Germany expands its exoatmospheric missile shield with second Arrow-3 deployment

VIENNA — Germany is expanding its nascent territorial missile shield, with the Bundeswehr announcing plans for a second Arrow air defense site in Bavaria to complement the system’s inaugural battery near Berlin.

The Defense Ministry said Tuesday that an “Einsatzstellung Süd,” or southern operational position, will be built in the greater Kaufbeuren area to house elements of the Arrow Weapon System for Germany, or AWS-G. The decision was announced jointly by Bavarian Minister-President Markus Söder, Luftwaffe chief Lt. Gen. Holger Neumann and the Defense Ministry’s director-general for force expansion, Alexander Götz.

The new site expands upon the deployment reported last December, when Germany activated the first Arrow 3 battery at Fliegerhorst Holzdorf/Schönewalde, straddling Brandenburg and Saxony-Anhalt. It was the system’s first-ever deployment outside Israel.

That initial rollout, delivered under an accelerated schedule negotiated with manufacturer Israel Aerospace Industries, gave the Bundeswehr its first-ever capability to detect and intercept ballistic missiles above the atmosphere. At the time, officials had already signaled that the system’s eventual architecture would include additional batteries in Schleswig-Holstein in the north and Bavaria in the south.

Kaufbeuren will be home to the system’s radar site, while the actual interceptor launchers for that battery are planned for nearby Fliegerhorst Lechfeld, according to German public media.

The Ministry of Defense casts Arrow as a defensive system meant to provide early warning and protection for the population, critical infrastructure and the military, while emphasizing Germany’s role as a logistics hub for allied forces moving toward NATO’s eastern flank in a potential conflict. The Kaufbeuren-area position is intended to strengthen the system’s ability to detect and destroy ballistic missiles at altitudes above 100 kilometers through kinetic impact.

The expansion follows a broader pattern of accelerating Arrow procurement since the Schönewalde activation, including a $3.1 billion follow-on contract Germany and Israel signed in December to expand interceptor and launcher stocks, pushing total German purchases of the system past $6.5 billion. Berlin’s full operational rollout of Arrow across multiple sites is expected to continue through the end of the decade.