The Patriot, Iris-T and Arrow land-based systems are the talk of the town when it comes to air defence. However, the German Navy already has modern and effective weapons for this purpose in the form of frigates 124.
Russia's unlawful war against cities and critical civilian infrastructure in Ukraine has finally led to a realisation in Germany of the importance of efficient air defence. Now it is time to seriously and swiftly re-equip - together with other NATO partners. This was announced by Defence Minister Christine Lambrecht in a statement on the fringes of the October meeting of NATO defence ministers in Brussels. According to the statement, fourteen European countries and Germany have signed a letter of intent to establish a European Sky Shield Initiative (ESSI) with the aim of a joint air defence. The European Sky Shield project is a German initiative that envisages the joint procurement and operation of air defence systems in Europe. The aim is also to create interoperability and achieve lower prices for the industry through joint procurement, said Lambrecht.
According to the defence minister, Germany's focus is on the Stinger, Iris-T, Patriot and Arrow 3 air defence systems. The Bundeswehr's special assets are also to be used to finance Germany's share of the project. In addition to the initiator Germany, the signatories also include Belgium, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Hungary, the Netherlands, Norway, Slovenia, Slovakia, Romania, the UK and Finland. However, ESSI should also be open to all countries within NATO.
However, none of the press releases published immediately after the signing mentioned the sensors required for such an air defence umbrella to detect and track enemy aircraft and missiles, the so-called radar umbrella. Although Germany is currently converting its ground-based airspace surveillance to state-of-the-art technology, many of the signatory states have no or only insufficiently suitable sensors for comprehensive airspace surveillance.
There was also no coordination with the Air Component Command in Ramstein, which is responsible for air defence in NATO Europe, in the run-up to the initiative. A decisive factor for the effectiveness of such a comprehensive air defence contribution would be its seamless integration into the NATO Integrated Air and Missile Defence System (NATINAMDS).
Maritime skills
Only land-based air defence systems for ground-based air defence are mentioned in the press releases. Existing and future maritime systems of the European NATO states were not mentioned. Why are existing shoulder-launched Stinger missiles and the ageing Patriot system mentioned, but not the frigate 124 or the frigate 127, which is currently in the planning stage? The Standard Missile 2 (SM-2) of an F 124 covers approximately four times the airspace of the Patriot system missile. This means that the three German frigates 124 could theoretically provide as much coverage with the SM-2 long-range missile alone as all twelve German Patriot squadrons combined. In addition, the frigates 124 would also have considerable short-range defence capabilities with the ESSM missiles.
If you add the six American destroyers now permanently stationed in Rota, Spain, NATO in Europe would already have around forty modern air defence ships with a wide range of sensors and missiles for short, medium and long-range defence, including ballistic missile defence. It would be a fatal mistake to neglect these maritime capabilities when planning the European Sky Shield.
Birth defects
But even if this birth defect were to be corrected: The term shield, which connotes a protective umbrella, is misleading. Russia has thousands of short and medium-range missiles. There can never be a comprehensive protective shield for a large country like Germany. Germany alone has 80 large cities with more than 100,000 inhabitants. And the European Phased Adaptive Approach (EPAA) already integrated into NATO air defence, with which the USA has been providing a "missile shield" with Standard Missile 3 (SM-3) in south-eastern Europe since 2016, only offers a very limited area of effect.
The initiative also lacks a view into the future. Stinger, Patriot and Iris-T can be used to engage subsonic and supersonic targets from low altitudes up to 30 kilometres. The existing maritime systems can also do this. Arrow 3 is used to defend against ballistic missiles outside the atmosphere, i.e. at an altitude of over 100 kilometres. None of the systems mentioned in the reports would be able to defend against hypersonic tactical missiles like the Russian Kinshal missiles that have already been used against Ukraine. This would require capabilities in the upper endo-atmosphere, i.e. between 30 and 100 kilometres, which a multinational study on the topic of Seabased Upper Layer Effector Feasibility developed back in 2018 and for which the Federal Office of Bundeswehr Equipment, Information Technology and In-Service Support (BAAINBw) has begun initial analyses with the HF 133 Hypersonic Technologies project.
Defence against drones is hardly possible with the missiles mentioned in the ESSI. A laser system could be used against them, for example, as was successfully tested on the frigate Sachsen in summer 2022, but was unfortunately not mentioned in the initiative.
The procurement of Arrow 3 for defence against ballistic missiles would also be mere window dressing in view of the Russian threat potential. Germany would probably procure three or four systems that could provide 30 to 40 operational interceptor missiles. Russia has hundreds of warheads in its strategic missile arsenal. Only one more warhead would have to be deployed and the defence shield would be overcome.
Strengthening deterrence
A swift and credible strengthening of nuclear sharing in the context of deterrence appears to make more sense here, which is already being considered with the announcement of the procurement of dual-use F-35 fighter-bombers. Similarly, the creation of its own conventional capabilities for a deep precision strike, i.e. the option of being able to destroy missile infrastructure or similar up to 2000 kilometres deep in enemy territory, would help to deter the Russian leadership from attacking German or NATO territory. It is no coincidence that NATO's new strategic concept, which was adopted in July 2022, is aimed at greater and more credible deterrence.
Conclusion
The purchase of defence missile systems alone is not enough. It will take decades to build up comprehensive air defence capabilities (reconnaissance, command, control, action, support) in Europe. ESSI will only be agile and resilient enough to effectively protect parts of the population from Russian air warfare potential in a joint sensor and command and control architecture with existing NATO capabilities, capable of multi-domain operations and in close cooperation with the European Phased Adaptive Approach, which in its final stage will comprise two Aegis land stations, six missile destroyers and a space surveillance radar. Technologies such as hypersonics and lasers should already be considered today. The extent to which a limited ballistic missile defence capability makes sense in view of the size of the Russian arsenal will be the subject of the procurement debate. Political decision-makers will have to deal with the issue of the balance between defensive and offensive options.
And finally: Europe is a peninsula growing out of the Urals. Almost forty air defence ships with their sensors and effectors could, if deployed appropriately, already be an important component in the protection of the continent's extensive coastal regions. The necessary procedures for this are already set out in NATO's tactical regulations.
In 2015, around 41% of people in the EU countries lived less than 50 kilometres from a coastline, and the trend was stated as increasing at the time. The German Navy also has a significant contribution to make to air defence in NATO Europe.
Frigate Captain Andreas Uhl is a member of the Warfare Development Fusion Team at Allied Command Transformation in Norfolk, USA.
It would be nice if a map of Europe could be added to the article when it is published, showing that it is "a peninsula growing out of the Urals" (see conclusion, last two paragraphs). Pictures of F124 or other European air defence ships as well as PATRIOT, IRIS-T or ARROW 3 would also fit the article. I'm sure Markus will find something suitable in his archive.
Andreas Uhl
English 
German
0 Kommentare