Ukraine has struck an agreement to manufacture a howitzer designed by defense giant BAE Systems, a deal that provides a potential blueprint for Kyiv’s goal to produce other Western-designed weapons, including Patriot missiles.
Event Context
“Ukraine wants the ability to manufacture and sustain their own capabilities, to build sovereign capability around that,” said Giles Ambrose, engineering, technology and strategy director at BAE Systems, a U.K. arms maker.
Team Analysis
Several Western defense companies have discussed manufacturing weapons in the war-torn country. But only a handful of smaller foreign drone makers have managed to launch production.
Earlier this month, President Trump said he wants to give Ukraine a license to build missiles for the Patriot air-defense system. Last week, French President Emmanuel Macron said Ukraine could also build the Aster interceptor and other European munitions.
While Ukraine has developed world-beating drone and electronic warfare systems, it still needs U.S. and European expertise on other weapons. That includes making radars, missiles and satellite technology.
President Volodymyr Zelensky and BAE Systems first discussed making it in Ukraine in 2023. A Ukrainian engineering company will start manufacturing under license from BAE, starting with a test model, said Ambrose.
Attempts by Western companies to manufacture weapons in Ukraine have proven difficult amid safety fears, lack of investment and concerns over the loss of intellectual property.
Germany’s Rheinmetall talked of setting up three different factories, including one that its chief executive, Armin Papperger, said would be capable of churning out 400 new tanks a year. Papperger said later that Ukraine didn’t bring the necessary investment and orders.
Zelensky has long tried to get a license to manufacture Patriot interceptors, which are Ukraine’s only reliable way of stopping ballistic missiles. In recent weeks, a lack of these interceptors has allowed Russian ballistic missiles to pierce Ukrainian defenses.
But making a Patriot interceptor in Ukraine is another level of complexity compared with howitzers. The U.S. is guarded on who is allowed to make its high-end weapons, for fear that the technology will end up in other’s hands. Rheinmetall, for instance, wanted to make Pac-3 interceptors, the most updated Patriot missile, but has yet to receive permission.
“Going from an announcement to actually having a working production line won’t be easy…doing it in Ukraine doesn’t make it easier,” said Ralph Savelsberg, a missile expert at the Netherlands Defence Academy, a research and training institute of the Netherlands’ Defense Ministry.
Write to Alistair MacDonald at Alistair.Macdonald@wsj.com
Match Outlook
Getting howitzer production up and running will be a test of Ukraine’s ability to serve as a manufacturing base for top-tier foreign equipment.
Howitzers are put together from metal subsystems, such as the barrel, the breech mechanism the shell is loaded into and hydraulics that reduce recoil when artillery fires. Ukraine will be forging many of these parts itself. Most drones, which are assembled from a series of sometimes off-the-shelf components, are both smaller and less complex to make.
“It does come with complexity, the materials, fabrication and machining,” said Ambrose.
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In 2022, Turkish drone maker Baykar announced it was building a factory in Ukraine that would be operating within two years. It has yet to open and has been hit several times in Russian attacks, according to Ukrainian media.
A spokesperson for Baykar didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Drones are responsible for more deaths in the Ukraine war than artillery. But big guns remain a potent weapon that can saturate an area with high explosives and destroy buildings, in a way that drones can’t yet.
The success of the L119 and the much larger BAE Systems’ M777 in Ukraine proved the continued utility of towed artillery systems in warfare. This is compared with popular self-propelled howitzers, which can move out of position quickly and where operators have the protection of an armored vehicle.
Towed artillery is easier to hide among trees and camouflage, and doesn’t give off the same heat signature, making it easier to hide from drones. It is also seen as easier to fix and more reliable, according to Ukrainian artillerists. (The U.S. Army uses a similar model, known as the M119.)
