UK, Germany to develop 2,000+ km deep precision weapon

British Defence Minister John Healey and German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius in Berlin on May 15, 2025 | Photo: UK Ministry of Defence

The British Ministry of Defence announced this week the United Kingdom and Germany have agreed to ‘work together to develop a new long-range strike capability with a range of over 2,000 kilometres.’

A statement issued by the defence ministry quoted British Defence Secretary John Healey as saying, “Together with Germany, we’re leading the way in supporting Ukraine, defending NATO’s eastern flank, and jointly investing in next-generation capabilities.”

The joint development of the new weapon is one of a series of ‘Lighthouse Projects’, envisaged under the Trinity House Agreement on Defence Cooperation concluded between the two countries last October.

A joint statement issued by the two governments said, “In October 2024 we announced a series of Lighthouse Projects, which provide the ambition and substance to Trinity House. Today we reviewed progress against these, and we continue to encourage our teams to accelerate progress. We are pleased to announce concrete steps we have taken, to work towards our shared ambition. Through Trinity House, we agreed to start work on a new Deep Precision Strike Capability. For the first time, we can confirm that we will aim for this system to have a range of over 2,000km, and are jointly leading a programme of work within the European Long Range Strike Approach.”

The British defence ministry said, “The new 2,000 km precision deep strike capability will be among the most advanced systems ever designed by the UK, to safeguard the British public and reinforce NATO deterrence, while boosting the UK and European defence sectors.”

At a meeting with Healey in Berlin, German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius said work on the project had already begun, notably referring to ranges of ‘more than 2,000 kilometres’, also adding the two countries are open to participation from other allies.

With no details released about the nature of the proposed weapon, it remains unclear if the weapon is planned to be a ballistic missile or cruise missile. The new weapon should be distinguished from the U.S.-developed, similarly designated ‘Precision Strike Missile’ (PrSM — pronounced ‘prism’), which is a short range ballistic missile intended as a battlefield tactical weapon to replace the U.S. Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS), with a planned range of up to 500 kilometres.

The European Long-Range Strike Approach (ELSA) is a project between the Germany, France, Italy, Poland, Sweden and the UK, with Dutch Defence Minister Ruben Brekelmans announcing last November the Netherlands’ intention to join the initiative. ELSA was originally envisaged as a project to develop a land-based over-2,000 kilometre strike capability, understood until last year be a new cruise missile. ELSA now appears to eventually be likely to feature a variety of options for strike capabilities derived from existing systems, that could fill a capability gap with Russia after it walked out of the INF Treaty (Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty) with the U.S., which barred land-based missiles of intermediate range (1,000 km – 5,500 km).

One possible candidate being speculated as a short-term solution is a land-attack version of the Naval Cruise Missile built by MBDA, that could be considered comparable to the U.S. Tomahawk missile in some ways.

So far, such a requirement has been presumed to be fulfilled by air-launched European solutions like the Storm Shadow, SCALP and Taurus.

But a 2,000-kilometre range for a land-based system could bring Moscow within reach from German soil, for example. Referring to ELSA, the British defence ministry had said last October ‘Working alongside international allies, France, Germany, Italy, and Poland, the UK will develop new cutting-edge long range missile capabilities, with the project expected to play a key role in Europe’s defence by the 2030s.’

While the U.S. had announced the deployment of Tomahawk cruise missiles with a range of 2,500 kilometres, SM-6 anti-aircraft missiles and newly-developed hypersonic missiles in Germany, ELSA and the planned ‘deep precision strike’ capability could one more solution for European members of NATO as they seek to create redundancies for U.S.-provided capabilities for the defence of Europe.

In a smaller such move, discussions between Healey and Pistorius also included the prospective joint procurement of BAE Systems’ Sting Ray torpedoes as payload for Boeing P-8 maritime patrol and reconnaissance aircraft of the two countries.