Home reports armor France wants to develop its own rocket launcher

Das französische Heer sucht einen Nachfolger für den Raketenwerfer LRU_Foto_Armée de Terre — The French army is looking for a successor to the LRU rocket launcher (Photo: Armée de Terre)

France wants to develop its own rocket launcher

October 23, 2023

Last week, the head of the French procurement agency DGA (Direction Générale de l'Armement), Emmanuel Chiva, spoke before the Defense Committee of the National Assembly, among other things, about the armed forces' future artillery system. It is about the successor to the US system “Lance-Roquettes Unitaire” (LRU), better known by its American name M270 MLRS (Multiple Launch Rocket System).

Wie die Fachzeitschrift „Zone Militaire“ berichtet, hatte Verteidigungsminister Sébastien Lecornu noch zu Beginn des Jahres erwogen, das US-Produkt M142 HIMARS (High Mobility Artillery Rocket System) zu beschaffen. Doch einige Wochen später nannte Chiva bereits drei mögliche Alternativen: Kauf von HIMARS „von der Stange“, Entwicklung eines europäischen Systems oder Entwicklung eines rein nationalen Systems.

In June, Lecornu finally enforced the “basic principle of sourcing French wherever possible” to the effect that no European offers should be sought. The Army's chief of staff, General Pierre Schill, added, according to "Zone Militaire", that with a purely national solution there could be no restrictions on deployment from third parties. Another advantage: With a national solution, France alone decides on the export guidelines.

DGA general delegate Emmanuel Chiva has insisted on the need to develop a “sovereign solution in the French sense and not in the European sense” (Photo: DICoD / Florian Szyjka)

The current Military Program Law (LPM) for the period 2024 to 2030 provides for the procurement of at least 13 new long-range artillery systems, i.e. up to 500 kilometers, by 2030; 13 more systems are to be added before 2035.

The Russian war of aggression against Ukraine shows how important artillery systems are in high-intensity conflicts.

The defense company MBDA France SAS, based in Le Plessis-Robinson near Paris, and the technology group Safran, based in Paris, are said to have already proposed a ground-based version of the A2SM (Armament Air-Sol Modulaire) guided bomb. The tank manufacturer KNDS France/Nexter and the military vehicle manufacturer Arquus, based in Versailles, have reportedly already announced that they want to jointly develop a competing product to MBDA/Safran.

Gerd Portugall

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