Los misiles tácticos terrestres empleados en los sistemas lanzadores como el GMLRS y el HIMARS son productos relevantes que las grandes corporaciones de defensa de EUA producen y comercializan. La alta demanda de los mismos, ocasionada por la asistencia a Ucrania, el apoyo a Israel en Medio Oriente y las adquisiciones que Australia y Taiwan están realizando, para prepararse ante un eventual conflicto en la región “Asia – Pacifico”, han afectado progresivamente los stocks de EEUU y aliados. Esto afecta al complejo industrial militar estadounidense, por una inesperada demanda creciente que ha pasado de 6.000 a 14.000 motores cohete al año. Empresas como Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman y L3 Harris, se asocian y adaptan sus estructuras y capacidades para implementar una solución eficiente a este problema en el corto plazo.
One of America’s most important domestic products—and exports, for that matter—is in dangerously short supply. Rocket engines, a key component of most weapons built by the massive U.S. military-industrial complex, are in stunningly high demand with orders rising from 6,000 to 14,000 rockets per year, a 233 percent increase.
The hunger for these engines comes from their use in at least two major, ongoing conflicts, while America and its allies are also stockpiling weapons as a hedge against future wars. The resulting shortage is a terrifying crisis of its own as manufacturers are ill-prepared to quickly ramp up production in the event of a crisis.
So how did we get here?
In 2022, the M31 Guided Multiple Launch Rocket System (GMLRS), a GPS-guided rocket round, first achieved fame in the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian War along with the M142 HIMARS truck that lobs the rockets into the air. The M142 HIMARS is an armored truck capable of carrying up to six GMLRS rockets; the rockets have a medium miss distance of just 8.8 feet and a range of 57 miles. This combination of range and accuracy has earned GMLRS the nickname “the 70-Kilometer Sniper” in British Army service. A HIMARS can ripple-fire all six rockets in less than a minute, each armed with a 200-pound high explosive warhead packed with 160,000 tungsten spheres.
The U.S. government provided 39 HIMARS rocket trucks to the Ukrainian Armed Forces, which used them to great effect against invading Russian forces. The rockets, capable of pinpoint accuracy, inflicted heavy losses on the invaders both on the front line and miles behind it. Most recently, HIMARS systems have been blasting bridges across the Seym River in support of a Ukrainian push into Russia’s Kursk region.
GMLRS was popular before the war, but the weapon’s success in Ukraine led to a blizzard of new orders worldwide. Among NATO countries, customers include Bulgaria, Estonia, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Poland, and Romania. In the Asia-Pacific, Australia and Taiwan have placed orders. Taiwan—recognizing a weapon that could savage invading troops swarming its beaches from China—more than doubled its order of 11 HIMARS trucks, for a total of 29. The U.S. Army and Marine Corps have also increased their orders, both to boost their stockpiles and to replace rockets sent to Ukraine.
Interest in HIMARS is just part of a move away from small wars fought against guerrillas in Iraq and Afghanistan toward big wars fought by industrialized countries, says Gregory Sanders, senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington, D.C.-based defense think tank. “Attempting to deter a conflict with Russia or China has notably different requirements than the occupations of Iraq or Afghanistan,” Sanders explains.
The two-and-a-half-year-long war has run down HIMARS/GLMRS arsenals in both Ukraine and Russia, highlighting the lack of not only weapons reserves, but an industrial capacity to replace weapons expended in combat. “The multiple year industrial scale conflict demonstrated by the war in Ukraine has put a premium on production writ-large,” Sanders says. “Similar motivations are at work in the present situation, as unclassified war games regarding the war in Taiwan have demonstrated that missile stock, especially anti-ship missiles, would be exhausted in a matter of days.”
Lockheed Martin, which builds both the M31 GMLRS rocket and the M142 HIMARS launch truck, has subcontracted rocket motor production to Northrop Grumman and L3 Harris. Together, the defense giants have produced 6,000 rockets per year; still, they’ve been unable to scale production to Lockheed Martin’s satisfaction.
Why are defense contractors having a hard time filling orders? “Surging production in general faces a variety of challenges,” Sanders says. “Ideally, one would want to have some available room on the factory floor, idle or mothballed machinery, and a reserve of workers to call on. That will rarely be the case, as most defense facilities are optimized to reduce unit costs, not to maintain slack capacity.” In other words, the demands of a private, capitalist corporation and national security are not always aligned.
Other reasons undercut rocket production and efforts to buy more artillery rockets. “Munitions have gone through boom and bust cycles repeatedly in the past few decades. Production ramps up to meet the needs of a major conflict, but then collapses in the drawdown … so several missiles are more likely to be cut than one jet,” Sanders says. “These cycles undermine the incentives to maintain surge or even ramp up capacity, because a boom may not last long enough to reward investing in greater capacity.”
To remedy the situation, news broke in September of an alliance between two of America’s biggest weapons manufacturers, with General Dynamics agreeing to build rocket motors for Lockheed Martin—rockets destined for GLMRS. According to the two companies, General Dynamics will start building the motors in 2025 followed by motors for other missiles and rockets across the Lockheed Martin portfolio. Thales, a European defense giant, will build the motors for GMLRS destined for the Australian Defence Forces.
Hopefully, this solution to the missile shortage will pan out. The specter of a war in the Asia-Pacific, or a growing war in Europe, is one that haunts not only America but her allies around the world. After years of underspending on defense, countries are reacting to the new global instability by boosting their arms budgets, in many cases all at once and on the same weapons. GMLRS rockets would be a key component of the defense plans of most NATO armies or the Taiwanese Army—but only if the companies involved can make them in time.
Fuente: https://www.popularmechanics.com
