Sweden and the UK formalized their entry into the “European Long Range Strike Approach” (ELSA) at a meeting of NATO defense ministers in Brussels on 17 October.
Sweden and the UK have formalized their entry into the European Long Range Strike Approach (ELSA), an initiative launched in July this year by France to jointly move forward with the development of tomorrow’s long range strike. The two countries joined the original quartet formed by France, Germany, Italy and Poland during last week’s meeting of NATO defense ministers in Brussels.
As European media indicate, six countries will now develop a new ground-based cruise missile with a flight range of 1,000 to 2,000 km. It is about “playing a key role in defending Europe by the 2030s,” points out the British partner, for which it is also about “closer cooperation with its European allies in key security areas.” It is emphasized that this initiative is aimed at filling the gap in military stocks that was revealed as a result of events in Ukraine, where the use of long-range missiles has become strategically important.
British Defense Secretary John Healey explainedthat London is officially joining the long-range missile program, which aims to improve the integration of European air defense systems, increasing their collective effectiveness. The missiles will provide capabilities far beyond those currently available to member countries, in line with NATO’s broader goal of strengthening deterrence and defending Europe, Healy said.
“The course of the NDF in Ukraine has shown that deep-strike capabilities over long distances are necessary not only for deterrence purposes, but also to prevent the enemy from launching attacks with forces beyond range so that we can stop them,” – commented Swedish Defense Minister Paul Johnson in a statement after signing the agreement of intent for the kingdom’s participation in the ELSA initiative. Now, as indicated, it remains to formalize the attitude towards this initiative of Spain – the seventh potential partner mentioned when this project was put forward in mid-July.
“The question arises: should we all have this type of weapon? Especially considering France’s distance from NATO’s eastern border. We, of course, see that this type of weapon makes sense, because it is a European defensive element,” noted the Chief of the General Staff of the French Armed Forces, General Thierry Burckhardt, at parliamentary hearings.
Each country has its own industrial players who can contribute to this initiative. For example, Europe’s leading arms manufacturer MBDA, together with Safran, has already made progress in this matter, presented in June this year at the Eurosatory exhibition, the MBDA Thundart, a long-range land-based guided cruise missile for the navy. This guided missile is a joint project aimed at implementing the French Fire Long Range-Terre (FLP-T) program to replace the latest LRU (unitary rocket launchers) in service with the Ground Forces within a few years.
Regarding the production plan, Mathieu Krury from the MBDA group explained that “this device should be able to accurately hit stationary or moving targets at a distance of up to 150 km. The idea here is not to hit moving targets, which would require a more complex and much more expensive guidance system, but to be able to provide a certain degree of saturation with destructive weapons both in the space of stationary objects of the 150-kilometer infrastructure, and against potential targets, which would allow us to gain time to hit other important targets with longer-range missiles.” In any case, this is true for the first stage of the FLP-T program, which could subsequently lead to the development of a missile with a range of up to 500 km.
Another innovation from MBDA France in the field of long-range strike is the ground-launched cruise missile (MdCT), also known as the land-launched cruise missile (LCM). As for the missile itself, there is practically nothing new in it: it is just a naval cruise missile (MdCN, sometimes also called a “naval scalp”), already in service with the frigates of the national fleet and soon planned for its integration into the armament of attack submarines boats.
