Monitor, detect, classify, intercept and eliminate. Five actions to treat aerial threats and protect the French territory from the attacks of heaven.
Flagated by more than 12,000 aircraft per day, France is constantly monitored by a network of dozens of military and civil radars, whose information is transmitted to these detection and control centers. Its objective is to observe airspace and detect any irregular phenomenon.
To multiply detection capabilities, radars can also be deployed in ships such as air defense frigates or terrestrial batteries. This is the case, for example, the Fire 300 of land developed by Thales: mounted in the medium-sized Sol-Aire System of the New Generation (SAMPT/NG) Franco-Iteitalian of Eurosam that will be delivered from 2027, will be able, according to its manufacturer, to detect objectives up to 400 km away and treat the threats that extend from the crona of the missiles to the Hypersonic.
Because the threats are varied: they are drones or teleoperada ammunition (“suicide bomber drones”), but also airplanes and missiles, whether ballistic, intercontinental, hypersonic.
Speed and altitude determine the degree of threat. If drones fly to speeds of 100 to 200 km/h, on the other hand, cruise missiles can fly up to 1,000 km/h, or even several kilometers per second for ballistic missiles.
Destroy the threat
Once the threat is detected, it must be identified and classified to determine the best way to use to neutralize it.
The French inventory includes artillery systems, cannons capable of destroying very close objectives such as drones, very short rank systems (up to 8 km), the abuse manufactured by MBDA for objectives ranging from drones to subson missiles, as well as Mica Mica VL Mica Systems VL of short range and 15 ASTER missiles for targets up to 30 km.
To intercept, and destroy, cruise missiles or ballistic missiles, France can have the 30 MBDA Aster missiles, which can be extracted from the ground (Samp/T system) or from the sea (Frigate Multi -program). A modernized version, the Aster 30 B1nt, was successfully tested in October 2024 and should equip the Air Force and space, as well as the French Navy since 2026. According to the Ministry of Weapons, it can “attack an objective at 25,000 kilometers above sea level (…) and intercept average ballistic missiles or hypersonic missile missiles, which move at the speed of 25,000 kilometers above sea (…) and will intercept average ballistic missiles or hypersonic missiles, which move at the speed of sound speed. “
NATO Shield
To complete these capacities, France can also count on the media in the framework of NATO antimiSilic defense (BMD).
Germany houses the BMD and the anti -Missile shield center is based on American capacities based on sites located in Poland and Romania for the Naval System Aegis on land, while Spain houses US destroyers and a long -range detection radar is based on Turkey.
A European shield project
The war in Ukraine, and more recently, Trumpian’s ads of military disconnection in Europe, encourage the countries of the former continent “to reinvest in their air defense to the air and antimiles,” says a note from the French Institute of International Relations (IFIRI) dated January 2025.
Released in 2022 by Germany, the European industrial initiative Sky Shield (ESSI – European Sky Shield Initiative) brings together 20 European countries today, but not France. ESSI aims to fill capacity deficiencies modeling the Iron Dome Israeli, but mainly equipped with non-production materials in Europe (American and American-Israeli arrow 3), which led to tensions with France.
Is this a sign of Franco-German relaxation? In July 2024, the Minister of the Armed Forces Sébastien Lecornu signed a letter of intention with their German, Poles and Italian counterparts to develop capabilities of land typification to land more than 1,000 kilometers. A capacity that France does not have yours. Sweden, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom have been joined since then to Elsa (European Long Field Strike approach), which would be “complementary to the shield of heaven,” according to IFRI.
Source: BFM TV
