France to procure Polish Piorun missiles – details emerge

According to information obtained by Defence24.pl, Paris intends to purchase the Polish Piorun systems through the SAFE program’s common procurement mechanism. France thus becomes another major EU member state, following Germany, to signal such intent. Unlike Berlin, however, Paris plans to utilize SAFE loan instruments, drawing on an allocated envelope of €16.2 billion. 

Sources indicate that approximately 70 percent of the Piorun systems acquired by France will be delivered to its national armed forces, while the remaining share will be supplied to Ukraine as part of continued provision of military aid packages. Kyiv has employed the Polish MANPADS with considerable success since 2022. The systems have been credited with downing Russian combat aircraft, including the Sukhoi Su-25 and Sukhoi Su-34, as well as rotary-wing platforms such as the Mil Mi-35M and Kamov Ka-52. They have also proven effective against cruise missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles.  

We will certainly cooperate with France under the SAFE framework. As the largest beneficiary of the program, we will allocate part of the funding to procure French equipment. Here, however, we see the reverse situation: Paris procuring weapons from Warsaw. This is the direction we should pursue in the future: exporting as much Polish defense equipment as possible. Piorun is already a global product.
dr Aleksander Olech, Chief Editor, Defence24.com

Beyond Poland and Ukraine, the Piorun system is in service in several European countries, including Belgium, Sweden, Estonia, Latvia, Norway, and Moldova, and has also been exported to the United States. The SAFE program is expected to further expand the system’s international user base.

Piorun MANPADS has been developed within the framework of the domestic industry’s R&D effort, pursued since the year 2010 by Mesko S.A. (leader), Telesystem-Mesko, and the Military University of Technology. The project has made use of experiences gathered during the development of the Grom missile. Piorun offers better resistance to countermeasures, and greater capabilities when it comes to engaging targets with low thermal signature. Piorun can be used against air threats, such as fixed- and rotary-wing aircraft, cruise missiles, and UAVs, at a distance ranging from 400 meters, up to 6.5 kilometers, flying at altitudes ranging from 10 meters to 4 kilometers.

Written with: Jakub Palowski