US deploys latest robotic missile systems near Taiwan for the first time
The US Marine Corps has deployed its latest NMESIS robotic launch systems with Naval Strike Missile for the first time in the Philippines.
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This happened in preparation for the large-scale US-Philippine exercise Balikatan 25, which will run from 21 April to 9 May. The manoeuvres involve the 3rd US Coastal Marine Regiment, which will rapidly deploy some NMESIS systems to remote islands using helicopters of the Army Aviation 25th Army Brigade.
The main deployment location is the strategically important Batanes Islands in the northern Philippines, which are located just 150 km from Taiwan. The NSM missiles, which are part of NMESIS, have a range of up to 185 km, which allows for an effective exclusion zone for Chinese ships in the Luzon Strait.
Thus, the United States is able to control the approach to the Taiwan Strait and prevent a potential blockade of Taiwan.
The NSM is launched from the NMESIS ground-based unmanned launcher. Illustration: US Navy
Despite the fact that missile launches are not foreseen as part of the exercise, the example of previous Salaknib manoeuvres shows that equipment deployed to the Philippines as part of the exercise can remain there after it is completed. This was the case with the Typhon system, equipped with Tomahawk and SM-6 missiles, which was never removed from the country.
The deployment of NMESIS demonstrates a new concept of US military operations in the Indo-Pacific region - the creation of forward firing points on remote islands. For this reason, the Marines have relied on mobile, autonomous platforms that can be quickly delivered by helicopter and deployed without crew.
Unlike the land-based version of Typhon, which depends on large vehicles, NMESIS and the similar Long Range Fires (LRF) system are a next-generation solution.
Source: Defence Express
