The National Interest:
The United States Army has awarded Raytheon a contract to technologically mature and reduce risks on its DeepStrike missile system.
The company is developing the potent new weapon for the service’s Long-Range Precision Fires (LRPF) program. The contact is worth $116.4 million.
The U.S. Army’s LRPF program aims to develop a new surface-to-surface missile that can hit point land targets out to 499 kilometers to replace the existing Army Tactical Missile System. At those ranges, the new missile will be just below the threshold of weapons prohibited under the landmark Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty) that was signed in 1987, which many scholars and diplomats such as former U.S. ambassador to the Soviet Union, Jack Matlock, have argued marked the true end of the Cold War.
Raytheon’s DeepStrike–can fire two missiles from a single weapons pod—reducing costs while increasing capacity. It also offers a 40 percent increase in range over the current ATMS…
