In an important interview with The Economist, which is highly recommended for reading, the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Valerii Zaluzhnyi made an important statement regarding HIMARS.
Thanks to the strikes with GMLRS missiles at a range of up to 70-80 km deep into enemy positions, it has become a game changer on the battlefield and made it possible to counter the artillery offensive of the russian army. But the problem is that now they have adapted to it.
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"They moved to a distance that HIMARS can no longer reach. And we don't have any longer-range weapons," Valerii Zaluzhnyi said.
Just two sentences, which provide a number of conclusions. First, the russian army was able to organize logistics from remote warehouses located deeper than 80 km from the front line. Of course, now it is much more difficult, requiring much more transport, creation of a wide-ranging network of field warehouses with a minimal supply of ammunition, but even under these conditions, the russian army continues to conduct artillery offensives.
Secondly, the active use of HIMARS has become an important factor in the actions of the Armed Forces of Ukraine against the russian army, not only due to the fact that warehouses with ammunition were burned, but also that command posts and communication centers were hit. It disrupted the enemy's communication system and troop management. Apparently, the enemy has moved them deep, and those responsible for the direct control of the troops on the front lines are effectively camouflaged. This does not mean that all warehouses and other objects has been moved or hidden. In particular, only yesterday, December 15, the ammunition warehouse in Irmino blew up. But it is becoming more and more difficult to go through them with high-precision fire.
That is, HIMARS, which is the main element of "softening" the enemy's defense, acts less effectively than at the time of its appearance. But in any case, the time that the enemy needed to adapt to it was used as efficiently as possible by the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Especially considering that HIMARS was used for tactical-operational level strikes, although it was created for much simpler tasks.
In this situation, an alternative is needed for high-precision GMLRS missiles, which should be more long-range and no less massive.
Of course, the first thing that comes to mind is the ATACMS. But besides it, there is a number of other long-range weapons. For example, the GMLRS-ER, which is an updated version of the standard ammunition for HIMARS, which actually has twice the range of use, up to 150-160 km. But the problem is that its first test launch took place only in October.
An alternative to the GMLRS-ER is the development of Boeing and Saab, which is a high-precision means of destroying targets at a range of up to 160 km called GLSDB.
But again, the GLSDB production may not begin until early 2023. And it should also be clear that the pace of serial production at the very beginning will not be high.
Next in ranking are glide bombs, in particular the AGM-154 JSOW. Their integration with the Soviet aircraft is unlikely to be very different from the JDAM integration, which, according to unofficial information, may be transferred to Ukraine soon. But its range is up to 110 km, even when launched from a significant height and at a significant speed.
Therefore, air-launched cruise missiles along with ATACMS are a completely logical alternative. First of all, the already mentioned SLAM-ER, or even more powerful AGM-158 JASSM or the European Storm Shadow, also known as SCALP.
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