Romania’s government signed an agreement to buy Raytheon’s [RTN] Patriot Integrated Air and Missile Defense (IAMD) system from the U.S. Army, the company said Wednesday.
The agreement, called a Letter of Offer and Acceptance opens Romania to reach initial operational capability (IOC) for Patriot relatively quickly and sets up contract negotiations between the U.S. government and Raytheon.
Under this agreement Romania will receive the latest Patriot Configuration-3+ and an undisclosed number of GEM-T and Patriot Advanced Capability (PAC)-3 Missile Segment Enhancement (MSE) interceptors.These interceptors will enable Romania’s military to defeat current and emerging threats.
The PAC-3 MSE is produced by Lockheed Martin [LMT] while Raytheon makes the GEM-T.
Tom Laliberty, Raytheon vice president of IAMD, said the new capability will allow Romania to help defend itself and NATO allies.
“Patriot will also enable Romanian air defenders to train, exercise and interoperate with their U.S. and European counterparts,” he said in a statement.
Laliberty added this agreement for Patriots will create jobs in the U.S. and Romania and that the company “is developing long-term relationships with Romanian companies to help us build and sustain Romania’s Patriot fleet.”
Once this agreement and contract is completed Romania will be the 14th overall and fifth European country to field the Patriot. Other European militaries using the Patriot include Germany, Greece, the Netherlands, and Spain.
The State Department first approved the $3.9 billion foreign military sale of the Patriot Configuration-3+ to Poland in July. A notice by the Defense Security Cooperation Agency noted Poland requested seven Patriot systems along with 56 GEM-T missiles and 168 PAC-3 MSE missiles (Defense Daily, July 12).
More recently, this month the State Department approved a $10.5 billion sale of the Patriot Configuration-3+ system to Poland with 208 PAC-3 MSEs (Defense Daily, Nov. 17).