Three NATO countries purchase Israeli ROTEM loitering munitions

Israel Aerospace Industries reported that it signed contracts with three NATO countries to supply the ROTEM loitering munition (or suicide drone) system.

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Following the recent announcement that NATO member Estonia made a major purchase of long-range loitering munitions from Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), the company signed separate contracts with three other NATO countries worth several million dollars for the supply of Rotem systems.

ROTEM is a unique, combat-proven vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) loitering tactical munition intended for use by customers’ special forces that can also serve for test and evaluation purposes.

ROTEM is part of IAI’s family of loitering munitions, which includes Harpy, Harop and Mini-Harpy, and was combat proven on different occasions since 2019.

Features

The ROTEM system is effective up to a distance of ten kilometers and was designed to be deployed by an individual soldier at infantry or small unit/special forces level. Its simple operation and robust design make it very cost effective. It allows individual soldiers to gain an elevated view of the area around them, look over hills or into an urban environment and beyond line of sight. The soldier can then engage the enemy as soon as targets appear.

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Rotem carries both day and night electrooptical sensors to give tactical field units an advantage against adversaries, acting as a sensor and a weapon of opportunity. Unlike missiles or rockets, it can be launched to seek a target, but is disarmed if authorization to attack is not received. If this occurs, Rotem can fly back to be retrieved safely, have its battery replaced, and be deployed immediately on a new mission.

With a flight autonomy of 30 minutes (carrying a 1.2 kg warhead), or being able to stay on mission for up to 3 hours equipped only with reconnaissance payload (counting extra batteries in the operator’s backpack), Rotem can hover over a tall building or a hill, with an open camera and data link, while waiting for the target to appear. Once the target is detected, ROTEM can attack instantly.