“ASRAAM was attractive to air forces not willing to wait for the AIM- 9X, such as Australia, but MBDA has not been willing to fund extensive integration efforts for fighters other than European types. The main European challenger to AIM-9X in recent years has been the IRIS-T, a German spinoff of the earlier Sidewinder license manufacture program.”

In the tactical air-to-surface category, Teal Group reports European development “has not been very vigorous,” although Storm Shadow and Brimstone munitions have scored successes in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya.

 

Russia

While Russia has lost most of the captive customer base of the old Soviet Bloc, Moscow is trying to position itself for a comeback in the global AAM export market – not with the high technology of the United States and Europe, but with less expensive alternatives. However, they continue to suffer from a significant reduction in fighter exports and potential customer concerns about both Russian political stability and long-term product support.

In addition, its former Warsaw Pact customers, almost all now members of NATO, have spent the past two decades dumping Soviet military equipment for Western-compatible systems.

For the near-term, Zaloga believes those drawbacks, among other factors, make it unlikely even a new generation of advanced and less expensive AAMs will enable Russia to break into traditional American and Western European markets. That is partly due to the costs and challenges of integrating Russian missiles onto Western aircraft, given the low exports of Russian aircraft.

“The Russians have tried to overcome this hurdle and adapt their systems to current Western aircraft, but this effort now appears to have gone into limbo due to a lack of funding and a lack of market interest,” he said, while adding there has been improvement in the world view of Russian stability and missile technology. “However, the dire circumstances in the Russian aerospace industry at the moment will probably lead to further drops in sales as Russia has failed to maintain significant RDT&E over the past decade.

“Russia [also] currently lacks an inexpensive, single-engine replacement for older fighter types comparable to the current F-16 or their own MiG-21. Teal Group estimates Russian fighter sales over the next decade will be about 15 percent of the market. Since AAM sales are closely linked to sales of the related fighter aircraft, this will affect Russian missile sales.”

That also has affected Russian AGM efforts, along with their technology lag and the lack of global interest in using Russia’s GPS alternative satellite system – GLONASS – for precision guidance, primarily due to concerns about Russia’s ability to maintain the constellation. At the same time, however, GPS guidance is not as popular as electro-optical guidance for tactical air-to-surface weapons, although it remains the top choice for standoff weapons.

“The short-term market for Russian ASMs is tied to Russian strike aircraft sales, of which there have been few. The standard Russian export types, the MiG-29 and Su-27 families, are primarily interceptors, though the later Su-30s have ground attack capability,” Zaloga noted. “For the moment, the Russians have not made any major effort to adapt their weapons to common Western platforms.

“The shaky financial state of the Russian aerospace industry has led to desperate Russian marketing efforts of these weapons and sales will probably be forthcoming over the next few years, aided by relatively low costs compared to comparable Western weapons.”

 

China

China’s low-cost export missiles have raised its status in the international AAM market, but even cash-strapped nations have drawn a line on quality.

“The poor quality of Chinese fighter aircraft and their associated missiles has kept their sales relatively low, [with] many weapons being provided as direct arms transfers to Chinese allies, such as Pakistan,” Zaloga reported. “China is on the verge of deploying a new generation of advanced fighters and this could eventually change the dynamics of the missile market. So far, projected sales of these aircraft have been limited to close allies such as Pakistan, but this could change.”

 

Others

Israel has more advanced air-to-air missiles than either Russia or China, but faces other problems exporting its Python 4 and 5.

“Because Israel employs American aircraft, the integration problems are already settled and Python 4 could have enjoyed some significant sales prior to the introduction of true fourth-generation AAMs like AIM-9X and ASRAAM,” Zaloga noted.

“However, Israeli sales have been hampered by political considerations in prime export regions such as the Mideast and Southeast Asia. As a result, Israeli sales have been confined mainly to niche markets such as Latin America. This could change if India decides to shift towards Israeli missiles to arm its aircraft, [but] the Python 4 is unlikely to be widely exported outside of Israel.”

Several nations are developing missiles more for domestic than export markets, primarily due to non-technology restrictions of their own.

The Japanese Type 90, for example, is limited by legal restrictions on military exports. For South Africa and Taiwan, past arms embargoes have pushed their domestic AAM capabilities, while also limiting export market potential. As a result, Teal Group “does not foresee significant exports of these missiles,” regardless of cost, capability, or integration issues.

Some previously popular ALMs have faded from the market with new technologies, new mission requirements, and changes in platforms, from a decline in Russian fighter exports to the rise of weaponized UAVs. In addition, the rising cost of new medium-range missiles is expected to increase spending to modify and upgrade existing inventories.

The Teal Group, for example, estimates worldwide spending on medium-range modifications will grow from about $50 million a year now to as high as $120 million by 2021.

At the same time, exporters of launch-and-leave missiles are limited.

“At the moment, AMRAAM and [France’s] MICA are the only significant weapons of the launch-and-leave type in the export market. The Russian Vympel R-77 [AA-12] entered production in 1997 and export sales are under way to Malaysia, India, and China in relatively modest quantities,” Zaloga said. “Since the Meteor is unlikely to be ready for several years, the Europeans have bought AMRAAM as an interim solution.”

“In the short-term, missile sales in this category will be dominated by platform selection. New sales of the F/A-18, F-16, and F-15 will aid further AMRAAM export, while sales of new Rafale and MiG-29/Su-27 will help MICA and R-77 sales. In the long term, these missiles will be integrated to other platforms, but this is unlikely to occur until late in the decade. This will give the AMRAAM a significant short-term boost due to its earlier availability and greater extent of existing integration. AMRAAM already has a substantial export order book of over 7,000 missiles and we expect it will continue to dominate this category over the next decade.”

This article was first published in Defense: Summer 2012 Edition.