Kongsberg’s New NSM/JSM Anti-Ship & Strike Missile
Dec 28, 2011 17:05 EST
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Polish contract finalized. (Dec 28/11)
Kongsberg’s stealthy new Naval Strike Missile (Nytt SjomalsMissil), which continues its development and testing program, has already shown potential in the crowded market for long-range ship attack and shore defense weapons. NSM’s Joint Strike Missile counterpart may have even more potential, as a longer-range air-launched naval and land strike complement to Kongsberg’s popular Penguin short-range anti-ship missile.
The market for anti-ship missiles is a crowded one, and the distinction between anti-ship and precision land strike weapons is blurring fast. Aside from a bevy of Russian subsonic and supersonic offerings, naval buyers can choose Boeing’s GM-84 Harpoon, China’s YJ-82/C-802 Saccade, MBDA’s Exocet, Otomat, or Marte; IAI of Israel’s Gabriel/ANAM, Saab’s RBS15, and more. Despite an ongoing shift toward supersonic missiles, Kongsberg chose not to go that route. So, how do they expect to be competitive in a crowded market? The F-35 Lightning II may hold the key…
- Kongsberg’s Naval Strike Missile/ Joint Strike Missile
- Contracts & Key Events [updated]
- Additional Readings
Kongsberg’s Naval Strike Missile/ Joint Strike Missile
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The 1,000-pound, stealth-enhanced NSM missiles aim to be a generation beyond the USA’s GM-84 Harpoon. A 130 nautical mile operational range gives the missile reach, Global Positioning System/Inertial Navigation System (GPS/INS) guidance flies them toward the target, and an in-flight data link makes the missile reprogrammable in flight, if its target disappears or a higher priority threat appears. An imaging infrared seeker with automatic target recognizer (ATR) are used for final approach targeting. Note the lack of radar use by the missile itself, which is normally standard procedure for anti-ship weapons. That makes the NSM completely passive, offering no warning from shipboard ESM systems that detect radar emissions, even as its stealthy shape offers little warning from its target’s active radar sweeps. This is a missile optimized at all levels for stealth, making supersonic speed less necessary. Once NSM locks on, it strikes ships or land targets with a titanium warhead and programmable fuze.
In order to speed deployment, Kongsberg and the Norwegian government have always envisaged an overlap between the NSM’s development phase and its production phase, referred to as the transition phase. That phase related to the Armed Forces’ commitments to Navantia, with a view to scheduling the NSM’s phase-in on the 4th vessel of Norway’s new Nansen Class AEGIS frigates. To date, NSM has also been chosen for Norway’s Skjold Class air cushion catamaran corvettes, and Poland’s land-based coastal defense batteries will use it to defend the country’s narrow Baltic Sea approaches.
The air-launched “Joint Strike Missile (JSM)” variant is designed to be carried and launched internally from the F-35 Lightning II fighter’s internal bays (1 missile per bay), or carried on external hardpoints by any aircraft type to integrate the weapon. The prospect of stealth-enhancing internal carriage, plus out of the gate integration with the F-35 Lightning II, could also give the JSM an entry hook for F-35 customers: Kongsberg says that the adaptation study is being funded by Norway and by Australia. Other potential JSF-linked buyers may include Denmark, The Netherlands, Turkey, et. al.
Kongsberg’s JSM development partner Lockheed Martin has a similar air-launched land-attack product in its AGM-158 JASSM, and other competitors exist, from MBDA’s Storm Shadow/Scalp, to EADS/KEPD’s Taurus to Boeing’s anti-ship and land attack SLAM-ER. The difference would be internal F-35 carriage, something that only the JSM is currently designed for.
Contracts and Key Events
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Dec 28/11: Kongsberg finalizes the Dec 7/10 preliminary contract with Poland, whose scope has increased along with its cost (now NOK 712/ $119.5 million). Deliveries of NSM missiles NSMs, in conjunction with a command and weapon control system similar to the firm’s NASAMS air defence system, are expected to begin in 2012, and the order will be booked as a Q4 2011 transaction.
Kongsberg adds that will be subcontracting with a large number of Polish enterprises, adding that the coastal defense network’s radar system, communications system and the trucks to carry the launch ramps are all being developed and delivered by Polish industry. Kongsberg Defence.
June 30/11: Kongsberg signs a NOK 543 million (about $100.9 million) contract with the NLDO for Phase II development of the air-launched Joint Strike Missile variant. It builds on the NOK 166 million JSM Phase I contract, signed in 2009. Kongsberg.
June 30/11: Kongsberg announces the first ever live-fire of the surface-launched NSM against a land target. It was actually a land-land firing, as the Polish Navy Coastal Squadron fired the missile from a land-based platform, to hit its land-based target over 150 km away.
Naval ships will also use the NSM, beginning with Norway’s own Skjold Class corvettes and Fridtjof Nansen Class AEGIS frigates. Deliveries for these platforms, and the Polish coastal defense batteries, are scheduled for 2011-2014.
June 16/11: Norwegian Parliamentary approval to buy 4 initial F-35A fighters, and begin JSM Phase II to equip those fighters with an internally-stowed anti-ship missile. VNN | F-16.NET | Reuters | Stortinget Prop. S110 [Nynorsk, PDF].
June 6/11: Defense Minister Grete Faremo is called in to an open Parliamentary hearing about the F-35A, but she also discusses the NSM/JSM. Translated from the Norwegian statement issued by the Forsvarsdepartementet:
“JSM: The operational level of ambition for new combat aircraft capability requires long-range anti-surface weapons by sea and land attack capability. The Joint Strike Missile – JSM – is considered to be the only weapon in development that will meet these operational requirements, and can be carried inside the F-35. The fact that the missile can be carried inside the plane is a very central point, namely, it means that the plane keeps its stealth capabilities – which is not the case if the missile is hung outside the wings in the traditional manner.
JSM Development Step 1 is completed, and to continue with the development of JSM in step 2 is crucial to provide operational capability – and it is an important signal to potential customers and it will create a necessary degree of credibility in our ongoing efforts to establish international collaboration for the integration of the missile.
There is considerable interest in the JSM from several other nations. I have taken the initiative include the establishment of a bilateral working group with U.S. to follow up there in particular. A clarification about the participation of other nations, including the United States, is essential in order to include them in the integration phase, which is expected to begin within the next 12-18 months.”
Dec 7/10: Kongsberg Defence Systems announces a NOK 660 (about $110.4 million) million contract with the Polish Ministry of Defence, which includes Naval Strike Missiles (NSM) and support equipment. The contract is not final yet, pending approval of the related industrial offsets contract. Some of Poland’s naval ships currently operate Saab’s RBS-15 naval strike missile, but the NSM missiles appear to be destined for coastal batteries that would cover Poland’s Baltic Sea approaches.
June 29/09: Kongsberg announces that:
“Today, the Kongsberg District Court served KONGSBERG a writ regarding a lawsuit being filed by the Swedish company SAAB in Poland against both the Polish Ministry of Defense and KONGSBERG. The lawsuit refers to the award of a contract which KONGSBERG signed with the Polish Ministry of Defence in December 2008 for the delivery of a coastal artillery system featuring Naval Strike Missiles (NSM). SAAB claims the contract to be declared void.”
April 27/09: Kongsberg Gruppen anounces a NOK 166 million (about $25 million) contract with the Norwegian Defence Procurement Division for the first phase in the development of the Joint Strike Missile. The contract is scheduled to run over the next 18 months.
Feb 2/09: Kongsberg announces a successful test firing of the Naval Strike Missile (NSM):
“Fired at the Pt. Mugu artillery range in the US state of California, the missile completed the planned trajectory prior to striking the target ship. During its flight, the missile conducted a large number of advanced manoeuvres that clearly place it far ahead of competing systems.”
May 25/07: In the largest order Kongserg has landed to date, the firm signs a NOK 2.746 billion (about $466.4 million) contract with the Norwegian Armed Forces’ Logistics Organisation for serial production of the new Naval Strike Missile (NSM). This includes the transition contract for NOK 200 million (about $34 million).
This contract covers the production of NSMs for Norway’s Nansen Class AEGIS frigates, and Skjold Class catamaran-hovercraft fast attack craft. Production under this contract will run until 2014, and will ensure employment for 200 – 250 individuals in Kongsberg, as well as work for nearly 120 of their 1400 Norwegian subcontractors in Akershus, Buskerud, and Oppland counties. Tom Gerhardsen, president of Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace, adds in the firm’s release that the contract will also:
”...give us the references we need to sell the missile to other countries’ naval defence forces. Several countries have already indicated an interest in the NSM.”
Jan 31/07: Lockheed Martin and Kongsberg sign a a joint marketing agreement for an aircraft-version of the new Naval Strike Missile (NSM), to be known as the Joint Strike Missile (JSM) and adapted for deployment on Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. A study for making adaptations to both the missile and the fighter craft is already in progress, funded jointly by Norway and Australia. It is expected that the adaptations will take 3 years to reach the technological maturity required for deployment on the F-35. Read “Lockheed & Kongsberg Partner to Bring NSM to JSF” for more.
Jan 15/07: Kongsberg announces 2 more successful NSM test firings in California, USA, as part of the Norwegian Navy’s final approval of the development phase. The tests were conducted in the U.S. because the Americans have a test firing range that allows the missile to be tested over land and sea alike, which is essential for testing several of the missile’s functions.
Aug 2/06: Kongsberg announces a pair of successful NSM missile tests in California, on April 1/07 and July 21/06.
The test firings are part of the Norwegian Navy’s final approval of the NSM development phase. The test was conducted in the U.S. because the Americans have a test firing range that allows the missile to be tested over land and sea alike.
Dec 13/05: Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace attempts to fire an NSM missile at a testing facility in France, but the test is aborted before the missile left the launcher due to a malfunction in the launcher’s systems.
A successful test is required before the project can enter the final part of the development phase, in which the missile system’s performance and functionality will be verified against the contract specifications issued by Norway’s Armed Forces’ Logistics Organisation. Kongsberg’s release says that the missile’s schedule will be unaffected.
April 26/04: In Recommendation No. 54 to the Storting, the Government asks the Storting (Norway’s parliament) for authorization to sign a contract for the Naval Strike Missile (NSM) transition phase. The contract is valued at approximately NOK 200 million.
Full implementation of the production phase will be initiated only upon formal completion of the development phase and be based on a decision by the Storting at a later date. At this point, development phase is scheduled for completion in late 2005. Kongsberg release.
Additional Readings
- DID Spotlight – F-35 Lightning II Wins Norway’s (Fake) Competition
- DID (Feb 2/07) – Lockheed & Kongsberg Partner to Bring NSM to JSF
