Latvia gets approval to purchase HIMARS, including long-range ATCMS missiles
Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania could hit enemy targets 300 km from their borders
Latvia will purchase six High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) weapons systems with ammunition, including Army Tactical Missile System (ATCMS) missiles that can hit targets 300 kilometers away, Latvia’s Defense Minister Andris Sprūds announced late on October 25 on his X account (formerly Twitter).
Sprūds wrote that the U.S. State Department had approved the sale of HIMARS to Latvia in a deal valued at around USD 220 million with a purchase agreement to be finalized “in coming months”.
In Washington, the Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) said in a press release that it had delivered the required certification notifying Congress of this possible sale.
With DSCA and State Department approval of the HIMARS sale, which Latvia requested in the summer of 2022, all three Baltic countries will acquire the rocket artillery system that has proven itself in combat in Ukraine, which has destroyed Russian troop concentrations and ammunition dumps with HIMARS strikes.
More recently, an ATCMS missile fired from Ukraine into Russian-occupied territory destroyed several helicopters at a base used by the Russian armed forces.
A HIMARS platform launches an ATCMS long range missile. Photo: Wikipedia
The US agency approved the sale of HIMARS to Estonia in July 2022 and to Lithuania in October last year. All three deals include deliveries of ATCMS missiles, making the Baltic defense forces capable of striking targets deep inside Russia or Belarus in case of an attack from either country.
While Latvia’s Defense Minister didn’t mention a date for deployment of the HIMARS system, the request made under his predecessor in a earlier government, Artis Pabriks, indicated that Latvia wanted to take delivery of the weapons system by 2025.
The purchase of HIMARS by the Baltic countries – all members of NATO since 2004 – is by three separate contracts, but the multiple rocket launch systems are mobile and interoperable.
Military analysts describe HIMARS, with launchers and targeting and guidance systems mounted on vehicles as having “shoot and scoot” capability – to fire at a target and move away quickly to avoid the enemy locating them and firing back. Even shorter range HIMARS missiles can hit targets beyond the range of most conventional artillery.
With Latvia’s purchase of its six HIMARS systems valued at USD 220 million and the Estonian and Lithuanian HIMARS deals at around USD 500 million each, the Baltic countries will spend some USD 1.2 billion on rocket artillery to be built and delivered by the US defense contractor Lockheed Martin.
All three planned contracts will also include training, maintenance support and the presence of US specialists to oversee the deployment of HIMARS in each country.
The three Baltic countries are also purchasing air and coastal defense missile systems. Latvia and Estonia recently announced they will jointly procure the multi-nationally developed IRIS-T medium range anti-aircraft defense system. The IRIS-T is a medium range, infrared guided air defense missile developed by defense companies in several European countries but sold by Diehl Defense in Germany and often described as a “German” air defense system.