US Army awards huge new weapons contract and Ukraine will benefit a lot

The United States Army has awarded a contract to make FGM-148 Javelin anti-tank weapons to a joint venture between two of the world’s top defense contractors worth well over a billion dollars. The new deal will soon see Javelin stocks replenished in Ukraine.  

The Lockheed Martin and Raytheon Javelin Joint Venture was recently awarded a $1.3 billion dollar contract to produce the FGM-148 Javelin for the U.S. Army in a deal that is the largest single-year production contract for the advanced weapon to date. 

A press release from Lockheed Martin noted that the new contract was a follow-up to a contract awarded to the Javelin Joint Venture group in May 2023 that provided an indefinite-delivery and indefinite-quantity deal to the two defense contractors' joint venture. 

The new Javelin contract aims to increase the overall production of the weapon to 3,960 units per year by 2026 to meet the growing global demand for the advanced anti-tank weapon system following its performance throughout the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

“Now more than ever, [the] Javelin is recognized as the most effective, combat-proven anti-armor weapon system in the world,” explained President and Raytheon Program Director of the Javelin Joint Venture Andy Amaro about the anti-tank weapon. 

“Through this contract, we will continue to produce and deliver this needed capability to support global ground forces in their efforts to protect and defend their interests and sovereignty,” Amaro added. The stats behind the Javelin’s current global customer base are surprising. 

The Joint Javelin Venture has more than twenty-five international customers worldwide and has produced more than 50,000 Javelin missiles and over 12,000 of the system's reusable command launch units according to the company’s records. 

“With the increased demand for Javelin worldwide, our ability to ramp production to support our Army customer and global users is more important now than ever,” said Dave Pantano, the Vice President of the Javelin Joint Venture and Lockheed Martin Javelin Program Director. 

“This production contract demonstrates how Javelin’s mission-focused capabilities are helping to keep customers Ahead of Ready and defend against threats worldwide,” Pantano added. One of the countries the new production contract will help is Ukraine. 

Ukraine is set to receive an infusion of roughly 4,000 new Javelin missiles as a result of the new contract, which is a significant number of new missiles that will likely make a serious difference in the defense of the country from Vladimir Putin’s ongoing invasion. 

According to CNN, the FGM-148 Javelin proved to be one of the three critical weapon systems that changed the course of the war in Ukraine since the man-portable missile helped blunt the onslaught of Russian armored columns in the first weeks of the war. 

"The Ukrainians needed something that could blunt that attack – and found it in the form of the Javelin, a shoulder-fired, guided anti-tank missile that can be deployed by a single individual," explained CNN's Brad Lendon in February 2023.

A Javelin missile has an effective range of 4.75 kilometers or roughly 3 miles according to Kyiv Post, which noted the system has been “highly effective in combat against Russian armored vehicles, particularly against T-72, T-80, and T-90 main battle tanks.”

The United States has delivered more than 10,000 Javelin missiles as well as hundreds of command launch units to Ukraine since Putin ordered his invasion, but the nearly 4,000 missile refill will allow soldiers to continue countering Russian armor. 

“Reports from the battlefield indicate that the Javelin has contributed to the destruction of hundreds of Russian tanks, often in situations where Ukrainian forces were outnumbered,” wrote Army Recognition. 

The new contract award to the Javelin Joint Venture might state that it is worth $1.3 billion but it has the potential to earn Lockheed Martin and Raytheon as much as $7.2 billion for the unspecified number of missiles to be produced between 2023 and 2026 according to several reports. 

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