The European Commission recently announced that it had selected the Mistral 3 joint acquisition project under the European Defence Industry Reinforcement through common Procurement Act (EDIRPA) financial support programme. It is the first time the EU’s budget has supported member states’ purchase of defence equipment.
The aim of EDIRPA is to drive greater co-ordination and efficiency in procurement, reinforce Europe’s resilience against threats, and contribute to the sovereignty of EU member states.
The Mistral project was part of the ‘Air Defence Systems’ section of the EDIRPA. The project will receive funding of €60 million out of a total EDIRPA budget of €300 million. The objective is to reinforce the joint air defence and anti-missile capacities of nine member states (Belgium, Cyprus, Denmark, Estonia, France, Hungary, Romania, Slovenia and Spain). The French Defence Procurement Agency (Direction Générale de l’Armement) is responsible for implementing the acquisition with MBDA for 1,500 Mistral 3 missiles over four years.
The Mistral 3 is an air defence missile with an infrared imaging seeker and advanced image processing capabilities. Mistral has a proven operational success rate of over 96% and better reliability than any existing short-range ground-to-air defence system. Mistral can engage low-heat-signature targets such as drones, turbojet missiles and fast attack craft at very long ranges for a man-portable air defence system.
