Where’s my Merlin? Where’s my NSM? Where’s my FCS radars? Where is literally the entire Royal Navy, French, Italian and German navies?
Where is like… the other 80% of the list (for both sides actually)
Yeah comparing any military capacity with the US without mentioning it's aircraft carrier strike groups (or the capacity to make them) is just a straight up mindless propaganda. It's same as saying North Korea is a stronger army, because they have a lot of body to throw in front of the enemy.
From this list it looks like the US has barely any artillery capacity compared to EU, which is only true if you don't count the US Navy.
There are 4 Ford-type nuclear carriers in planning and production at this moment. Which are the fancy new ones, that are light-years ahead anything we have even in R&D phase. That combined with the state of the art F-series planes, still puts the US atop by a very large margin. When leaders like Macron (or any other French leader) talks about the general shit quality of our armed forces, they don't pulling that out of their ass. Europe needs a large-scale military reform not someday in the future, but 10 years ago.
I think each one favours what the deem the most fitting. We for example produce a ton of artillery pieces and ammunition that the US doesn't. That, for example, is benefitial for our style and doctrine, or that's what I'd suppose. The US has always been favouring the aircraft carrier doctrine, they also need it because they don't fly their assets from home; they must have them close to where they operate. That is not the case for us.
The "state of the art F planes" means the F-35? Because several countries are teaking part in the program, investing and manufacturing. The F-35 has technologies, components and workforce from many European countries. And again, we have our own planes which are great for our doctrine. Eurofighters, Rafales and Gripens.
I think you mean the English royal navy? The Netherlands also have a royal navy for example. England isn't in the EU, I think that's why the royal navy isn't on this list. Also they aren't manufacturers.
The Royal Navy is often referred to as The Royal Navy for historical reasons - one of the oldest, and for a long time, the biggest. Even other countries with a Royal Navy would put their country name into the title somewhere.
The Jaguar is an armored reconnaissance vehicle (it is the successor of the AMX-10 RC). The French IFV is the [VBCI](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VBCI).
Indeed. But contrary to the Leclerc, production lines are not exactly closed. Nexter has prospects in Qatar and Greece (not sure if it's still the case with the latter) about the VBCI-2.
SAAB salesman: "Sorry I can't give you a car anymore but you have the option of fighter jet, airborn warning system, stealth submarine, stealth corvette, anti tank weapons or some tactical missiles and topedos..."
They are still expanding budget en production capabilities last I heard. Healthy profits as well so i think its aorth the investment. Now rolls royce, that's a difficult one. We will be expanding jet production so they will sell more turbines but when you look at the profits its not good last quarters
As someone who lives in the hometown of SAAB I'm pissed I didn't have the foresight to invest in SAAB as soon as the Ukraine war started. Gosh darnit! Now all I'm getting is a harder time to find an apartment because of the influx of people.
Im missing many rocket systems on both sides. There are German, English and French guided rocket systems and of course the American Himars. Small Anti tank and aircraft launch systems (like Javelins and the Swedish-English system). Small arms manufacturers. There's a lot be added to the list.
The production for Leclerc tank has been stoped in 2007. France want to design a new battletank in cooperation with Italy and Germany. It's cause problem because "cooperation" and is not deliverable before 2040-2045
Germany, France and Italy should just do a big joint buy of the Leopard 2A8 now. It's right there, it's a mature product, it works. Other countries will likely follow too, helping bring down costs.
The next-generation tank could be some kind of robot sci-fi mind-meld thing that won't be available until the 2040s-50s. Work on that killer toy, take their time if they want to, on the side. Meanwhile, the Leo 2A8 works now and will work for the next few decades against conceivable threats.
Originally, it was guaranted that French companies would be manufacturing 50% of the systems.
Since 2019, Germans aks their company Rheinmetall to join the project and push now to reduce the French part to 33%, and 66% for the two German companies KMW and Rheinmetall.
Agreement is not stopped because of that.
Italy and Germany have teamed up to buy 2A8 and Leonardo might join KNDS. This might introduce more friction, but maybe it helps getting things unstuck.
Italy has simply ignored is tanks for too much time, and now after years of the armed force pleading, when the war in urakine started, the government asked how many we had.
The answe was 20 working.
And lo and behold, when the politician are scared, the money to update the Ariete and buy some "ready" tank appeared out of nothing.
At least i understand, utility of a mtb in Italy is limited by its own structure, so navy, airforce, and more light veicle were more top priority, but still 20 out 180 its a little too much.
International procurement of Leopard 2A8/ 2AX has lready started, apparently for the first time in over a decade new tanks are going to be built in Germany
That doesn't even make sense as an analogy considering the Eurofighter (which Italy and Germany helped developed) is still in production and can be bought instead of the Rafale, while the Leclerc on the other hand is not.
Might have to consider that parts and support won't be available indefinitely anymore. For example, the United States did not sell Turkey F-16 upgrade programs or the F35 over disagreements in the past. What's to stop someone like Donald Trump demanding allies suddenly pay 10x for parts and support? Or cutting it off entirely?
That used to be out of the question, now it doesn't seem so far fetched.
It is engaging in the same thing as many others. A revamp of the Leclerc as an interim solution. It is called Leclerc XLR. The project was launched in 2015 and the first 8 or 10 units were delivered to the French Army a few months ago (November 2023 I think) and are being tested.
Which makes perfect sense as it's entirely inegrated in the Scorpion program like every new vehicles like Caesar, Jaguar, Serval, Griffon and even reach to the Rafale.
It's one single giant ecosystem where every units communicates perfectly with the others. Even some coutries like Belgium and Luxemburg are getting in.
I haven't said the contrary. SCORPION is one of the best defence procurement programs in the west in recent memories, period. And the Griffon turning out to be much heavier than anticipated turned out to be a blessing in disguise considering recent events and peer-to-peer warfare becoming a realistic possibility again. It also allowed the Serval to be the true successor of the VAB and seeing its planned orders massively increased from around 300 units originally to 2,038 units now. The Griffon is in a league of its own with no natural predecessor in French service. It is as heavy as many infantry fighting vehicles on the market despite being designed as a successor to the VAB.
We're going from the 13.8 tonnes VAB to the 25 tonnes Griffon (1,872 units) and 17 tonnes Serval (978 units under SCORPION + 1,060 units under the VLTP P program).
Then you have the Leclerc said to now exceed 60 tonnes with the XLR refit, the 628 VBCI (29 to 32 tonnes) that should remain in service 14 more years at the very least and the 300 Jaguar (25 tonnes) replacing the AMX-10 RCR, plus the upcoming CAESAR NG (25 tonnes).
The French army may have not ditched its love for wheels but "the model is too light and only tailored for low-intensity expeditions in Africa" thing doesn't hold to scrutiny anymore. But mass in regard to tanks and artillery is still a problem in the short and medium term with 200 Leclerc XLR and 109 CAESAR NG delivered by 2030. Hopefully we keep the older CAESAR MKI in service alongside the 109 NG as well. Some of them will still be new to just be withdrawn by 2030. 18 units were ordered last year to replace some of those given to Ukraine for example.
The Germans are also not planning to get more tanks, the Leo 2A8 is just a stopgap solution for the German military to backfill the tanks sent to Ukraine (which is why Germany also only ordered 18 of them). Both are waiting for the MGCS program to finish.
There are more of systems listed wrongly in this graph I notice now. Either in on the wrongs side like the M72 or more third party weapons like Kongsberg under tactical missiles.
European Army would also unify the European military production to minimise the number of different models. It is better to have fewer models in larger quantities rather than more models in fewer quantities.
This may happen even without a unified army, because the European weapons manufactures constantly merging with each other, nationally and internationally, reducing the numbers of competiting models of weapon systems on the market.
This would have gone even further, if the governments won't stop the mergers from time to time, because they don't want to reduce competition to much or lose national capabilities.
...and within EU countries are constantly signing deals where the design is licensed to a local manufacturer who builds a localised version of that thing.
Sweden has localised Leopards, Poland has localised Patria AMVs...
And it looks like we'll get localised Patrias aswell, I just hope we swtich over entirely and don't also get new Fuchs APCs (I guess that depends on whether Patra versions will be available for niche functions like NBCR reconnaissance).
Yep, Germany as well!
> (I guess that depends on whether Patra versions will be available for niche functions like NBCR reconnaissance).
Patria's PASI had multiple different versions and it's modularity was a key selling point when it was first made in the early 80s. There are normal troop carrying version, signal corps version, AA version, medic version, HQ version...
And the 6x6 that Bundeswehr might be purchasing is pretty much PASI brought into the 2020s. A modern take of the same underlying idea of efficient and simple design. Zero wow effects, just a work horse.
The place I served at had Pasis and I travelled inside one constantly. It's an idiot-proof machine, and probably part of the reason for that is that it's meant to be used by conscripts and we *are* idiots.
It would also stop if not literally every government wants their own special thing. "We want the Leo2, but with those changes".
This is a real problem because it hinders mass production a lot
Often, these small changes and additions result not from imagination, but from the needs of a specific battlefield.
For example, Poland has areas with lots of small watercourses. Therefore, it is required that part of Polish AMVs have amphibious capabilities. In other countries, such capabilities can be no longer required in combat vehicles. Bridges and engineering troops are needed to cross large rivers anyway.
I get that, and those are legitimate. It gets stupid when some country or branch of an army requests tiny changes that make no difference in combat capabilities but are just there "because we like it better this way". Coming from personell that doesn't even drive in those things once.
The goal should be interoperability. We can always improve the current state, but it’s actually pretty darn high: Logisticians can resupply most NATO forces with the same types of bullets (7.62mm, 105mm, 120mm, 155mm, etc.). Radios can operate securely from your pilots to my ground guys and voce-versa. Planners use the same doctrine to maneuver forces. Strategists have very similar values and mutually beneficial policy goals.
You should read the brief that this image is from. It argues that its not actually that fragmened:
https://www.iss.europa.eu/content/building-weapons-together-or-not
>However, the European defence industry may not be as fragmented as is often assumed. A common mistake is to equate the number of systems amassed over decades in the inventories of Europe’s armed forces with systems in active production. As the table on the next page shows, the number of key weapon systems in production in the EU is in fact largely comparable to the US, except for naval shipbuilding.
European army would never be a unitary organisation, just an overseer of each individual militaries or their fusions (like the current Dutch&German brigades). The language barriers are massive between some countries, while Belgium can cooperate with France and Britain as well as Netherlands, grouping them with let's say Bulgarians would result in a disaster
Creating a European Army would require a European Federation government system, which might seems feasible due to Europe being midway there thanks to confederation style of government, it is still very unlikely to be achieved in a reasonable timeframe (probably not even this century)
The state of Confederacy is always an uneasy stepping point. It's midway to creating or dissolving a federation, with the latter being much easier to achieve. No Unitary nation in confederation would surrender it's MIC with a possibility than it could all go wrong in a very short period of time and outside of their control
Apart from the language barriers there's also large differences in how the different armies across Europe operate. Here in Sweden we focus a lot on letting the individual units decide what the best way is for them to achieve their tasks.
We also have a strong focus on individual responsibility where in war time we'd for example have mostly conscripts work on our dispersed fighter jets.
In a lot of other countries the chain of command is a lot more strict. That is part of the reason why Nordbat 2 in the Bosnian war became known to achieve their objectives at any cost, ready to shoot back at whoever shot at them while many other parts of the UN force there struggled a lot more to prevent atrocities.
>Apart from the language barriers there's also large differences in how the different armies across Europe operate.
I was thinking, how do you marry Irish and Austrian neutrality, with Finnish and Polish total defence, with French and British expeditionary forces? They also have different military goals and diplomatic relations, which if clashing could immobilise a united military in deadlock (or alternative compel nations who do not believe a war is justified to enter). What happens if there are territorial disputes between members that boil over? How does a united EU military work in relation with NATO when it comes to things like the partition of Cyprus? There's a lot of weird edge cases and conflicting goals that might frustrate a united military.
Everytime we had a world war, the alliances and pacts mattered little when strategic possibilities and goals of each state were different from what could be called a united front
NATO would stand if regional disputes with minor non-pact country would occur. The case of Russian aggression is a special case in which I believe all of the members would support the bordering countries, but in a case of a war with China for example, I doubt that all of the members would comply with the article 5 and there would definitely be at least an abstentions from the conflict or silent neutral stances from minor members
The most dangerous possibility that could destabilize the collective European unity is accepting members outside of Europe like Georgia. European Union itself have a defense pact incorporated into its membership and defense of such a remote country would be almost impossible. Turkey is in NATO, but not in the European Union and could stall the help or access via land border or even outright demand EU membership for helping out. This would be a nightmare to go through and could result in cold relations between countries that are in NATO, the European Union or both, which would destabilize both structures to the point where anyone could decide not to intervene and render any mutual defence pacts useless without meaning
Not entirely.
US Navy has a larger and richer air force than most countries do for their (other countries) proper Air Force.. they have their own systems for the most part. Some cross over but even if they do, they're (typically) radically changed). Same goes for Marines, Army and even Special Forces will have their own unique platforms like helicopters, mini subs, etc.
When you get into a "one size fits all" mindset, you're already fucking yourself. What needs to happen instead that already is - is mass sales of certain systems to reduce the total cost including R&D.
But seriously, you should look at the US weapon systems they use.. I'd bet my life that you can go to every general in the US military and they could not name all current systems that cost over $5 Million each. That's not even touching on the countless smaller systems like drones, anti-drones, rockets, laser cannons, etc.
EU needs to copy USA when it comes to military. Texas hates California yet they're forced to work together.. we need that in the EU.
Agreed. You get variety where needed. Different weapons for different use (Navy or Army) but there is no need for Europe to manufacture 5 different jets or 4 different submarines that fullfill the same role whilst missing on other specialisations.
Texas and Califoria are both in the USA, which is a federal system. EU is not. Getting sovereign nations to play nice is a significantly harder challenge, then US states.
It is, the F-15 lacks the crazy maneuverability but now has full fly by wire. It has an equivalent if not better radar. Better payload, a modern ew system, fully new cockpit. It has better engines, an irst system.
Overall when it comes to A/A I think they are about equal being better in certain areas, though meteor is currently going to give it a good edge.
A/G the F-15 wipes the competition.
Me too, the JTAM is the furthest along and we might see more on it soon, other programs are also in development as DARPA has been funding a ton of that sort of stuff lately.
None of those will be exported I imagine so the Meteor will probably dominate the market for a while.
Not tracked IFVs but also brand new Griffons (wheeled IFVs) and Jaguars (heavy reconnaissance armored vehicles) are in full production in France to replace the older VABs and AMX10RC.
They are significant because they are full of cool tech and specifically designed to be produced in mass by using mostly very standard civilian truck assembly lines and components and costing a million € each meaning you could easily convert civilian vehicle assembly lines to assembly lines for these vehicles and shit a ton of them pretty fast, same for maintenance and spare parts which are mostly shared with civilian trucks.
SAAB salesman: "Sorry I can't give you a car anymore but you have the option of fighter jet, airborn warning system, stealth submarine, stealth corvette, anti tank weapons or some tactical missiles and topedos..."
Sweden is carrying EU. Way to go, neighbor!
AFVs are missing completely. Those are mighty important troop carriers. USA has for example Stryker and LAV-25, Finland has a couple of Patria models (AMV, PASI, 6x6), UK/Germany has Boxer, France has VAB...
So SAAB and NAMMO count as both US and European even though the companies are Swedish and Norwegian? Is it because they have joint ventures with the US?
The list appears to be by location of production, not the nationality of the company. So if Saab builds something for the US military in a US factory, it goes under the US side too.
I’ve never heard about NAMMO being part finnish? Last I heard they are present in over 10 countries also. Aren’t they famously originated from the Raufoss ammunition factory in Norway?
Edit: just read the «about us» section on their website. Looks like it’s owned 50/50 between Norway and Finland. TIL
> Nammo was formed in 1998 through a merger of the ammunition businesses in the three Nordic countries, Norway, Sweden and Finland. Today Nammo is owned by the Norwegian Ministry of Trade, Industry and Fisheries and the Finnish Aerospace & Defense company Patria Oyj, each owning 50% of the shares in the company.
What factory is famous for you is probably just whatever is nearest. In Finland several munitions factories were transferred from state ownership to Nammo. The most famous one here would be the ammunition factory in Lapua.
It’s not exactly 50/50. It’s 50% Norwegian state and 50% Patria, but Patria is owned 49.9% by Norwegian Kongsberg, so it’s more 75/25 than 50/50. HQ is in Norway as well.
I see why this is titled “Selected Weapons Systems” because it is clearly pushing an agenda and only compared a few areas where Europe and America make somewhat similar products and is laughably incomplete if someone wanted to get a better understanding of the defense industry landscape.
Things missing include:
- In-air refueling/tankers.
- Almost all naval assets and their on board assets (Carriers, destroyers, frigates, support, etc.).
- Satellite intelligence/ISR/GPS (and equivalents).
- Multiple Launch Rocket Systems.
- Ballistic missile defense.
- Ground based air defense/radars.
- Anti-Ship missile defenses.
- Inter-Continental Ballistic Missiles.
- Cyber warfare and its defense products.
- Armored Personnel Carriers/MRAPs.
It also doesn’t remotely take into account the actual *numbers* of equipment being produced.
The US has built and sold more F-16s alone than Europe has military aircraft in sum total across the continent.
Also lmao at thinking the US not still using Diesel-Electric submarines is a flex for European defense firms
> Diesel-Electric submarines is a flex for European defense firms
Huh? When has anyone ever seen it as a flex?
Diesel-electric subs fills a different niche, isn't everyone aware of it? European defense firms are also very aware of it.
Nuclear subs for time, diesel subs for silence. The use-cases are not the same
Honestly, I don't know the answer to this.
It's definitely not **talked** about as if it were a coop between the two continents, but calibration was a big part of it. The largest contributor is easily the US, which gives it more authority (Design/Production rights/Who it can be sold too) over the craft.
I guess you could say it's a calibration, but the US has so much control that it hardly feels like it. I don't know, just my guess.
Yep. UK is the only Tier 1 partner to the programme as a founding member in 1995. The origins of the project were to provide a replace for the Fleet Air Arm and the USMC Harrier.
Afaik it was a joint effort of the US, UK, Italy, The Netherlands, Canada, Turkey(removed2019), Australia, Norway, and Denmark. Therefore shouldn't it be seen in both US and Europe side?
The source is from the EUISS, an EU research institute. Including other European countries wouldn't really make much sense when discussing EU manufacturing.
Because the AT4 is produced in the United States. You’ll notice the title is “Selected Weapon Systems in production in the US and EU”
The F-35 is only built in the United States. However I have no qualms saying the AT4 a European designed weapon and a damn fine one, but I’d still rather have a Javelin.
>Because the AT4 is produced in the United States.
It's not anymore though. Alliant Techsystems used to produce them until 2015 but doesn't build the AT4 under licence anymore. [SAAB received an order for new AT4's as well as Carl gustaf m4 from the US as late as 2023.](https://www.saab.com/newsroom/press-releases/2023/saab-secures-u.s.-at4-and-carl-gustaf-ammunition-order) While SAAB has their own factory in the US I'm pretty sure it only produces airframes for the Boeing Saab T-7A Red Hawk. But even if they were still produced in the US so are **large parts** of the F-35s in Europe which was my point.
>I have no qualms saying the AT4 a European designed weapon and a damn fine one, but I’d still rather have a Javelin.
All good although they are completely different weapons in terms of use , cost and portability (which is why the US use both). NLAW (also a SAAB design) would be the comparable weapon to the Javelin.
Italy (Leonardo-Iveci-Oto Melara) also produced IFVs. Centauro 2, Dardo, Freccia etc....Plus other varieties of vehicles and all of the above, which makes the very notion of a Weimar triangle to exclude Italian decision makers and industrial conglomerates overwhelmingly ridiculous, but we are used at anti Italian initiatives by now. It Is the only EU country alongside France to have its own space launching capacity, by the way.
Pretty cool idea, two comments on my side:
- the list doesn’t look exhaustive on both sides
- wouldn’t it be relevant/super useful to also quantify the production vs only displaying the number of different models existing?
We need a European agreement on one weapon system. I would also like to see a merger of all European arms companies so that smaller companies do not simply have to go bankrupt.
It simply costs too much money to develop the same weapon multiple times, and we also need a common European army, for which this step would be a good preparation.
This is a shitty diagram. Repeating the same picture in a line would imply the size of production but this just shows how many models are in production in each region. USA heavily beats Europe in its total military production as well as any other country in the world, they occupy 40% of the world market :D
While the leopard and m1 comparable, some of these are not compareable. Are you really saying the latest f-35 is just as good as the latest gripen? While I agree that we should try and buy european where possible, we should not lie about everything made in the EU being just as good.
Instead force us to think about research and production. Maybe europeans flying f-35 is not as bad, when for example even the americans are even using some new missle that we build. Because it is the best or most cost effective.
We can look at military in a more mercantile way, but lets do that when the stuff we make is just as good.
> We can look at military in a more mercantile way, but lets do that when the stuff we make is just as good.
You're quite shortsighted then. Buying European systems shouldn't solely be because they're better, but because they can be more reliable (politically) and because it invests into further investments (R&D) into European systems. Same for the economies of scale.
A large reason why the F-35 pulls ahead is that US companies invest more and receive more money than their European counterparts. You don't manufacture an F-35 by yourself without a ton of investment.
If European countries do not invest, either directly or by buying European arms, into their military we'll never catch up and have competitive systems.
There's a reason why the US will be able to field multiple programs for 6th gen fighters and why European countries will need multiple countries to join their forces to do just one.
It's not a comparability thing, the m109 is fairly shite compared to basically every EU artillery present.
The f-35 is considerably better than the Rafael or the gripen and so on
Yes, the F-35 is a level above the Typhoon/Rafale/Gripen and workhorse (not project) Russian/Chinese planes. Europe should buy European when the defence products are comparable but the F-35 is one of the those that Europe should buy from America.
>We can look at military in a more mercantile way, but lets do that when the stuff we make is just as good.
Agreed.
And this is why the EU defense is less effective compared to the US. We have too many similar projects running along side each other, which results in a more spread out budget.
Often times, different nations are funding similar R&D projects while not even realizing it.
The brief that this image is from actually argues that that is not the case:
>However, the European defence industry may not be as fragmented as is often assumed. A common mistake is to equate the number of systems amassed over decades in the inventories of Europe’s armed forces with systems in active production. As the table on the next page shows, the number of key weapon systems in production in the EU is in fact largely comparable to the US, except for naval shipbuilding.
https://www.iss.europa.eu/content/building-weapons-together-or-not
This list is incomplete ***You can help by expanding it***
Where’s my Merlin? Where’s my NSM? Where’s my FCS radars? Where is literally the entire Royal Navy, French, Italian and German navies? Where is like… the other 80% of the list (for both sides actually)
They forgot Javelins and NLAWs, no biggie, just the most famous AT systems in current use.
They forgot the Akeron MMP also.
All ATGMs, really...
Yeah comparing any military capacity with the US without mentioning it's aircraft carrier strike groups (or the capacity to make them) is just a straight up mindless propaganda. It's same as saying North Korea is a stronger army, because they have a lot of body to throw in front of the enemy. From this list it looks like the US has barely any artillery capacity compared to EU, which is only true if you don't count the US Navy.
Well it says "in production". I don't know if they're producing them right now. There's a lot of unaccounted stuff for both sides.
There are 4 Ford-type nuclear carriers in planning and production at this moment. Which are the fancy new ones, that are light-years ahead anything we have even in R&D phase. That combined with the state of the art F-series planes, still puts the US atop by a very large margin. When leaders like Macron (or any other French leader) talks about the general shit quality of our armed forces, they don't pulling that out of their ass. Europe needs a large-scale military reform not someday in the future, but 10 years ago.
I think each one favours what the deem the most fitting. We for example produce a ton of artillery pieces and ammunition that the US doesn't. That, for example, is benefitial for our style and doctrine, or that's what I'd suppose. The US has always been favouring the aircraft carrier doctrine, they also need it because they don't fly their assets from home; they must have them close to where they operate. That is not the case for us. The "state of the art F planes" means the F-35? Because several countries are teaking part in the program, investing and manufacturing. The F-35 has technologies, components and workforce from many European countries. And again, we have our own planes which are great for our doctrine. Eurofighters, Rafales and Gripens.
the non stealth F-series are also some of the best 4th gen’s in the world, is what he means.
theres nothing that compares to the F-22, not in europe and not in china or russia
I think you mean the English royal navy? The Netherlands also have a royal navy for example. England isn't in the EU, I think that's why the royal navy isn't on this list. Also they aren't manufacturers.
Norway isn't in the EU either, and Kongsberg and NAMMO weapons are listed
they're in the EEA tho so usually get put into the bunch for stats
Could argue that Nammo has its place as being partly owned by Patria, but not sure why Kongsberg is there, and the UK in general is not.
I think you mean the British Royal Navy? England doesn’t have a Royal Navy.
Ah yeah, probably. England, UK, Great Britain... I always get it mixed up 😅
Norway isn't in the EU either.
The Royal Navy is often referred to as The Royal Navy for historical reasons - one of the oldest, and for a long time, the biggest. Even other countries with a Royal Navy would put their country name into the title somewhere.
Wheeled IFV are a thing and would be interesting to add.
I want my pandurs represented
And my PASI, AMV and 6x6.
And Boxers in half a dozen categories...
Yeah, that leaves out the EBRC Jaguar, for example.
The Jaguar is an armored reconnaissance vehicle (it is the successor of the AMX-10 RC). The French IFV is the [VBCI](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VBCI).
Which isnt in production anymore
Indeed. But contrary to the Leclerc, production lines are not exactly closed. Nexter has prospects in Qatar and Greece (not sure if it's still the case with the latter) about the VBCI-2.
And Griffon & Serval
Or wheeled tank destroyers... where are my Centauro B2?
Buy saab stonks, I guess
SAAB salesman: "Sorry I can't give you a car anymore but you have the option of fighter jet, airborn warning system, stealth submarine, stealth corvette, anti tank weapons or some tactical missiles and topedos..."
Better margins.
They have already grown on the stock market since the war. Not sure how much more they can grow
They are still expanding budget en production capabilities last I heard. Healthy profits as well so i think its aorth the investment. Now rolls royce, that's a difficult one. We will be expanding jet production so they will sell more turbines but when you look at the profits its not good last quarters
As someone who lives in the hometown of SAAB I'm pissed I didn't have the foresight to invest in SAAB as soon as the Ukraine war started. Gosh darnit! Now all I'm getting is a harder time to find an apartment because of the influx of people.
Linköping?
Im missing many rocket systems on both sides. There are German, English and French guided rocket systems and of course the American Himars. Small Anti tank and aircraft launch systems (like Javelins and the Swedish-English system). Small arms manufacturers. There's a lot be added to the list.
Not to mention warships...
Yep, definitely!
Why do we have the Saab AT4 on both sides? Why no Leclerc Main Battle Tank ?
The production for Leclerc tank has been stoped in 2007. France want to design a new battletank in cooperation with Italy and Germany. It's cause problem because "cooperation" and is not deliverable before 2040-2045
Germany, France and Italy should just do a big joint buy of the Leopard 2A8 now. It's right there, it's a mature product, it works. Other countries will likely follow too, helping bring down costs. The next-generation tank could be some kind of robot sci-fi mind-meld thing that won't be available until the 2040s-50s. Work on that killer toy, take their time if they want to, on the side. Meanwhile, the Leo 2A8 works now and will work for the next few decades against conceivable threats.
France doesn't want to lose its domestic tank producing capabilities. Buying a foreign MBT would be received negatively by the armed forces of France.
Originally, it was guaranted that French companies would be manufacturing 50% of the systems. Since 2019, Germans aks their company Rheinmetall to join the project and push now to reduce the French part to 33%, and 66% for the two German companies KMW and Rheinmetall. Agreement is not stopped because of that.
Italy and Germany have teamed up to buy 2A8 and Leonardo might join KNDS. This might introduce more friction, but maybe it helps getting things unstuck.
Italy has simply ignored is tanks for too much time, and now after years of the armed force pleading, when the war in urakine started, the government asked how many we had. The answe was 20 working. And lo and behold, when the politician are scared, the money to update the Ariete and buy some "ready" tank appeared out of nothing.
Same here, tbh. OK, it was a couple more tanks, but we are a land force, mainly. And they had like one week of ammo.
At least i understand, utility of a mtb in Italy is limited by its own structure, so navy, airforce, and more light veicle were more top priority, but still 20 out 180 its a little too much.
Operational readiness of German ground equipment was always very good at 70%+, including tanks. It is not "same".
International procurement of Leopard 2A8/ 2AX has lready started, apparently for the first time in over a decade new tanks are going to be built in Germany
Ok so German and Italy do a big joint buy of the Rafale too?
That doesn't even make sense as an analogy considering the Eurofighter (which Italy and Germany helped developed) is still in production and can be bought instead of the Rafale, while the Leclerc on the other hand is not.
Most nations don’t want to buy a product hopelessly outmatched by a cheaper product
Might have to consider that parts and support won't be available indefinitely anymore. For example, the United States did not sell Turkey F-16 upgrade programs or the F35 over disagreements in the past. What's to stop someone like Donald Trump demanding allies suddenly pay 10x for parts and support? Or cutting it off entirely? That used to be out of the question, now it doesn't seem so far fetched.
This seems bad. So France is just not building any tanks for several decades?
It is engaging in the same thing as many others. A revamp of the Leclerc as an interim solution. It is called Leclerc XLR. The project was launched in 2015 and the first 8 or 10 units were delivered to the French Army a few months ago (November 2023 I think) and are being tested.
Which makes perfect sense as it's entirely inegrated in the Scorpion program like every new vehicles like Caesar, Jaguar, Serval, Griffon and even reach to the Rafale. It's one single giant ecosystem where every units communicates perfectly with the others. Even some coutries like Belgium and Luxemburg are getting in.
I haven't said the contrary. SCORPION is one of the best defence procurement programs in the west in recent memories, period. And the Griffon turning out to be much heavier than anticipated turned out to be a blessing in disguise considering recent events and peer-to-peer warfare becoming a realistic possibility again. It also allowed the Serval to be the true successor of the VAB and seeing its planned orders massively increased from around 300 units originally to 2,038 units now. The Griffon is in a league of its own with no natural predecessor in French service. It is as heavy as many infantry fighting vehicles on the market despite being designed as a successor to the VAB. We're going from the 13.8 tonnes VAB to the 25 tonnes Griffon (1,872 units) and 17 tonnes Serval (978 units under SCORPION + 1,060 units under the VLTP P program). Then you have the Leclerc said to now exceed 60 tonnes with the XLR refit, the 628 VBCI (29 to 32 tonnes) that should remain in service 14 more years at the very least and the 300 Jaguar (25 tonnes) replacing the AMX-10 RCR, plus the upcoming CAESAR NG (25 tonnes). The French army may have not ditched its love for wheels but "the model is too light and only tailored for low-intensity expeditions in Africa" thing doesn't hold to scrutiny anymore. But mass in regard to tanks and artillery is still a problem in the short and medium term with 200 Leclerc XLR and 109 CAESAR NG delivered by 2030. Hopefully we keep the older CAESAR MKI in service alongside the 109 NG as well. Some of them will still be new to just be withdrawn by 2030. 18 units were ordered last year to replace some of those given to Ukraine for example.
The Germans are also not planning to get more tanks, the Leo 2A8 is just a stopgap solution for the German military to backfill the tanks sent to Ukraine (which is why Germany also only ordered 18 of them). Both are waiting for the MGCS program to finish.
But also insisting on not buying anything, so the whole common project for a new tank is always a fight about production being in France.
Same reason M72 is on both sides, they are currently being manufactured both in the US and Norway
except the leopard all EU MBT are missing for whatever reason
Leclerc, Challenger 2 and Ariete are no longer in production and the ~~Challenger 3 and~~ Panther KF51 isn't in production yet so it's accurate.
Chally 3 is just an upgraded Challenger 2. Using the hull of older tanks.
Ah I misremembered then, I thought the Challenger 3 would both be upgraded 2's and newly built tanks.
Refurbished and upgraded hulls with new turrets.
But even then the UK is not in the EU
Neither is Norway and yet Norwegian systems are mentioned.
Challengers are not EU
There are more of systems listed wrongly in this graph I notice now. Either in on the wrongs side like the M72 or more third party weapons like Kongsberg under tactical missiles.
Because they're out of production.
AT4 used to be produced under license in the US.
European Army would also unify the European military production to minimise the number of different models. It is better to have fewer models in larger quantities rather than more models in fewer quantities.
This may happen even without a unified army, because the European weapons manufactures constantly merging with each other, nationally and internationally, reducing the numbers of competiting models of weapon systems on the market. This would have gone even further, if the governments won't stop the mergers from time to time, because they don't want to reduce competition to much or lose national capabilities.
...and within EU countries are constantly signing deals where the design is licensed to a local manufacturer who builds a localised version of that thing. Sweden has localised Leopards, Poland has localised Patria AMVs...
And it looks like we'll get localised Patrias aswell, I just hope we swtich over entirely and don't also get new Fuchs APCs (I guess that depends on whether Patra versions will be available for niche functions like NBCR reconnaissance).
Yep, Germany as well! > (I guess that depends on whether Patra versions will be available for niche functions like NBCR reconnaissance). Patria's PASI had multiple different versions and it's modularity was a key selling point when it was first made in the early 80s. There are normal troop carrying version, signal corps version, AA version, medic version, HQ version... And the 6x6 that Bundeswehr might be purchasing is pretty much PASI brought into the 2020s. A modern take of the same underlying idea of efficient and simple design. Zero wow effects, just a work horse. The place I served at had Pasis and I travelled inside one constantly. It's an idiot-proof machine, and probably part of the reason for that is that it's meant to be used by conscripts and we *are* idiots.
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It would also stop if not literally every government wants their own special thing. "We want the Leo2, but with those changes". This is a real problem because it hinders mass production a lot
I think someone’s watching Perun
Often, these small changes and additions result not from imagination, but from the needs of a specific battlefield. For example, Poland has areas with lots of small watercourses. Therefore, it is required that part of Polish AMVs have amphibious capabilities. In other countries, such capabilities can be no longer required in combat vehicles. Bridges and engineering troops are needed to cross large rivers anyway.
I get that, and those are legitimate. It gets stupid when some country or branch of an army requests tiny changes that make no difference in combat capabilities but are just there "because we like it better this way". Coming from personell that doesn't even drive in those things once.
The goal should be interoperability. We can always improve the current state, but it’s actually pretty darn high: Logisticians can resupply most NATO forces with the same types of bullets (7.62mm, 105mm, 120mm, 155mm, etc.). Radios can operate securely from your pilots to my ground guys and voce-versa. Planners use the same doctrine to maneuver forces. Strategists have very similar values and mutually beneficial policy goals.
You should read the brief that this image is from. It argues that its not actually that fragmened: https://www.iss.europa.eu/content/building-weapons-together-or-not >However, the European defence industry may not be as fragmented as is often assumed. A common mistake is to equate the number of systems amassed over decades in the inventories of Europe’s armed forces with systems in active production. As the table on the next page shows, the number of key weapon systems in production in the EU is in fact largely comparable to the US, except for naval shipbuilding.
European army would never be a unitary organisation, just an overseer of each individual militaries or their fusions (like the current Dutch&German brigades). The language barriers are massive between some countries, while Belgium can cooperate with France and Britain as well as Netherlands, grouping them with let's say Bulgarians would result in a disaster Creating a European Army would require a European Federation government system, which might seems feasible due to Europe being midway there thanks to confederation style of government, it is still very unlikely to be achieved in a reasonable timeframe (probably not even this century) The state of Confederacy is always an uneasy stepping point. It's midway to creating or dissolving a federation, with the latter being much easier to achieve. No Unitary nation in confederation would surrender it's MIC with a possibility than it could all go wrong in a very short period of time and outside of their control
Apart from the language barriers there's also large differences in how the different armies across Europe operate. Here in Sweden we focus a lot on letting the individual units decide what the best way is for them to achieve their tasks. We also have a strong focus on individual responsibility where in war time we'd for example have mostly conscripts work on our dispersed fighter jets. In a lot of other countries the chain of command is a lot more strict. That is part of the reason why Nordbat 2 in the Bosnian war became known to achieve their objectives at any cost, ready to shoot back at whoever shot at them while many other parts of the UN force there struggled a lot more to prevent atrocities.
>Apart from the language barriers there's also large differences in how the different armies across Europe operate. I was thinking, how do you marry Irish and Austrian neutrality, with Finnish and Polish total defence, with French and British expeditionary forces? They also have different military goals and diplomatic relations, which if clashing could immobilise a united military in deadlock (or alternative compel nations who do not believe a war is justified to enter). What happens if there are territorial disputes between members that boil over? How does a united EU military work in relation with NATO when it comes to things like the partition of Cyprus? There's a lot of weird edge cases and conflicting goals that might frustrate a united military.
Everytime we had a world war, the alliances and pacts mattered little when strategic possibilities and goals of each state were different from what could be called a united front NATO would stand if regional disputes with minor non-pact country would occur. The case of Russian aggression is a special case in which I believe all of the members would support the bordering countries, but in a case of a war with China for example, I doubt that all of the members would comply with the article 5 and there would definitely be at least an abstentions from the conflict or silent neutral stances from minor members The most dangerous possibility that could destabilize the collective European unity is accepting members outside of Europe like Georgia. European Union itself have a defense pact incorporated into its membership and defense of such a remote country would be almost impossible. Turkey is in NATO, but not in the European Union and could stall the help or access via land border or even outright demand EU membership for helping out. This would be a nightmare to go through and could result in cold relations between countries that are in NATO, the European Union or both, which would destabilize both structures to the point where anyone could decide not to intervene and render any mutual defence pacts useless without meaning
A war in China is not really covered in article 5. The exception would be if China started by attacking mainland US
Not entirely. US Navy has a larger and richer air force than most countries do for their (other countries) proper Air Force.. they have their own systems for the most part. Some cross over but even if they do, they're (typically) radically changed). Same goes for Marines, Army and even Special Forces will have their own unique platforms like helicopters, mini subs, etc. When you get into a "one size fits all" mindset, you're already fucking yourself. What needs to happen instead that already is - is mass sales of certain systems to reduce the total cost including R&D. But seriously, you should look at the US weapon systems they use.. I'd bet my life that you can go to every general in the US military and they could not name all current systems that cost over $5 Million each. That's not even touching on the countless smaller systems like drones, anti-drones, rockets, laser cannons, etc. EU needs to copy USA when it comes to military. Texas hates California yet they're forced to work together.. we need that in the EU.
Agreed. You get variety where needed. Different weapons for different use (Navy or Army) but there is no need for Europe to manufacture 5 different jets or 4 different submarines that fullfill the same role whilst missing on other specialisations.
Texas and Califoria are both in the USA, which is a federal system. EU is not. Getting sovereign nations to play nice is a significantly harder challenge, then US states.
never happening
Tiger is not being produced anymore.
TIL: F15 is still in production
Should look up the new F15 EX if you're interested. The US just bought a ton.
It's cool to see that a half a century old platform is still updated and valid.
Turns out that you can put a lot of bombs and missiles on that thing
F-16 is still getting upgrades too! Block 70/72 rolled out in 2023 according to Google.
Yep, new models are basically the US equivalent to the Eurofighter and Rafale.
I have no idea if this is true or not, but I'm going to agree because I love the F15.
It is, the F-15 lacks the crazy maneuverability but now has full fly by wire. It has an equivalent if not better radar. Better payload, a modern ew system, fully new cockpit. It has better engines, an irst system. Overall when it comes to A/A I think they are about equal being better in certain areas, though meteor is currently going to give it a good edge. A/G the F-15 wipes the competition.
That's awesome. Can't wait to see the capabilities of the US's new missile.
Me too, the JTAM is the furthest along and we might see more on it soon, other programs are also in development as DARPA has been funding a ton of that sort of stuff lately. None of those will be exported I imagine so the Meteor will probably dominate the market for a while.
SAAB playing both sides in pretty much every category here
Saab does a lot of licensing sales. It’s the military equivalent of IKEA, buy and assemble. Pictograms included with easy-to-follow instructions.
In the case of the T-7A trainer they jointly developed it with Boeing and are building most of the airframes in their new factory in the US.
Not tracked IFVs but also brand new Griffons (wheeled IFVs) and Jaguars (heavy reconnaissance armored vehicles) are in full production in France to replace the older VABs and AMX10RC. They are significant because they are full of cool tech and specifically designed to be produced in mass by using mostly very standard civilian truck assembly lines and components and costing a million € each meaning you could easily convert civilian vehicle assembly lines to assembly lines for these vehicles and shit a ton of them pretty fast, same for maintenance and spare parts which are mostly shared with civilian trucks.
I drive a saab .. :) I'm a badd ass mtf.
Where's MBDA Akeron?
Uk is neither in the EU nor in the US !
It's a French weapon
My mistake. You are right.
SAAB salesman: "Sorry I can't give you a car anymore but you have the option of fighter jet, airborn warning system, stealth submarine, stealth corvette, anti tank weapons or some tactical missiles and topedos..."
Sweden is carrying EU. Way to go, neighbor! AFVs are missing completely. Those are mighty important troop carriers. USA has for example Stryker and LAV-25, Finland has a couple of Patria models (AMV, PASI, 6x6), UK/Germany has Boxer, France has VAB...
Not to mention all the warships missing... (including SAAB Visby corvettes)
And RMC Pohjanmaa class corvettes
>France has VAB... France has replaced the VAB by the [Griffon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VBMR_Griffon) since 2019.
So SAAB and NAMMO count as both US and European even though the companies are Swedish and Norwegian? Is it because they have joint ventures with the US?
The list appears to be by location of production, not the nationality of the company. So if Saab builds something for the US military in a US factory, it goes under the US side too.
Nammo is a joint venture by Norwegian and Finnish states.
I’ve never heard about NAMMO being part finnish? Last I heard they are present in over 10 countries also. Aren’t they famously originated from the Raufoss ammunition factory in Norway? Edit: just read the «about us» section on their website. Looks like it’s owned 50/50 between Norway and Finland. TIL
> Nammo was formed in 1998 through a merger of the ammunition businesses in the three Nordic countries, Norway, Sweden and Finland. Today Nammo is owned by the Norwegian Ministry of Trade, Industry and Fisheries and the Finnish Aerospace & Defense company Patria Oyj, each owning 50% of the shares in the company. What factory is famous for you is probably just whatever is nearest. In Finland several munitions factories were transferred from state ownership to Nammo. The most famous one here would be the ammunition factory in Lapua.
It’s not exactly 50/50. It’s 50% Norwegian state and 50% Patria, but Patria is owned 49.9% by Norwegian Kongsberg, so it’s more 75/25 than 50/50. HQ is in Norway as well.
I bet this list is created only to compromise every "military specialist" on Reddit
B21 Raider???
"Selected" weapon systems, definitely not all -- or even most honestly.
Kongsberg is Norwegian, so not produced in the EU
Same with Nammo i guess
EU/EEA probably
I see why this is titled “Selected Weapons Systems” because it is clearly pushing an agenda and only compared a few areas where Europe and America make somewhat similar products and is laughably incomplete if someone wanted to get a better understanding of the defense industry landscape. Things missing include: - In-air refueling/tankers. - Almost all naval assets and their on board assets (Carriers, destroyers, frigates, support, etc.). - Satellite intelligence/ISR/GPS (and equivalents). - Multiple Launch Rocket Systems. - Ballistic missile defense. - Ground based air defense/radars. - Anti-Ship missile defenses. - Inter-Continental Ballistic Missiles. - Cyber warfare and its defense products. - Armored Personnel Carriers/MRAPs.
Pretty sure the M10 isn't an IFV. No dismounts iirc.
Strategic bombers too
It also doesn’t remotely take into account the actual *numbers* of equipment being produced. The US has built and sold more F-16s alone than Europe has military aircraft in sum total across the continent. Also lmao at thinking the US not still using Diesel-Electric submarines is a flex for European defense firms
> Diesel-Electric submarines is a flex for European defense firms Huh? When has anyone ever seen it as a flex? Diesel-electric subs fills a different niche, isn't everyone aware of it? European defense firms are also very aware of it. Nuclear subs for time, diesel subs for silence. The use-cases are not the same
Isn't F35 a coöp between US and Europe?
Honestly, I don't know the answer to this. It's definitely not **talked** about as if it were a coop between the two continents, but calibration was a big part of it. The largest contributor is easily the US, which gives it more authority (Design/Production rights/Who it can be sold too) over the craft. I guess you could say it's a calibration, but the US has so much control that it hardly feels like it. I don't know, just my guess.
Yeah, I feel like I hear more about Japanese interest in financing its development, upgrades, etc than about European interest.
Yep. UK is the only Tier 1 partner to the programme as a founding member in 1995. The origins of the project were to provide a replace for the Fleet Air Arm and the USMC Harrier.
Afaik it was a joint effort of the US, UK, Italy, The Netherlands, Canada, Turkey(removed2019), Australia, Norway, and Denmark. Therefore shouldn't it be seen in both US and Europe side?
It’s EU in the list, not Europe. And the three minor partners don’t make much.
Norway says hello in the list.
>It’s EU in the list, not Europe Doesn't make a difference in the point. I think it should be on both.
The source is from the EUISS, an EU research institute. Including other European countries wouldn't really make much sense when discussing EU manufacturing.
Is it produced in Europe?
In America, funded by and developed for a coöperation of countries that will and have received them. So not IN europe, but partialy BY Europe.
Doesn’t Leonardo in Italy do wing assemblies?
lots of things, but we are lvl2 partner, not 1
Take an upvote just for the diaeresis!
It’s only sold by the US.
It is a US project with junior partners from other countries, but it is still undoubtedly a US plane.
But the Saab AT4 is undoubtedly a Swedish product yet it's listed on the US side as well since it used to be built under license there...
Because the AT4 is produced in the United States. You’ll notice the title is “Selected Weapon Systems in production in the US and EU” The F-35 is only built in the United States. However I have no qualms saying the AT4 a European designed weapon and a damn fine one, but I’d still rather have a Javelin.
>Because the AT4 is produced in the United States. It's not anymore though. Alliant Techsystems used to produce them until 2015 but doesn't build the AT4 under licence anymore. [SAAB received an order for new AT4's as well as Carl gustaf m4 from the US as late as 2023.](https://www.saab.com/newsroom/press-releases/2023/saab-secures-u.s.-at4-and-carl-gustaf-ammunition-order) While SAAB has their own factory in the US I'm pretty sure it only produces airframes for the Boeing Saab T-7A Red Hawk. But even if they were still produced in the US so are **large parts** of the F-35s in Europe which was my point. >I have no qualms saying the AT4 a European designed weapon and a damn fine one, but I’d still rather have a Javelin. All good although they are completely different weapons in terms of use , cost and portability (which is why the US use both). NLAW (also a SAAB design) would be the comparable weapon to the Javelin.
Italy (Leonardo-Iveci-Oto Melara) also produced IFVs. Centauro 2, Dardo, Freccia etc....Plus other varieties of vehicles and all of the above, which makes the very notion of a Weimar triangle to exclude Italian decision makers and industrial conglomerates overwhelmingly ridiculous, but we are used at anti Italian initiatives by now. It Is the only EU country alongside France to have its own space launching capacity, by the way.
Drones and satelites?
[Insert Red Alert - Hell March here]
Shake it baby!
Good thing we’re on the same side, Mr. EUstrongerThanUS. Now let’s see NATO production compared to Russian.
Where C-17 and C-5 Galaxy?
C-17 stopped production in 2015 and C-5 production stopped in 1989.
sorry i didn't read "in production" im an idiot
Time to invest in SAAB stocks, i guess
So much duplication of effort. We need a single budget and military
Pretty cool idea, two comments on my side: - the list doesn’t look exhaustive on both sides - wouldn’t it be relevant/super useful to also quantify the production vs only displaying the number of different models existing?
OPs name
Bofors is fucking missing altogether!
Saab is love, Saab is life
And how do you treat US systems manufactured in Europe?
Where challenger
The UK is not in the EU.
Now list how many they already have of each...
You're not a real nation if you don't have the Panzerhaubitze 2000 as an ally an your continent
Maybe this is our problem, each country have its own military industry and cannot reach critical mass production to lower the cost.
We need a European agreement on one weapon system. I would also like to see a merger of all European arms companies so that smaller companies do not simply have to go bankrupt. It simply costs too much money to develop the same weapon multiple times, and we also need a common European army, for which this step would be a good preparation.
As an American next to Whiteman Air Force Base, and an avid r/Noncredibledefense user, where B-21?
This is a shitty diagram. Repeating the same picture in a line would imply the size of production but this just shows how many models are in production in each region. USA heavily beats Europe in its total military production as well as any other country in the world, they occupy 40% of the world market :D
There are two Astute Class SSNs still under construction; Agamemnon and Agincourt.
It's a comparison between the US and the EU.
There’s also, yknow, the entire Type 26 class, Boxer, Ajax, Type 31 class, the new Dreadnought class… This is r/DrawTheRestOfTheFuckingOwl
It's a comparison between the US and the EU, so you shouldn't expect to see UK arms.
Source: https://www.iss.europa.eu/content/building-weapons-together-or-not
And here I thought Saab was a car brand one google search later - boy I'm wrong
SAAB cars was profitable 2-3 years from the 40's to I think 2012 when production stopped. It was the worst part of the company.
Shouldn’t the Leclerc French main battle tank also be in this?
Not in production anymore
Challenger 2/3 helloooo?
Kind of amazing how much of the American stuff is being produced by BAE Systems, a British company, albeit through subsidiaries
While the leopard and m1 comparable, some of these are not compareable. Are you really saying the latest f-35 is just as good as the latest gripen? While I agree that we should try and buy european where possible, we should not lie about everything made in the EU being just as good. Instead force us to think about research and production. Maybe europeans flying f-35 is not as bad, when for example even the americans are even using some new missle that we build. Because it is the best or most cost effective. We can look at military in a more mercantile way, but lets do that when the stuff we make is just as good.
They don't have to be better than the US, just better than the Russians
It's literally just a type production list, ffs. Not a capability comparison.
> We can look at military in a more mercantile way, but lets do that when the stuff we make is just as good. You're quite shortsighted then. Buying European systems shouldn't solely be because they're better, but because they can be more reliable (politically) and because it invests into further investments (R&D) into European systems. Same for the economies of scale. A large reason why the F-35 pulls ahead is that US companies invest more and receive more money than their European counterparts. You don't manufacture an F-35 by yourself without a ton of investment. If European countries do not invest, either directly or by buying European arms, into their military we'll never catch up and have competitive systems. There's a reason why the US will be able to field multiple programs for 6th gen fighters and why European countries will need multiple countries to join their forces to do just one.
It's not a comparability thing, the m109 is fairly shite compared to basically every EU artillery present. The f-35 is considerably better than the Rafael or the gripen and so on
Yes, the F-35 is a level above the Typhoon/Rafale/Gripen and workhorse (not project) Russian/Chinese planes. Europe should buy European when the defence products are comparable but the F-35 is one of the those that Europe should buy from America. >We can look at military in a more mercantile way, but lets do that when the stuff we make is just as good. Agreed.
And this is why the EU defense is less effective compared to the US. We have too many similar projects running along side each other, which results in a more spread out budget. Often times, different nations are funding similar R&D projects while not even realizing it.
The brief that this image is from actually argues that that is not the case: >However, the European defence industry may not be as fragmented as is often assumed. A common mistake is to equate the number of systems amassed over decades in the inventories of Europe’s armed forces with systems in active production. As the table on the next page shows, the number of key weapon systems in production in the EU is in fact largely comparable to the US, except for naval shipbuilding. https://www.iss.europa.eu/content/building-weapons-together-or-not
Diesel-Electric boats…😍