Star weapon in Ukraine war, US offers India 'exclusive deal' to co-produce Javelin FGM-148 missiles in country

One of the star weapons of the Ukrainian military arsenal, the Javelin shoulder-fired anti-armor weapon, will likely be co-produced in India if negotiations between New Delhi and Washington are successful.

During US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan's recent visit to India, the two sides discussed a series of joint production proposals, including Javelin anti-tank missile systems for the Indian Army.

Produced by defense contractors Raytheon and Lockheed Martin, the 46-pound weapon is shoulder-fired and has the deadly power to penetrate any tank or mobile vehicle on the battlefield. It can also shoot down helicopters.

The Indian Army has been researching shoulder-fired ATGMs for almost a decade. If discussions move forward, a local partner will be sought to set up a manufacturing plant in India.

The Javelin system is piloted by a team of two soldiers. It fires a heat-seeking missile with a range of up to 2.5 miles. It is also called the “fire and forget” system and helps soldiers take cover immediately after firing.

The system earned the name Javelin because it hits tanks from above like a spear. Javelins can also be fired directly at a target, making them a threat against low-flying helicopters.

To meet its needs for anti-armor weapons, the Indian Army acquired Spike ATGMs from Israel in 2020 to counter Chinese aggression. Today, the National Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO) and the Indian Army tested a man-portable anti-tank guided missile (MPATGM) weapon system at the Pokhran firing range in Rajasthan.

Announcing the test in a press release on April 14, 2024, the Indian Ministry of Defense (MoD) said the MPATGM weapon system – consisting of the missiles, the tripod-mounted command launch unit, the system target acquisition and fire control unit – was evaluated in the field in different flight configurations several times “to prove its technology” during the test.

It remains to be seen whether India will accept the US offer to produce Javelins in India.

The Javelin is a combat-proven weapon. According to the Pentagon, the United States has supplied more than 10,000 Javelin systems to Ukraine. Experts believe that this weapon has helped Ukrainian light infantry kill Russian mechanized forces. The FGM-148 Javelin costs about $176,000 each.

In late August 2023, US defense giant Lockheed Martin announced it would nearly double the current Javelin production rate from 2,100 per year to just under 4,000 by 2026, in conjunction with the American defense contractor Raytheon.

India and the United States are discussing several products. As previously reported by the EurAsian Times, it was proposed to jointly produce Stryker armored vehicles. After the limited commercial purchase of Strykers through Foreign Military Sales (FMS), joint production will be done in India. So far, none of the transactions have reached the execution stage.

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Indian company Larsen and Toubro has created a joint venture with France's MBDA to develop missiles and weapons systems in India. The two countries will develop and supply fifth-generation anti-tank guided missiles (ATGM5), coastal battery missiles and high-speed target drones.

The prototype was presented at DefExpo in Chennai under the name ATGM-5. It is planned to be produced in India with complete technology transfer. The foreign supplier is also ready to support Indian development of an improved ATGM-5 with a much longer range of 10 km. It will be configured to be fired from land and air platforms.

The Indian Army's quest for firepower

The Indian army is systematically seeking to strengthen its firepower to compete with its adversaries in the East and West. In June 2023, it launched a tender for the acquisition of 5,000 fire-and-forget missiles and 500 launch systems to be mounted on BMP-2/2K “Sarath” infantry fighting vehicles built licensed.

The RFI specifies that ATGMs must be capable of superior and direct attack modes. They must be less than 1.25 m long, weigh 25 kg and have a caliber of 125 mm. The missiles are expected to fire at a minimum range of 200m and 1,100m for direct and over attack modes, respectively, and at a maximum range of over 5km.

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The Indian Army requires ATGMs to penetrate at least 650 mm of rolled homogeneous armor equivalent (RHAe) and explosive reactive armor (ERA). They should also be equipped with dual-mode day and night seekers, wireless guidance systems, interchangeable anti-armor warheads with impact fuze, or multi-purpose, blast-penetrating, high-explosive anti-armor warheads with blast fuze.

ATGMs will be used to destroy enemy tanks, armored personnel carriers (APCs), combat vehicles, low-flying helicopters and other ground weapons platforms along the line of effective control (LAC) with China and the western border with Pakistan. » added the RFI.

The Indian Army's ATGM capabilities provide a deterrent against any Chinese incursion into the Chicken's Neck region along the Line of Actual Control (LAC). In early 2024, the Indian Army conducted a large demonstration of its ATGM capabilities at Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh, an Indian state claimed in its entirety by China.

The Indian Army currently has a French-made MILAN 2T ATGM for light anti-armor warfare. The second generation missile can destroy moving targets up to a range of 2 kilometers. Another ATGM widely used by the Indian Army is the 9M133 Kornet system. This is a Russian-made ATGM deployed against heavy armor.

The army also has a large stockpile of 9M113 Konkurs weapon systems. In NATO circles, these Russian-made SACLOS wire-guided anti-tank missiles are commonly known as the “AT-5 Spandrel”.

India also has an indigenous third generation ATGM developed by the DRDO. It uses infrared homing and millimeter wave active radar technologies to focus on the target. Nag exists in three versions: an on-board version (based on the Namica launcher), a helicopter-borne version (HeliNa) and a portable version (MP-ATGM).

• Ritu Sharma has been a journalist for over a decade, writing on defense, foreign affairs and nuclear technology.
• The author can be contacted at ritu.sharma(at)mail.com
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