The Army wants to replace the Stinger missile

The Army wants thousands of new missiles to replace the venerable Stinger air defense system amid the growing threat of relatively cheap and small attack drones.

First introduced in 1981, the shoulder-fired Stinger missile proved deadly against Soviet and Afghan government aircraft after the United States provided the weapon system to  Mujahadeen rebels. 

Over time, the Stinger became a major part of American air defense. The U.S. military also mounted Stingers on vehicles, including one named for Army Sgt. Mitchel Stout, who was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor after he used his body to absorb the blast of an enemy grenade in March 1970. Stout is the only air defense artillery soldier to have received the U.S. military’s highest award for valor.

The U.S. military’s attention to air defense systems waned during the Global War on Terrorism, when the main threat U.S. troops faced in both Iraq and Afghanistan was improvised explosive devices, or IEDs. But Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 showed that the age of the drone had arrived.

Many of the threats that are dominating current conflicts did not exist when the Stinger was first designed and fielded, including small and mid-sized drones that weigh anywhere from 21 to 1,350 pounds and can both attack targets and provide constant surveillance of the battlefield.

These types of drones are smaller than the targets that the Stinger was designed to hit. The military refers to them as Group 2 and 3 unmanned aerial systems. An example of the latter is Iran’s Shahed-136 one-way attack drone – which the U.S. military used as the basis for the design of its Low-cost Unmanned Combat Attack System, or LUCAS, drone.

Now the Army wants to replace the Stinger with thousands of new missiles, which it calls the Next Generation Short Range Interceptor, to counter these types of drones.

Both Lockheed Martin and Raytheon Technologies, now known as RTX Corporation, were awarded contracts in 2023 to develop prototypes for the missiles, which are meant to replace Stingers on Sgt. Stout air defense vehicles. The Army expects to select one company to produce the missiles in fiscal year 2028.

In June of this year, the Army posted a request for information asking the defense industry to provide a cost estimate of producing 11,000 of the missiles and 2,200 control launch assemblies over a 10-year period. The solicitation added that companies should assume that 200 missiles and 20 control launch assemblies would be built in fiscal year 2028.

The Army has asked Congress for $215 million in its fiscal year 2027 budget for the Stinger replacement along with $713 million for 14 more Sgt. Stout Systems. Ultimately, the Army wants to replace Stingers on 248 of the vehicle-based missile defense systems.

The Iran war, which began on Feb. 28, has underscored the importance of air defense in modern conflicts and also shown that the U.S. military can no longer rely on a limited supply of expensive interceptors.

Iran has launched thousands of drones at U.S. military bases in the Middle East and partner nations since the United States over the past five months. One such drone attack killed six soldiers at Port Shuaiba, Kuwait on March 1.

U.S. air defense missiles — each of which can cost about $4 million — have been used to shoot down Iranian drones, which cost between $20,000 and $30,000 apiece.

Since the war began, the U.S. military’s inventory of Patriot and Terminal High Altitude Area Defense missiles has dropped so precipitously that experts estimate it will take at least three years to replenish all the interceptors that have been fired.

For more information about the Army’s efforts to replace the Stinger, go to our YouTube channel, where Task & Purpose’s video producer Kyle Gunn does a deep dive on the subject.