Franco-Italian rival to US Patriot air defense system passes first test

BISCARROSSE, France — On a sunny Tuesday morning in a missile testing center facing the Atlantic Ocean, France and Italy’s plan to build a rival to a German and American air defense effort cleared its first major hurdle.  
An Aster 30 B1NT missile was fired for the first time from a launching pad and successfully destroyed a target to applause from engineers, military officers and French Armed Forces Minister Sébastien Lecornu — all watching multiple screens in an operations center.
“This is the first step in a program that is absolutely key to our strategic autonomy,” Lecornu said.
“The whole world is watching us, especially Europe. They had to buy American [equipment], now we’ve made a big enough technological leap to be able to buy Franco-Italian,” he added a few minutes later in a brief address to the press, including POLITICO. 
Air defense has become one of Europe’s most pressing priorities since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine; Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities are regularly pummeled with Russian missiles and drones.
Earlier this year, Greece and Poland called for a European air defense shield — an idea backed by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
In the past decade, France and Italy jointly developed the Medium-Range Ground-to-Air/Ground System (SAMP/T), a European-made air defense system that can intercept ballistic missiles, drones, fighter jets and other targets. However, many European countries are buying the rival American-made Patriot air defense system.
Politically, Paris and Rome also want to compete with Berlin, which is leading the European Sky Shield Initiative that aims to jointly procure Patriots, its own IRIS-T and Israel’s Arrow 3 systems to provide a multi-layered defense.
Faced with lackluster customer interest, both countries are accelerating the development of an update to their system — the SAMP/T New Generation.
According to Eurosam, the joint venture between MBDA and Thales, the SAMP/T NG will detect targets more than 350 kilometers away and intercept them beyond 150 kilometers.
In the corridors of the testing center, the SAMPT/NG is described on posters as a “European solution to protect sovereignty.”
One of the main innovations of the upgraded system is the Aster 30 B1NT’s enhanced ability to follow targets and define whether they’re friends or foes thanks to its self-steering technology, developed by Thales. The SAMP/T NG is also expected to be able to intercept hypersonic missiles.
Officials from the French arms procurement agency, DGA, declined to disclose many more details for security reasons. 
The SAMP/T — so far operated in France, Italy, Singapore and Ukraine — has struggled to find customers and long been overshadowed by the Patriot.
However, Paris and Rome are hoping the new version will attract more European governments, which is why Tuesday’s test was a crucial step to prove the system’s technical parameters. More tests are expected in the coming months.
Nations that are not Patriot clients, such as Belgium, could be interested in the SAMP/T NG. French officials said that some European countries are looking to buy the system, but declined to name them. 
Lecornu told reporters that a major benefit of the SAMP/T system is that it can strike targets across a 360-degree range, a feat which would require multiple Patriot fire units. 
Lecornu and his Italian counterpart Guido Crosetto have been pushing to create a rival to Germany’s European Sky Shield Initiative since April. Their joint effort will be helped by Lecornu’s reappointment to Prime Minister Michel Barnier’s cabinet.
In mid-September in Rome, both Lecornu and Crosetto announced their countries would buy SAMP/T NG systems: France will get 12 overall, including eight that are already ordered, and Italy will have 10. 
Lecornu aims for France’s air force to have the first systems in 2026. The French navy is also expected to be equipped with Aster B1NT missiles in 2026 or 2027.