NATO allies commit £37bn to a new long-range missile project
At the NATO summit in Ankara on July 8, the UK and eleven other member states announced a £37bn commitment over the next ten years to develop new long-range precision strike weapons. The initiative, branded “Deep Precision,” is intended to field missiles that can hit targets several hundred kilometers away, with longer-range variants under consideration.
The program is a European-weighted response to the war in Ukraine and to gaps in the alliance’s ability to strike at distance without relying on US systems. Like most large weapons programs, it is a long-lead effort: the missiles are not expected to enter service until the 2030s, so the near-term value is industrial planning and a signal of intent rather than added capability now.
The announcement lands amid friction over burden-sharing at the summit, where Trump again pressed allies on defense spending. A multibillion-pound, multi-country buy is the kind of concrete commitment that lets European members answer that pressure with a pooled program rather than separate national purchases.