The UK has committed to handing over blueprints for the UK-France-designed Storm Shadow/Système de Croisière Autonome à Longue Portée – Emploi Général (SCALP EG) cruise missiles to Ukraine.
This will allow Kyiv to manufacture its own missiles, which it has been launching not only from the Dassault Mirage 2000 fighters donated by France, but also from the Ukrainian Air Force’s (PSU) pre-war fleet of Soviet-era Sukhoi Su-24 fighter-bombers.
Su-35. Image Credit: Creative Commons.
Su-35 Fighter. Image Credit: Creative Commons.
The UK announcement has the country following in the footsteps of a previous, parallel decision by France to provide the same technical documentation.
British policymakers also note that enabling Ukraine to produce this weapon domestically sends a signal to Moscow.
Namely, some of the Western nations supporting Ukraine will share their defense industrial technology and manufacturing methods to help the nation defend itself.
The news about sharing the Storm Shadow technical data comes as UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham is on his first overseas trip since taking office last month.
On Monday, 24 August, he joined a group of other European leaders and dignitaries in Kyiv as the nation celebrated the 35th anniversary of its declaration of independence from the then-Soviet Union.
“For Ukraine, independence is not an abstract idea. We defended it against all odds,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha wrote on his social media platforms. “In times like these, nations learn how important it is to have allies by your side.”
Technology and Timelines
The UK’s assistance, alongside France’s, to produce this weapon is an important symbolic step, if not in substance. This weapon is an air-launched, high-precision cruise missile with a range of more than 340 miles.
It uses components and technology sourced from both MBDA partner nations, and its warhead is an 880-lb high-explosive penetrating charge.
The SCALP and Storm Shadow missiles had previously been provided to Kyiv out of the military stockpiles of both the UK and France.
They were also used to hit military facilities inside Russia at a time when the then-Joe Biden Administration was still forbidding Kyiv to use any US-made weapons to strike targets outside of occupied Ukraine. (That moratorium was lifted only after Biden had exited the presidential race and his vice president had lost the November 2024 election.)
But despite the benefits Ukraine would gain from manufacturing these missiles, the fact remains that it is an older-generation weapon system.
The missile itself was developed over 30 years ago, and due to the smaller production runs, compared with most US weapons, the unit price is very high.
Production of the weapon has therefore been in the hundreds, which puts the current price of the UK-produced Storm Shadow at £1 million, or about US$ 1.3 million per unit. That production process is also not straightforward.
Supply chains are scattered across the globe, and peacetime production ended about 15 years ago. This will make the Ukrainians’ efforts to source all the necessary components complicated and time-consuming.
As with other weapon systems for which Kyiv has been promised domestic production, the war with Russia could very well already be over before a single missile rolls off a Ukrainian production line.
More Pressing Needs
Additionally, without modifications to modernize the missile’s guidance system and reduce its signature, Russia’s air defense systems could shoot it down.
This could require a substantial effort at a time when Ukraine has more urgent requirements.
The most pressing of these is a lack of air defense interceptor missiles, specifically the PAC-3 MSE fired by the US Patriot system.
While he was in Kyiv, Burnham co-chaired a meeting of the Coalition of the Willing.
This group is a 34-nation alliance formed last year by the UK and France to fill the gap in military aid to Ukraine after US assistance dropped off during the Trump Administration’s tenure.
The alliance promised to take steps to improve Ukraine’s air defenses on Monday, with Burnham saying that Kyiv’s allies need to do “everything we can” to supply more air defense hardware.
French President Emmanuel Macron, who joined the meeting remotely, said that the last few weeks have demonstrated that Kyiv’s allies “need to accelerate delivery of interceptors,” and pledged that France will expedite the delivery of “everything that we have available.”
About the Author: Reuben F. Johnson
Reuben F. Johnson has thirty-six years of experience analyzing and reporting on foreign weapons systems, defense technologies, and international arms export policy. Johnson is the Director of Research at the Casimir Pulaski Foundation. He is also a survivor of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. He worked for years in the American defense industry as a foreign technology analyst and later as a consultant for the U.S. Department of Defense, the Departments of the Navy and Air Force, and the governments of the United Kingdom and Australia. In 2022-2023, he won two awards in a row for his defense reporting. He holds a bachelor’s degree from DePauw University and a master’s degree from Miami University in Ohio, with a specialization in Soviet and Russian studies. He lives in Warsaw.
