The military contractor Lockheed Martin, Built the
HIMARS, high-mobility artillery rocket system or long-range, mobile rocket
launcher system, can fire the same type of long-range ordnance as a
conventional multiple launch rocket system, such as the M270, at targets up to
300 kilometers away.
A crew consisting of driver, gunner, and launcher
section chief operate the system, which carries a payload of six
precision-guided missiles. A spent munitions pod can be reloaded in mere
minutes by trained soldiers. In service since 2005, the HIMARS has been
considered vital to operations against ISIS in Iraq and Syria.
Retired Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling, a former commander
of the U.S. Army in Europe and a frequent commentator analyzing the war,
praised the HIMARS as the best weapons system around. “More agile, less
training required, less maintenance and support,” “This design offers a unique
shoot and scoot capability that enables soldiers, Marines and our allies to
position, engage and rapidly relocate after firing,” wrote Michael Williamson,
vice president and general manager of missiles and fire control at Lockheed
Martin, last year in a LinkedIn post.
Thanks to its light weight, the HIMARS is also
easily transportable so it can be utilized in locations otherwise hard to
reach. It’s even deployable from a C-130 Hercules transport plane. The Biden
administration claims to have provided $4.6 billion in assistance to Ukraine
and approved an additional $40 billion, which includes four M142 high-mobility
artillery rocket systems. More HIMARS units may very well be shipped depending
on ongoing assessment of their performance on the battlefield.
In response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine,
Latvia’s government decided to gradually raise its defense budget to 2.5% of
the country’s gross domestic product by 2025 to finance several acquisition
programs. Next year, Riga aims to allocate about €747.7 million (U.S. $763.9
million) toward military expenditure, according to data from the ministry.
Latvia has sent a letter of request to buy an
undisclosed number of High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems from the United
States, with the potential acquisition to be carried out as a joint initiative
of the three Baltic states, which also include neighboring Estonia and Lithuania.
“The MoD has sent a letter of request to the U.S.
about the availability and prices of HIMARS,” a spokesperson for the Latvian
Ministry of Defense. “This is a joint project of the Baltic States, and the MoD
expects the U.S. to support it with co-financing.” In June 2022, during a
meeting between U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and his counterparts from
the Baltic states, Lithuanian Defense Minister Ardyvas Anušauskas said the
three European countries Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania, were planning to order
the Lockheed Martin-made HIMARS systems this year.
The lighter and easier-to-maintain M142 HIMARS was
developed in the 1990s. Rocket launcher mounted on the back of a truck, the
M142 HIMARS is light enough to be transported by cargo plane and its mobility
makes it hard for the enemy to take out. Previous rocket launcher systems were
known for being destructive but also crude and inaccurate. The biggest
technical leap in recent years has been the development of the precision-guided
rockets, which use GPS tracking to hit specific targets at great distances.
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