Following the results of the latest Coalition of the Willing meeting in the UK, a statement was issued noting that British Prime Minister Keir Starmer welcomed the statements by his partners in the Coalition of the Willing on the supply of long-range missiles to Ukraine.
The name of these missiles has not been announced, which means there are a huge number of different assumptions. It should be noted that the US is not part of this coalition. Also, given the statement by the head of the British government, the UK can be ruled out, as he welcomed other partners.
Read more: Ukraine to Receive Ten ERAMs by October: New Missiles For MiG-29 and F-16
It is also worth noting the words of British Secretary of State for Defence John Healey, who said he would not "disclose details of the technologies" provided to Ukraine, as confirmation of the supply of Nightfall ballistic missiles. Especially since they do not yet exist, as this is merely the name of the program, which is currently at the stage of collecting proposals, followed by their analysis and selection. Following this, the winner has to present prototypes in 9–12 months.
It should also be noted that "partners" is used in the plural form. In other words, France’s continued unilateral supply of SCALP cruise missiles does not meet the conditions. It is unlikely that Germany will join in and provide a certain number of Taurus missiles. Otherwise, Berlin would have been the first to announce this.
It is possible that these are entirely new long-range missiles, developed in complete secrecy and already in serial production. Another pragmatic option is American cruise missiles created under the ERAM project.
Although the U.S. is not part of the Coalition of the Willing, Ukraine's purchase authorization specifies that Denmark, the Netherlands, and Norway will finance the deal. Most likely, these are exactly the countries that Keir Starmer welcomed in his statement.
Ultimately, these are long-range cruise missiles from Zone 5 Technologies and CoAspire, which won the ERAM (Extended Range Attack Munition) project. The program aims to create a cruise missile the size of a 500-pound bomb (227 kg) with a range of about 400 km and the potential to produce 1,000 units per year.
Zone 5 Technologies will supply Rusty Dagger, while CoAspire will supply RAACM. The question of whether these systems would face the same fate as GLSDB, which proved useless against russian electronic warfare, has already been answered.
Read more: New U.S. Anti-Ballistic Interceptor Must Cost Under $750,000 — Is It Even Possible?
