Israeli defense sector companies presented in Warsaw their product offerings, which may attract the interest of the Polish Armed Forces, Border Guard, and other services responsible for defense and the protection of strategic infrastructure during the “Defense and Homeland Security Conference.” The event was organized by IMPROVATE Group from Israel and the Polish company JJB Defense from Szczecin.
For decades, the biggest competition for state-owned military manufacturing plants was foreign purchases. Private arms companies remained out of favor, although they were and still are several times more efficient than state-owned companies. The government promises that this is changing.
The election declarations about defense and the Polish arms industry have not yet stopped reverberating, whereas the government is already smoothly moving on to further promises. Although announcements of ideas about including private companies in production for the defense sector have been made in the past, there has been little enthusiasm to implement them to date. How will it be now?
A new final assembly line for AW149 helicopters for the Polish Armed Forces was launched at the PZL-Świdnik plant, part of the Leonardo concern. Production work on another helicopter for the army is underway in Świdnik.
Skepticism that the Polish industry is not able to invent and construct anything innovative on its own is a thing of the past. Such achievements were often treated very suspiciously, because if it was such a revelation, the Japanese would have invented it a long time ago. Today, we have Polish companies whose technologies are known in the world. The Gdynia-based company Advanced Protection Systems – a supplier of radar and anti-drone systems technology – is breaking stereotypes and conquering new arms markets.
Americans are drawing conclusions from the war in Ukraine and conflicts in the Middle East and are changing their air defense priorities. Instead of expensive long-range missiles, they will build cheaper, but more numerous systems to combat drones and low-flying targets. These are also conclusions for Poland.