BAE Systems announced this week in Kyiv that it has established a local legal entity in Ukraine and signed multiple agreements with the Ukrainian Government to enhance support for Ukraine’s armed forces.
The agreements also explore options for supplying light guns to Ukraine.
The company, which has previously supplied much of the equipment provided to Ukraine, is currently working with NATO countries to offer support, training, and repairs to Ukraine’s armed forces.
“Signing the agreements and establishing a legal entity in Ukraine builds on our existing trust and support and paves the way for us to work together to provide more direct support to the Ukrainian armed forces,” said Charles Woodburn, Chief Executive of BAE Systems.
The first of the new agreements lays the groundwork for BAE Systems to collaborate with Armed Forces Ukraine (AFU) in understanding and supporting the country’s future military capabilities and to help revitalise Ukraine’s industrial base.
The second agreement creates a framework for BAE Systems to explore potential partners and the possibility of manufacturing 105mm Light Guns within Ukraine.
These developments come on the heels of Ukraine and Sweden’s recent intent to cooperate on the CV90 platform, which is manufactured by BAE Systems’ Hägglunds business in Sweden.
Oleksandr Kamyshin, Ukraine’s Minister for Strategic Industry, expressed gratitude toward the defence giant, stating, “I am grateful to BAE Systems for the bold decision to stand side by side with us in the fight against Russian aggression and building the future of the Ukrainian defence industry.”
Well done Bae.
Just as a bit of info, the bald fellow on the far left (Oleksil Reznikov) was removed as defence minister by Zelenskiy on Sunday after a a large number of corruption scandals surfaced inside the Ukrainian parliament especially inside their ministry of defence. He is touted as a future British ambassador.
This makes for an interesting read!
List of political scandals in the United Kingdom
LINK
Splendid 🙄
AIUI he is not personally implicated in any scandals.
Reznikov’s failure has been in not rooting them all out firmly enough.
Interesting that his replacement is a Crimean Tartar.
Mate as you are probably aware, Ukraine is also the land of corruption, oligarchs and organised crime! But, it does have the option, and requirement to clean up its act if it wants to eventually become part of the European “gang”! But, as at this time, they are doing a bloody good job of reducing Russias capacity to wage war, and doing NATOs job for them! War makes for strange bed fellows 👍
They seem to be making strides on corruption, too.
Telegraph podcast had some excellent coverage in the last day or two.
Airborne wrote:
Still cleaner than the Uk, where liberal policing, even laxer courts sends the message that crime does pay.
No argument from me mate!
Do people not wear suits and ties these days? This is an important agreement
One normally dresses equivalent to your client these days. If it was U.K. MOD they’d wear suit and tie.
And they’re not even holding the documents up level…. Lol 😁
There is a war on you know.(Couldn’t resist the WW2/Dad’s Army cliche) Zelenski’s standard atire is an army green T-shirt.
But off topic but Poland taking their defence seriously unlike our government
https://www.defensenews.com/global/europe/2023/09/05/poland-buys-hundreds-of-naval-strike-missiles-in-2-billion-deal/
Now some people will argue that Poland don’t have a Nuclear Deterrent ,and two big Aircraft carriers .Which is true however I agree with you I don’t think our PM and government take defence seriously and what we do have on our conventional forces are not fully equity like our carrier airwings,and that’s just for starters.Still it is what it is 👍 🍺
Mm, Nuclear Deterrent is the last Defence, of course. A foe could likely take a great deal of the piss before you’d consider triggering.
Not convinced we’d even have the carriers if Brown hadn’t initiated them. Nowadays, we still await a proportionate military component, and that remains a shared asset. Perhaps our current parliamentarians are too gentlemanly i.e. very reluctant to take Offence 😏
I was talking about this on another thread recently in relation to UK Coastal Defence and the ability to support beachheads from attacks at home and abroad.
“WARSAW, Poland — Poland has ordered “several hundred” Naval Strike Missiles in a deal worth 8 billion zloty (U.S. $2 billion), according to the country’s weapons procurement agency.
MCSC is developing and fielding new anti-surface warfare weapons capabilities, including NMESIS, on pace to support Force Design 2030 objectives.
These new capabilities contribute to the Fleet’s ability to achieve sea control, sea denial and defense against adversary amphibious force missions.
“This exercise gave us an opportunity to not only measure but also validate the concepts for [the Marine Corps’] anti-ship capability, which is one of the most important avenues of the Commandant’s Force Design 2030,” said Lieutenant Col. Ryan Collins, combat integration office for artillery and fires at Marine Corps Combat Development Directorate, Combat Development and Integration.
“I think the successful launches of the missile will help us clarify the path forward as we move to fulfil the Commandant’s 2030 vision, and give the Marine Corps a transformative anti-ship capability.”
Defence Minister Mariusz Błaszczak signed the deal for two new naval missile units for its existing Naval Strike Missile anti-ship system. The contract will enable the military to boost its coastal defense capabilities along the Baltic Sea.”
SINKEX, the exercise scenario involving NMESIS, provided a testing environment for new and developing technologies to connect, locate, identify, target and destroy adversary threats in all domains, culminating in the live-fire demonstration of the naval strike missile against a sea-based target.
During the exercise, forward-deployed forces on expeditionary advanced bases detected and, after joint command and control collaboration with other U.S. forces, responded to a ship-based adversary. Simultaneous impacts from multiple, dispersed weapons systems and platforms across different U.S. services—including NMESIS—engaged the threat.
NMESIS integrates established, proven sub-systems, such as the Joint Lightweight Tactical Vehicle Chassis, the Naval Strike Missile and the Fire Control System used by the Navy for NSM.
From an acquisition perspective, NMESIS started a little over two years ago,” said Joe McPherson, long-range fires program manager at MCSC.
“We’ve been able to rapidly move [on developing and fielding this system] because we’re leveraging existing NSM and JLTV subsystems.”
https://media.defense.gov/2021/Aug/17/2002833410/780/780/0/210816-M-ZJ571-2531.JPG
https://www.navalnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Marine-Corps-successfully-demonstrates-NMESIS-during-LSE-21-2-1024×576.jpg
Think the UK needs to get its AD sorted like more sky sabre ,hard to believe we don’t really have 2nd to back up our Typhoons.For coastal defence it’s wishful thinking again 🤔
Indeed!
“Poland is beefing up its border defence capabilities in a clear warning to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Warsaw revealed on Tuesday (September 5) its plan to acquire six more batteries of the Patriot “hit to kill” missile defence system.
Three out of four of the announced contracts are for such systems or their components with the first contract expected for the supply of elements of the Wisa system, with 48 M903 launchers, 644 PAC-3 MSE missiles and a total of 12 LTAMDS radars.
The country’s Ministry of Defence confirmed the contracts are to be signed at the International Defence Industry Exhibition, an annual trade fair which this year is being held in Poland until September 8.”
Last I knew at the start of the Ukraine war our sky sabre platforms were sent to Poland to beef up there Air defence ,not sure how many but now I think Poland have more systems of there own in place ,is it not time for them to come back to the UK for our needs ? And maybe one could be quite useful in Cyprus ? 🍺
For the USMC to have this capability it makes perfect sense as they need to hold forward deployed bases on islands in the Pacific.
As for us acquiring NSM for coastal defences I really think we have higher priorities such as a proper missile defence system based on ASTOR and CAMMS.
If we needed it to defend UK home waters with coastal defence then something has gone seriously wrong.
On the other hand it would be interesting to know if the NSM is compatible with the SAAB Giraffe radars used in the Sky Sabre System.
My reason for that is we are buying NSM for the navy so why not add a land portable version for defending the Falklands. Sky Sabre is due to be deployed there at some point or other so give it some more teeth.
Poland has just ordered 1000 CAAM-er missiles and 138 launchers.
Maybe a bit of NATO stockpiling going on? How many ships are out there to hit?
That’s interesting. I thought the UK was fairly unique in still fielding 105mm atilliary as it was considered too light even decades ago. Hence 155mm being more the NATO standard. Shame we never got 155mm naval guns(Project was cancelled) so we could standardise our naval MG with army & Nato ammo. I do wish we’d pick a standard naval MG & stick to it, rather than choosing the BAE 5 inch (Good gun) but them selecting BAE 57mm for the T31.
Nope it’s in widespread use by dozens of operators including the US who have the L119 variant. They don’t have the range or power of a 155mm but are light, portable, accurate and pretty robust. Hence Ukraine is using as many as they can get hold of.
One thing I’ve never understood is why we don’t field the M777a ? After all it is a British design and we still build some of the parts for the US ones.
That’s always baffled me on M777 like you say British design still build parts and a very good weapon system 🤔
Most of our field artillery is of course 155mm and has been since FV433 Abbot was replaced by AS90 from 1992. Before then our artillery was 155mm (M109) or 8 inch (M110) or 175mm (M107).
It is only certain Light forces (Cdo, Para) that operate 105mm arty.