{"id":33742,"date":"2022-06-22T16:26:06","date_gmt":"2022-06-22T16:26:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/uncategorized\/2022\/06\/22\/france-requests-switchblade-loitering-munition-to-fill-urgent-capability-gap\/"},"modified":"2026-08-07T22:46:17","modified_gmt":"2026-08-07T22:46:17","slug":"france-requests-switchblade-loitering-munition-to-fill-urgent-capability-gap","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/unmanned\/2022\/06\/22\/france-requests-switchblade-loitering-munition-to-fill-urgent-capability-gap\/","title":{"rendered":"France requests Switchblade loitering munition to fill \u2018urgent\u2019 capability gap"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">PARIS \u2014 The French Army has started the process of quickly procuring <a href=\"https:\/\/www.defensenews.com\/opinion\/commentary\/2022\/06\/06\/stop-calling-switchblades-drones-its-causing-policy-confusion\/\" target=\"_blank\">American-made loitering munitions<\/a> as part of a longer-term effort to field remotely operated weapon systems, according to officials.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The service is looking to add AeroVironment\u2019s Switchblade to its inventory within the next six months, Col. Arnaud Goujon, the Army\u2019s chief of plans, told reporters at the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.defensenews.com\/digital-show-dailies\/eurosatory\/2022\/06\/14\/french-military-turns-to-sci-fi-to-fight-russia-hacking-spur-innovation\/\" target=\"_blank\">Eurosatory defense expo<\/a>, which was held last week outside Paris.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In a Tuesday email to Defense News, the French Armed Forces Ministry confirmed the country is in the process of launching a Foreign Military Sales request \u201cfor the acquisition of Switchblade remote-operated ammunition.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThis launch aims to set up a first urgent capacity for the benefit of the French forces,\u201d the ministry wrote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Pentagon in April announced <a href=\"https:\/\/www.defensenews.com\/pentagon\/2022\/04\/05\/dod-to-fast-track-300-million-in-ukraine-aid-procurements\/\" target=\"_blank\">plans to supply the Switchblade munition to Ukraine<\/a> as part of military aid provided to the European country since <a href=\"https:\/\/www.militarytimes.com\/flashpoints\/ukraine\/\" target=\"_blank\">Russian invaded it in late February<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At Eurosatory, Goujon noted the Army is discussing how best to use  such weapons. \u201cSix months from now, we\u2019re going to have a really good discussion\u201d on the path forward, he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The service is looking for a capability \u201cthat is different\u201d than a mortar or an artillery shell, he said. \u201cIf it is the same price of a mortar round that goes about 3 kilometers away and flies for 15 minutes, then it\u2019s interesting.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But if it\u2019s 10 times more expensive than a mortar and has the same range, Goujon said he is less interested. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">However, if the weapon can fly 30 or 50 kilometers (19 or 31 miles) away and has an endurance of two to four hours, \u201csuddenly, I can task it on a recovering mission \u2026 then it\u2019s a different animal,\u201d Goujon said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The use of loitering munitions by both Armenia and Azerbaijan in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict in 2020 provided many \u201clessons learned\u201d for how to use such weapons at the operational level, he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Neither Goujon nor the ministry commented on how many units the Army plans to acquire, and they would not provide a value of the foreign military sale. French news outlets <a href=\"https:\/\/www.intelligenceonline.fr\/grands-contrats\/2022\/06\/06\/paris-s-arme-de-drones-kamikazes-americains,109789508-art\" target=\"_blank\">reported<\/a> this month that the ministry\u2019s procurement office was looking to acquire 82 remotely operated weapon systems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The U.S. State Department\u2019s Defense Security Cooperation Agency declined to comment on any potential or pending arms transfers prior to congressional notification.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">AeroVironment declined to comment on the potential sale, but a company official said there has been \u201cconsiderable interest\u201d in the weapon from various militaries since the Defense Department announced plans to send it to Ukraine. The Switchblade 600 is on its way to Ukraine \u201cright now,\u201d Charles Dean, vice president of global business development for unmanned systems, told Defense News at Eurosatory. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">He noted that AeroVironment\u2019s loitering munitions have been \u201cout of public view for many years,\u201d despite being used for more than a decade by the U.S. Army. \u201cBut with the crisis in Ukraine and the donation by the U.S. government of our loitering munitions to support the Ukrainians, many more people are aware of these systems.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">AeroVironment has provided the rucksack-portable, tube-launched Switchblade 300 loitering munition to the U.S. Army for more than 10 years, and the company <a href=\"https:\/\/www.defensenews.com\/land\/2020\/10\/01\/aerovironment-debuts-bigger-anti-armor-loitering-missile\/\" target=\"_blank\">introduced the larger 600 variant<\/a> in 2020. The company also provides a nonlethal variant of the 300 system, dubbed Blackwing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The French ministry noted in its email that the government is gearing up for \u201ca long-lasting remotely operated ammunition operation,\u201d to launch as early as 2023 via two recently announced projects, Colibri and Larinae (or Hummingbird and Seagull in English, respectively).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Officials at Eurosatory told Defense News that the goal of those projects is to identify a low-cost solution that can target and neutralize an armored vehicle between 5 and 50 kilometers away, with a target demonstration date in 2024.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The French Army has started the process of quickly procuring American-made loitering munitions as part of a longer-term effort to field remotely operated weapon systems, according to officials.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":4125,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":27,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[7,160,29,32,46,86,11,12,36,27,167],"tags":[],"coauthors":[3420],"class_list":["post-33742","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-air","category-daily-news-roundup","category-digital-show-dailies","category-disaster","category-europe","category-eurosatory","category-global","category-industry","category-newsletters","category-unmanned","category-unmanned-systems"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"76ASEUY5ONEQXK536GLML7LQ3M","arc_canonical_url":"\/unmanned\/2022\/06\/22\/france-requests-switchblade-loitering-munition-to-fill-urgent-capability-gap\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented 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American-made loitering munitions as part of a longer-term effort to field remotely operated weapon systems, according to officials.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/unmanned\/2022\/06\/22\/france-requests-switchblade-loitering-munition-to-fill-urgent-capability-gap\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Defense News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2022-06-22T16:26:06+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-08-07T22:46:17+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Vivienne Machi\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Vivienne Machi\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\n\t   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