Alec Shelbrooke, Minister of State for the Ministry of Defence, recently stated:

“The Army’s long-range artillery capability is continually under review. The department plans to invest in the recapitalisation of our M270 tracked missile launcher system and various missile types to complement our current Guided Multi Launch Rocket System (GMLRS) munition stock.”

Earlier this year, Lockheed Martin was awarded a $32mn contract by the UK for “M270A2 MLRS Recapitalization”.

“Lockheed Martin Corp., Grand Prairie, Texas, was awarded a $32,979,835 to contract to recapitalize the Multiple Launch Rocket System into the M270A2 configuration. Work will be performed in Grand Prairie, Texas; New Boston, Texas; and Camden, Arkansas, with an estimated completion date of May 31, 2026.

The M270A2 Launcher version will be an upgraded version of the M270 with improvements such as the installation of new Launcher Loader Modules (LLM), the installing of the Improved Armored Cab (IAC) and the installing of a Common Fire Control System (CFCS). Fiscal 2022 Foreign Military Sales (United Kingdom) funds in the amount of $32,979,835 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Alabama, is the contracting activity.

To increase the compatibility with future MLRS Family of Munitions (MFOM), the upgrade will comprise new engines, improved armoured cabs and the modern Common Fire Control System (CFCS). Lockheed Martin has partnered with the Red River Army Depot for the effort. Multiple Launch Rocket System M270 launchers will also be able to fire the Precision Strike Missile and Extended-Range GMLRS rockets, both currently in development.

MLRS is a heavy tracked mobile launcher, transportable via C-17 and C-5 aircraft, that fires Guided MLRS rockets and Army Tactical Missile System missiles. MLRS will also be able to fire the Precision Strike Missile (PrSM) and Extended-Range GMLRS rockets, both currently in development.”

The UK has around 40 of these systems, and they are operated by the 26th Regiment Royal Artillery.

So we’re not getting any more despite evidence in the war in Ukraine of their significance, and were not even getting any to replace the ones we donated to Ukraine?

I believe we sourced units from Norway to replace the ones we donated.

Kinda depends how you look at it, we have twice as many as Ukraine currently has, and yet their 20 odd appears to have turned the tide of the war, after taking out ammo deposit, command and control hubs and key bridges. 40 would cause serious issues.

Whilst I do agree that we need to invest in our long range fire options, I feel the money should first go with upgrading the conventional artillery pieces.

Saying that I wonder how many of the 40 are actually operational and how many have been used for parts.

£32m for 40 upgraded M270 seems really cheap. Be as well to do every single M270 the uk has lying around at that price. Can always put them back in storage or loan them to Ukraine. Get them back when operations are finished or after a set time. New vehicles probably cost quite a bit more to buy. Fingers crossed that 155 artillery is next on the upgrade/purchase list. 105mm still has its place but shouldn’t be the main gun. I wonder how light and better you could make the 105mm gun by giving it a M777 style make over?…  Read more »

Its not the unit cost itself it’s the cost of the ammo. The way Ukraine is using them is tactical strikes, whilst using their traditional artillery for the breaking down enemy position approach which requires volume of strikes rather than just accuracy.

True but don’t need GPS guidance for more traditional role which are massively cheaper.

Appreciate what this system brings to the party, but have often wondered why we don’t also procure a cheaper unguided version for blanket bombardment, thus leaving all that precision strike stuff to systems like M270/HIMARS?

Wasn’t there a ‘dumb’ round originally for the M270? I seem to remember it was possible plonk an awful lot of fire in a short period on an ‘area’. I get the impression the rounds have gone from ‘relatively’ cheap to rather expensive as they gold plating process has got to work.

I’d just give M270 the option of firing dumb rounds and buy more launchers rather than buy another system…

They use to be cluster rounds but we stopped using them and started using GPS guidance due to treaty. Use to call it the grid square remover.

Hi CR, the original M27 round had 644 submunitions, dispensed at height over a target grid. This had the effect of covering something approaching a football field with anti personnel / anti material munitions. 12 rockets (unguided) x 644 = 7728 reasons to kiss yer arse goodbye. Now banned. Cheers

Isn’t there a version that replaced the explosive submunitions with thousands of titanium darts ?

Yup, but only the US use(d) them. The system’s Alternative Warhead rocket is a large airburst fragmentation warhead that explodes about 30 feet over a target area to disperse solid-metal penetrating projectiles to destroy enemy soldiers, armored vehicles, command posts, and other battlefield targets.

I suppose we generally look at likely scenarios in which we are fighting on or defending friendly ground, so the focus on precision fires. No point breaking everything your are trying to defend.Just look back to the Second World War, to liberate France the allies ended up killing around 60-70 thousand french citizens and wounded about 100,000 in the bombing of towns and cities, pretty much obliterating around 15-20 towns and cities.

Shouldn’t we be looking at a larger bore solution and establishing a new standard? 155 has been around for a while has it not, won’t people be looking at alternatives by now??? Would not buying new 155s now be tying us into a platform that’s nearing its end-of-life (though not support) dates and will gradually become redundant?

We also have about 30% as many as Germany have –

UK – 42 M270 B1. Germany – 114 M270 stored, 40 MARS II

Both minus unreplaced systems sent to UA.

IMO, this is one where we could do with some more.

However lesson from Ukraine war, first priority has to be to fit every armoured vehicle with active defense and not just the tanks.

I always thought I could understand English, until I started following the MoD. “Recapitalize”. Yer what?

It means to replace or refurbish these key assets. It is a word borrowed from accounting. Say you’ve bought a fleet of taxicabs for your hire car company – that is your primary capital for your business. 10 years on, you’ve lost a couple to traffic accidents, and the remainder look a tad dingy after years of fetching drunk lads and lasses home. As a result, your business isn’t operating at 100% any more – less money is coming in. So, you need to renew your capital – your taxi fleet – by replacing lost vehicles, reupholstering, fixing up the…  Read more »

Although in the context of a UK announcement some might baulk at the “…ize” spelling. In fairness most dictionaries list both the “…ise” and the “…ize” variants as acceptable British spellings but I’ve never quite been able to come to terms with the “…ize” version in British documents.

My works spell check is set on the US spellings and constantly has a fit because I use s and not z.

I quite agree. It’s babble.

Written by an American I suspect, one wants the world to know they attended college.

In plain English, I think that means ‘refurbish’

It means providing the capital / funds that will allow the upgrades to be made

LM have suggested carrying out the work in the UK.

Good. There’s a LM turret “centre of excellence” not doing a lot while the Ajax decision goes unmade. Perhaps they can turn their hands to some other engineering.

Sensible and overdue. I look forward to an equally pragmatic and frugal strategy for the howitzers

It is an asset that clearly works perfectly well against and Russian garbage equipment. So refurbishing them and bringing them up to a current spec makes a lot of sense. It is a battle winning tested and proven system. So spending money updating what we have already got is very sensible. It isn’t as if there is anything massively better out there apart from the full fat HIMARS. Reading between the lines a bit, the press release, is also suggesting that more up to date mentions would be purchased. And I would very clearly state that the effectiveness or otherwise…  Read more »

Whilst they are great, they are insanely expensive compared to traditional artillery. My feeling is that in the wars that we are likely to get involved in, we won’t be able to afford to use them, and so first upgrading the conventional artillery is a better use of cash. Saying that we should do both.

Expensive is a relative term. It requires a smaller crew that an AS90, less trucks to resupply it, and more accurately hit a target/ blanket an area. We used to have 3 Regts with MLRS (5, 32 and 39), each with 18 launchers, so a total of 54, which had been ordered when the Iron Curtain was still there, so I think if that was enough for then, then 40 should be enough now, given that over half of the Warsaw pact armies, are now on our side of the fence.

We ordered around 70 I believe. All 40 of those systems aren’t in frontline units, around 24 are.

Louis, yes understood, obviously a certain percentage are used by the Training Establishments, (RA at Larkhill, REME etc MOD Lyneham etc), plus others in CHE

I think you are right about MLRS but I think a mixed fleet of M270 armoured tracked MLRS and HIMARS would be a good idea- HIMARS is much more mobile and deployable being essentially a truck vs the very heavy and much less mobile MLRS. Still for exchange battery fire or fighting in contested battlefield space I wouldn’t want to be a HIMARS operator. HIMARS is strictly shoot and scoot whereas MLRS could be shoot, relocate, shoot again.

‘Full fat HIMARS’? The HIMARS system is identical in operation and systems to the M270A2 but only carries 1 pod of 6 rounds or 1 ATACMS. So it is in fact ‘half fat’. Cheers

Do you think there might be a reason for that?

After the obvious success of artillery of all kinds in Ukraine, the MOD should concentrate on beefing up our RA regiments with additional units. In recent years I’ve seen a marked decline in the RA’s strength.

Would this upgrade of happened if it had not been for Russia’s aggression in Ukraine?

Looks like it. It takes months if not years to set up this kind of deal and it was concluded “earlier this year”, well before these systems were given to Ukraine and their functionality proven.

I think we know the answer to that…

Yes, the contract for their refurbishment was signed before Ukraine.

When are we buying more? Along with regular artillery guns?

Sadly, we won’t. Not with the Army still set to be cut in size. Until we hear the politicians talk about ‘recapitalising’ the Army i.e. recruiting more troops, there wouldn’t be anyone to operate the additional systems… I was struck by pictures of the last King’s funeral compared to our Queen’s. The RN was lining part of the King’s route spaced apart 6 ft apart (at a guess). These days it is the police who man the route. It suggests to me there are not enough service personnel to line the route and still maintain frontline capability. The last Fleet…  Read more »

Any fleet review would be over in half an hour – not much to see these days. I truly hope Liz Truss follows through on her 3% of GDP pledge for defence. The MoD budget has been raided far too many times over the decades and in addition, Osborne had the genius idea of moving the nuclear deterrent into the core MoD budget away from the Treasury. This – by itself – eats up 13% of the annual defence budget. Absolutely insane! It’s no wonder the MoD is skint! That said, the MoD really does need to get its act…  Read more »

Eminently sensible move, now let’s do the same with 80 or so AS90’s

I am amazed at what Ukraine has done with the few MRLS / HiMars systems they have. A good investment

I think there is merit in considering a navalised version and also reawakening our project to have a navalised 155mm gun but now base it on the Bae 5″ weapon. Interoperability of the Royal Navy and Army would be great wouldn’t it? The potential is considerable for ASW. I believe the the US Marine Corps tried a multiple launch M270 or M277 aboard one of the USN ships.

Driving one out the hanger and parking it on the deck of a frigate, carrier, LPD or destroyer is the navalised version 😀 .

I think the effectiveness of MLRS has been reduced, the original rockets dispersed hundreds of submuntions meaning excellent counter battery weapon as 1 salvo of 12 rockets would drop 5k+ bomblets over area killing everything. Now with ban on cluster munition due to amount of unexploded ordanance left a single aimed rockets are good for bridges etc but if trying to counter battery 1 rocket per gun tube seems expensive way to go? Don’t get me wrong good kit of which we need more or HIMARS (think need to stick to 1 or other to reduce support costs though

GMLRS (M31) can be set to airburst mode which allows a single round to really piss on a load of chips! Cheers

A typical example of HMG re announcing old news.

A second MLRS regular regiment will form, but both regiments will only have 2 fire batteries each.

I have high hopes that the next review will increase the size of the Royal Artillery. New regiments are probably out of the question but a third battery for each regiment would be quite simple.

Bit like Hitlerand the panzer divisions, half the number of tanks per divisions and then double the number of divisions !!

You got it. Indeed, Hitler did do that, he was deceived by “Division ” numbers.

This is the usual MoD spin, while regular artillery guns are cut meantime.

This war once again showing the importance of long range artillery.

Now the question is if even it is justified to have non guided artillery at this level.

Of course it is, guided projectiles are horrifically expensive and need to be used selectively.

Unguided arty still has a role. It can be used to harass and suppress the enemy whilst your own forces move or attack. It can cheaply wreck their nerves hitting them 24×7 denying sleep or just the ability to safely nip out of a foxhole to take a dump.

It’s uses are not to be underestimated and extend beyond just blowing shit up.

Dumb rounds have their place and can be pretty accurate over certain ranges in certain weather conditions.

It is the semi guided rounds that fall into the mid ground between dumb (cheap) and 270 (expensive but accurate).

Hi SB, can you define ‘semi guided’ please? Cheers

Doesn’t take many to defeat Russia..