Current U.S. Navy plans detail the NSM to be equipped on both Independence and Freedom-class Littoral Combat Ships and the new Constellation-class frigates. U.S. Navy budget documents have not hinted at an intent to equip Arleigh Burke-class destroyers with the missile. For the Royal Australian Navy (RAN), Kongsberg was selected to deliver NSM in April 2022. The Australian government officially signed off on the delivery in January 2023.
Naval News discussed in 2021 a potential integration of NSM onto Arleigh Burke-class destroyers but the U.S. Navy denied plans to do so. While the U.S. Navy is inducting new NSMs into the fleet rather slowly—with only 13 missiles ordered this fiscal year—Naval News understands that there is a plan to replace the ageing Harpoon anti-ship missiles with NSM aboard the DDG 51 Flight I destroyers.
It is unclear how integrated the NSM are aboard USS Fitzgerald. A full integration would mean the missiles are integrated with the Aegis combat management system (CMS). This is quite complex and requires a lot of testing and integration work (therefore time). A more likely scenario is that the launchers are “bolted on and stand alone”, meaning the launchers are controlled by a dedicated computer or console which doesn’t communicate with the CMS. The first every launch of an NSM from an LCS, in 2014 from USS Coronado, took place in this configuration: The NSM launcher was temporarily “bolted on” the flight deck of the ship.
Ben Felton at ADM was the first to report about HMAS Sydney fitted with Naval Strike Missile, based on official images released in early June.
Background of the RGM-184A NSM
The RGM-184A is produced by RTX Corporation’s Raytheon (Formerly Raytheon Missiles and Defense) in the United States in a partnership with Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace. Current production capacity is approximately 120 missiles per year. In FY2025, 13 missiles will be delivered to the U.S. Navy in support of delivery to the LCS fleet—and potentially the Arleigh Burke / DDG 51 Flight I fleet—while 90 missiles will be delivered to the U.S. Marine Corps in support of delivery to the Navy/Marine Expeditionary Ship Interdiction System (NMESIS) unmanned NSM launcher batteries being fielded as part of Force Design 2030.
For non-U.S. customers, Kongsberg’s production facilities boast a production rate of ‘several hundreds of missiles’ per year according to Eirik Lie, Kongsberg’s head of Defence and Aerospace in an interview with Reuters. This number is across Kongsberg’s two production lines (including one that opened this month). A new production line is expected to be opened in Australia to support the domestic and Asia Pacific markets.
The missile itself features a range greater than 100 nmi (180 km) in a lo-lo-lo sea-skimming flight profile. It has a body with composite materials to minimize radar cross section, and several guidance modes including GPS, TERCOM, and INS to maneuver around land masses and strike land-based targets if needed. NSM has no active radar seeker, with Kongsberg opting instead to use an imaging infrared (IIR) seeker to minimize detection of the missile when in line of sight of opposing ESM systems. In its terminal phase, the missile is capable of executing a wide range of defensive maneuvers to improve survivability against opposing point defense systems.
The anti-ship missile has been selected so far by the navies of Norway, Poland, Malaysia, Germany, United States (for both the US Navy and USMC), Romania, Canada, Australia, Spain, the UK, the Netherlands and Belgium, Romania and Latvia.
Both the USS Fitzgerald and HMAS Sydney are berthed at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam awaiting deployment to sea for a myriad of RIMPAC exercises. Naval News has reached out to the Combined Joint Information Bureau for RIMPAC 2024 to see if the Fitzgerald or Sydney will fire NSM in an upcoming SINKEX planned in July. Read more about RIMPAC 2024’s kickoff and plans here.
Story by Carter Johnston with additional reporting by Xavier Vavasseur
