Paris-based Preligens, founded in 2016, offers two AI-based solutions, Robin, an imagery-analysis software, and Xerus, a computer system for military terrain mapping.

The systems work with commercial or government-collected satellite imagery, and they can help analysts determine whether objects of interest are civilian or military.

“It has been primarily designed for site monitoring and has an alerting system that can be set up for the customer for pattern-of-life analysis to cue analysts towards key signals that can identify aircraft, vessels, vehicles, surface-to-air missiles and more,” Coralie Trigano, the company’s senior sales executive for the Asian-Pacific region, told Defense News at the Singapore Airshow here.

The latest improvements made to the firm’s algorithms have included adding new detectable items as well as additional categories of objects that the software can spot.

“We recently developed a helicopter detector, that can now classify and identify precise models, and we have also improved the vehicle detector, which is now capable of detecting and categorizing civil, armored, military and electronics (radars) vehicles,” Sophie Hue, head of communication at Preligens, wrote in an email to Defense News.

Besides adding full-motion video gathered by drones to the mix of data sources, developers are also looking to implement analyses of synthetic-aperture radar images, Hue added.

The influx of the demand and development of drones, driven largely by the Ukraine war, has created a new era in cyber intelligence gathering.

To demonstrate the capabilities of their software, Preligens released its own imagery showing that China was carrying out major military infrastructure work at one of its naval bases in 2022.

The company’s vessel detector also was able to spot Russian air-cushioned landing craft that the country had stationed in the port of Baltiysk, Kaliningrad, in January 2022.

There is, however, a way Washington could help hold Ukraine over until Congress gets its act together. While the administration has declared it’s “out of money” for Ukraine aid, it retains the authority to give Kyiv over $4 billion worth of materiel from U.S. stocks. The administration has declined to tap this authority because it’s out of funding to replace the donated equipment. But there are key weapons America could send now without compromising U.S. military readiness.

Ukraine is suffering from a shortage of men and materiel, particularly artillery ammunition. Congress’ monthslong delay in passing supplemental aid funding has exacerbated this challenge. Yet after rejecting an aid bill passed by the Senate earlier this month, House Speaker Mike Johnson appears to be in no rush to tackle the issue. It could be months before a bill reaches the president’s desk. Ukraine can’t afford to wait that long.

Comparing Russian, Ukrainian forces two years into war

Since Russia’s February 2022 invasion, Washington has relied on presidential drawdown authority, or PDA, as its primary vehicle for Ukraine aid. PDA allows the administration to give foreign partners weapons taken from existing U.S. stocks, expediting delivery. Through PDA, the United States has provided Kyiv with regular shipments of artillery ammunition, air defense interceptors and other critical capabilities.

Normally, the Pentagon replaces equipment donated under PDA by procuring new systems or munitions, which the military receives within months or at most a year or two. In 2022 and 2023, Congress provided both additional PDA for Ukraine as well as funding to replace the donated equipment.

However, the PDA packages for Ukraine ground to a halt in late December. The issue isn’t a lack of PDA itself; the administration can still donate around $4.2 billion worth of weapons. Rather, as the Office of Management and Budget’s director explained, the administration made a “very tough decision” to forgo the remaining PDA because the Pentagon has run out of money to buy replacement equipment.

The Defense Department presumably worries, despite its $850 billion-plus annual budgets, that continued donations within this $4 billion limit could jeopardize U.S. military readiness, absent assured replacement funding.

The administration is obviously right to prioritize American warfighters. But the U.S. military’s vast inventories contain plenty of things that wouldn’t be missed by American troops but would be a godsend to Ukraine. The Pentagon could afford to wait to replace these items — if it bothers to replace them at all.

Most notably, the United States could probably spare some more cluster munitions for Ukraine’s Western-made artillery systems. Known as dual-purpose improved conventional munitions, or DPICM, these rounds release dozens of smaller sub-munitions, increasing lethality. The Biden administration first provided 155mm DPICM rounds to Ukraine last summer as Western stocks of standard shells ran low. Ukrainian forces have since employed these munitions to great effect.

While it’s unclear how many DPICM rounds Kyiv has already received, the United States probably has a lot left. America’s DPICM inventory reportedly totaled nearly 3 million rounds as of spring 2023. Some of those munitions may be expired or otherwise unsuitable for Ukraine, but a considerable portion is probably still available.

It’s doubtful sending Ukraine more now would harm U.S. readiness. Pentagon policy discourages U.S. commanders from using DPICMs, particularly those with a dud rate greater than 1%, which are supposed to be retired from service.

In addition to shells, Ukraine needs more protected mobility. Even outdated vehicles like the humble M113 armored personnel carrier could offer significant value if provided in sufficient quantities. M113s play a key role in evacuating wounded Ukrainian soldiers and moving forces around the battlefield, but Kyiv needs more of these vehicles. Absent enough armored vehicles, Ukrainian troops must rely on civilian alternatives that provide little protection against Russian artillery and other threats.

The U.S. Army has thousands of M113s in long-term storage and is actively replacing those still in service. Sending a significant number of them to Ukraine would prevent avoidable casualties. That’s especially important at a time when Kyiv needs to husband its scarce manpower.

To be clear, this stopgap solution would not obviate the need for Congress to pass additional security assistance funding. It would merely buy time. U.S. assistance for Ukraine will not be sustainable without that funding, and there’s a limit to what America should provide without assured replacements.

Administration officials may chafe at having to explain how they’re able to resume aid despite being “out of money.” They may also fear weakening — if only slightly — the pressure on House Republicans to pass the supplemental. But those are poor reasons not to take a simple step that would save Ukrainian lives.

Ukrainian troops are fighting not only for their freedom but also vital U.S. interests. America cannot afford to leave them out to dry indefinitely.

John Hardie is deputy director of the Russia Program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies think tank, where retired Rear Adm. Mark Montgomery is a senior fellow.

Macron said the issue of sending troops to Ukraine was among topics discussed during a meeting of 27 countries in Paris, including 21 heads of state, on how to aid the embattled nation.

“There’s no consensus today to send ground troops in an official, assumed and endorsed way, but in terms of dynamics, nothing should be excluded,” Macron said in a press conference Monday night after the meeting. “We will do whatever it takes so that Russia cannot win this war.”

Two years after Russia’s invasion, Ukraine in recent weeks has been pushed back along some parts of the frontline, after a counteroffensive last year failed to achieve a breakthrough. Macron said Russia’s defeat in Ukraine is “indispensable” to the security and stability of Europe.

Macron declined to say which countries supported the idea of sending troops to Ukraine, and rejected a suggestion that France wasn’t in favor. The meeting included German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Poland’s President Andrzej Duda and Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte.

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“I’m not going to clear up the ambiguity of tonight’s debates by naming names, I’m saying that it was mentioned among the options,” the French president said.

According to Poland’s Duda, the most heated discussion at the meeting was about whether to send troops to Ukraine and “there was no agreement on the matter,” and no decisions taken, the Associated Press reported.

Macron said at the start of the meeting that there had been a “hardening” of Russia in recent months, also in its internal politics, and he said almost all the countries gathered in Paris had faced increased cyber and information attacks in recent months. He said the collective analysis is that “within the next few years, we have to be prepared for Russia to attack these countries.”

“The lucidity is here, and the collective realization is that basically all of our security is now at stake.”

The countries discussed the need to “do things differently,” according to Macron. He said the war in Ukraine is a European war, and it’s up to the European countries to make a “strategic leap.”

“Ukraine is under enormous pressure, and we must not simply react, but help Ukraine to take the initiative, at a time when there are strategic uncertainties on the American capacity to decide on additional aid, based on the outcome of the American elections.”

Macron said there was a consensus for “new initiatives” on cyber defense; co-production of arms and munitions in Ukraine; defending countries threatened by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, in particular Moldova; supporting Ukraine on its border with Belarus with non-military forces; and demining operations.

If the five consensus points were fully implemented, they might require a number of security measures that would “justify some elements of deployment,” Macron said.

The countries gathered in Paris agreed on a new coalition to provide Ukraine with long-range strike capacity, by providing medium- and long-range missiles and bombs, according to Macron. The governments also agreed to strengthen existing coalitions for munitions and air-ground defense.

France isn’t in discussion with Ukraine about delivering Mirage jets, but continues to train pilots as part of the F-16 coalition, Macron said.

Macron backed an Estonian proposal for a joint European loan to set up a defense investment fund. He said a similar solution to the financing of the Covid crisis would be “relevant,” with a common guarantee backed by national budgets that would allow the European Union to issue debt.

The EU promise to deliver one million artillery shells to Ukraine by March “was no doubt an imprudent commitment,” because the stocks weren’t there, Macron said. Countries at the Monday meeting agreed to pool their efforts to source ammunition, including from non-EU countries, and they’ll provide “a clear response with a serious agenda” on the ammunition issue in the next ten days, he said.

He said finding the available ammunition is the main problem, the question of financing is secondary. Macron said explosive powder is “what’s really lacking today.”