Paris—The French Air Force may tap Safran to deliver fresh stocks of guidance kits for its powered smart bomb, needed to rebuild reserves of ordnance for the Rafale fighter, a senior officer said.
“We have laser guidance kits bought off the shelf from the United States, and guidance kits in its different versions for the Armement Air-Sol Modulaire, which we have ordered from the manufacturer Sagem,” Air Force Gen. Jean Rondel told theFrench Senate Foreign Affairs, Defense and Armed Forces Committee on Oct. 12. The Senate parliamentary record was only recently made public.
The US kits have been delivered, some of which were sent to the theater of operations to avoid dropping below a critical level of stock, he said. Those kits were mainly for the Mirage 2000.
“We now have to make the same effort for guidance kits for the Air-Sol Modulaire for the Rafale,” he said. “The challenge is clearly for the company, which received an order in summer 2015 … another order should be made by the Direction Générale de l’Armement between now and the end of the year.”
“The challenge is clearly to increase the production rate so Sagem can supply us with the kits,” he said. “We will watch the situation closely, knowing that our stocks allow us to respond … that we do not want them to reach critical levels.”
Sagem has been renamed Safran Electronics & Defense. A company spokesman declined comment.
Apart from the guidance kits, there is the issue of stocks of bombs, Rondel said.
The two issues on stock levels of bombs were: replacing the bombs used, and raising the total number to better manage the uncertainties of their being used, Air Chief of Staff André Lanata told the Senate committee. The 2017 budget reflects the need to boost the stock of bombs, reflecting a high rate of use.
There is a basic question of industry’s capacity to increase production, he said. “To support the war effort, a war industry is needed,” he said.
France bought bombs from Western allies, notably from Canada and European forces, and ordered bombs from the US to build up stocks, which were seen as too low, Rondel said. France no longer has a bomb manufacturer.
The level of bomb stocks has risen in the past, with the Libya air campaign showing an unexpected need to resupply European air forces with small- to medium-sized munitions.
