The Land Battle Decisive Munitions initiative has welcomed two new members, the Czech Republic and Sweden, bringing the total number of participating NATO Allies and partners to twenty-three.
The amendment to the initiative’s Memorandum of Understanding was signed in the margins of the NATO Defence Ministers’ Meeting in Brussels.
“The Land Battle Decisive Munitions Initiative forms a multinational framework for acquiring and managing key munition in the land domain. It enables participating nations to lower their acquisition costs by coming together and combining their purchase requirements. The Initiative also increases the ability of participating nations to share munition stocks.”
At the signing ceremony, NATO Deputy Secretary General Mircea Geoana highlighted the benefits that the Land Battle Decisive Munitions initiative brings to the Alliance:
“This project, by taking full advantage of economies of scale, is enabling us to get the most of every penny, cent or öre from our rising defence budgets.”
The Land Battle Decisive Munitions Initiative was launched during the NATO Summit in 2018 and the first delivery of acquired munition followed within six months. Participating nations are now working on further acquisition rounds for later this year.
With the two new participants, the Land Battle Decisive Munitions Initiative now includes Belgium, the Czech Republic, Croatia, Denmark, Estonia, Germany, France, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Montenegro, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, United Kingdom, as well as the partner nations Austria, Finland, North Macedonia and Sweden.
nice
USA not involved, I wonder why? Surely it’s not because they are gouging their allies with overly expensive munitions? Such as Patriot?? Nah…
Andy ,
I’m led to believe that this is just a buyers club where countries purchase weapon in bulk so as to get a much better deal. Seeing as the Yanks already purchase in bulk , this offers a money saving initiative for the smaller nations of NATO.and a select few others
https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/news_173307.htm
A munition? So fired by artillery? Or is it an ATGW?
Both and more besides, per NATO link below. As Farouk says probably a Costco for land forces;
“LBDM as an overarching term includes both self-propelled and non-self-propelled munition types. The self-propelled munition type consists of both ground and air-launched missiles. The engine and guidance system enable the missiles to change their flight path, increasing precision and efficiency. These include:
• rockets,
• land combat missiles and air defence missiles,
• rotary-wing-launched air-to-ground missiles.
The non-self-propelled munition type does not have an engine. These include:
• most tank and cannon munitions,
• mortars and artillery”
https://www.nato.int/nato_static_fl2014/assets/pdf/pdf_2019_06/20190625_1906-factsheet-lbdm.pdf
Thank you.
Interesting, the UK was late to join. Hope it saves a few pennies.
Guessing the more countries join the cheaper the designing and bulk buying gets.
Good to be involved i would guess