According to romania-Insider website, US defense group Raytheon will deliver its latest Configuration 3+ of the Patriot air defense missile system to Romania, the one currently used by the US Army, according to Mike Ellison, country manager of Raytheon Romania, local News.ro reported.
M901 launcher unit of Patriot air defense missile system at Paris Air Show in June 2009
The systems have new hardware and software components, added in 2017. The most modern/current variant of Patriot is called Patriot Configuration 3+, not PAC-3. PAC-3 is one of the missiles used by Configuration 3+, but as Patriot is an entire system, not just a missile, the Config 3+ enhancements involve a whole suite of upgrades and capabilities. One of them is enabling the system to take advantage of the PAC-3 MSE capabilities, but there are many other things, such as a better user interface and increased reliability, that Config 3+ has.
Mike Ellison, country manager of Raytheon Romania, said that Romanian specialists will contribute in the future to optimizing and modernizing this system. Some components of the Patriot systems, namely parts of the radar, may be produced in Romania, by local company Aerostar Bacau, Raytheon announced earlier this year. According to Ellison, the partnership between Romania and Raytheon has an important role in strengthening NATO’s Eastern flank as Europe faces the biggest challenges since the fall of the Berlin Wall. Romania has already paid the first Patriot system, which has a cost of USD 910.1 million. The total cost of this program is USD 4.64 billion, VAT included.
The MIM-104 Patriot is a surface-to-air missile (SAM) system, the primary of its kind used by the United States Army and several allied nations. Patriot uses an advanced aerial interceptor missile and high performance radar systems. The Patriot system is modular and highly mobile. A battery-sized element can be emplaced in less than 1 hour. The latest version is the PAC-3. Due to miniaturization, a single canister can hold four PAC-3 missiles (as opposed to one PAC-2 missile per canister). The PAC-3 missile is also more maneuverable than previous variants, due to 180 tiny pulse solid propellant rocket motors mounted in the forebody of the missile (called Attitude Control Motors, or ACMs) which serve to fine align the missile trajectory with its target to achieve hit-to-kill capability. The PAC-3 can hit ballistic missile up to 20km.
