# ANALYSIS: Germany Eyes Ukrainian Missiles to Fill the Void Left by Washington

> July 2024. Joe Biden and Olaf Scholz announce with great fanfare that the United States will deploy Tomahawk missiles in Germany starting

- Author: Maxime Marquette
- Publisher: MadMax (https://mad-max.co)
- Section: Analysis
- Published: 2026-06-22
- Canonical URL: https://mad-max.co/en/article/analyse-l-allemagne-lorgne-les-missiles-ukrainiens-pour-combler-le-vide-laisse-p-2

## Key takeaways

- Politico, citing internal German Ministry of Defense documents, reported that Berlin is considering the Flamingo FP-5 and the Bars, after Trump cancelled the planned Tomahawk deployment in Germany.
- The article attributes the shortfall partly to the Iran war, which reportedly used about 850 Tomahawks, roughly a quarter of the US inventory.
- The Flamingo, made by Fire Point, reportedly has a 3,000 km range, a 1,150 kg warhead, and costs about $500,000 per unit, against roughly $2.5 million for a Tomahawk Block V.
- Diehl Defence is reportedly in talks with Fire Point on a German production line, and could supply an advanced seeker head.
- Berlin's reported plan includes Ukrainian missiles from 2027, the Typhon launcher from 2029, a UK co-developed missile by 2032, and a hypersonic vehicle by 2035.

## Introduction: When Kyiv Becomes Berlin's Strategic Supplier

### The turn no one saw coming

July 2024. Joe Biden and Olaf Scholz announce with great fanfare that the United States will deploy Tomahawk missiles in Germany starting in 2026. The Atlantic Alliance brags, Moscow protests. Eighteen months later, Donald Trump cancels everything—and Berlin is left with a gaping strategic void at the heart of Europe. This is not a calendar detail. It is a doctrinal rupture. **For the first time since the end of the Cold War, Germany can no longer rely on the American promise of long-range strike capability.**

Berlin's response, revealed on June 19, 2026, by **Politico** based on internal German Ministry of Defense documents, is both bold and symbolically earth-shattering: Germany is actively scouting Kyiv to acquire the **Flamingo FP-5** and the **Bars**, two Ukrainian long-range strike systems, as alternatives to the American Tomahawk whose delivery is now compromised. **Ukraine, a country at war for over four years, is becoming a defense supplier for Europe’s leading economic power.** The world has just shifted.

### A context of deep transatlantic rupture

This shift cannot be explained solely by Trump's decision. It is part of a series of strategic shocks accumulated since 2025. The war in Iran has drained American Tomahawk stocks—according to the **Washington Post**, the United States launched approximately **850 Tomahawk missiles during the first weeks of the Iranian conflict**, or nearly a quarter of their total inventory. The American Navy is expected to receive only **110 new missiles this year**. In this context, exporting Tomahawks to Germany has become militarily and politically unsellable in Washington.

And yet, Berlin needed these missiles. Not as a symbol, but as a credible deterrent against a Russia that has never threatened Europe so much. **Trump's decision not to deploy a long-range strike battalion in Germany has left the Bundeswehr without autonomous deep-strike capability.** It is into this breach that Kyiv is stepping—not out of opportunism, but because Ukraine is the only nation in the world today producing, in series, long-range cruise missiles tested in real combat.

*I measure the historical irony of this moment with a certain amazement. Ukraine, which the West had to be begged for two years to supply with weapons, has become in 2026 the weapons supplier that Germany is courting. This reversal of polarity says everything about Kyiv's industrial vitality and the extent of American discredit under Trump. This is not a simple geopolitical anecdote—it is a marker of our era.*

## The Flamingo FP-5: Anatomy of a Total War Missile

### A weapon born of existential urgency

The **FP-5 Flamingo**, developed by the Ukrainian startup **Fire Point**, entered serial production in 2025 after a development cycle measured in months rather than years. Its design reflects a philosophy radically different from Western missiles: **prioritizing manufacturability over aerodynamic optimization**. Fixed straight wings instead of folding wings, a turbofan engine mounted externally above the fuselage rather than integrated. This missile was designed to be manufactured in mass in a country at war, not to flatter engineers in a research laboratory.

Its technical characteristics are nonetheless impressive: a **maximum range of 3,000 kilometers**—roughly double the unclassified range of the Tomahawk Block V—a **1,150 kg warhead**, and a cruise speed around **650 to 700 km/h**, with a maximum speed of 950 km/h. The announced accuracy reaches a **circular error probable of approximately 14 meters** under favorable conditions. The truck-mounted launcher looks like an ordinary commercial vehicle until firing preparation begins—a considerable concealment asset. **From a position in Central Europe, a Flamingo could theoretically reach a large portion of European Russia.**

### Real strikes on deep strategic targets

The Flamingo is not a prototype. It has already struck targets of considerable strategic importance inside Russia: an FSB facility in Crimea, the Skif-M factory involved in producing Su-34, Su-35, and Su-57 fighters, the **Kapustin Yar** missile test site, the Kotluban GRAU ammunition depot, the **Votkinsk** ballistic missile factory, the Promsintez explosives factory, and the VNIIR-Progress electronic center. The latter, hit in **Cheboksary, approximately 1,000 kilometers from the Ukrainian border**, produced navigation systems for Russian attack drones and ballistic missiles. This is not symbolic striking—it is a campaign to destroy Putin's industrial war chain.

The production rate is equally remarkable. Fire Point produces **approximately 200 Flamingos per month**, with available capacity to scale up. Co-founder and chief designer **Denys Shtilierman** told the Financial Times in May 2026: **"We just need orders and money."** At approximately **$500,000 per unit**, five times cheaper than a Tomahawk, this commercial proposition is hard to ignore for a Ministry of Defense seeking to saturate Russian air defenses through mass.

*When I read these figures—a missile manufactured in a few months, produced at 200 units per month, sold at $500,000 apiece—I understand why Western staffs are having trouble swallowing. Their own programs took decades and cost billions. Ukraine has succeeded in total war mode at what traditional defense industries no longer know how to do: go fast, keep it simple, produce a lot. It is humiliating for major European armament groups. And it is exactly what NATO needs.*

## The Bars: The Other Ukrainian Missile in German Documents

### A jet drone for saturation strikes

Less publicized than the Flamingo, the **Bars** also appears in the German Ministry of Defense planning documents examined by Politico. Described as a **medium-range jet drone**, the Bars represents a different category of weapon from the Flamingo: smaller, faster, designed for saturation missions or precision strikes on intermediate-range targets. According to available information, the Bars has also been used in recent Ukrainian attacks on Russia, giving it combat-proven status.

The inclusion of the Bars in German documents is significant. It signals that Berlin is not simply looking for a monolithic replacement for the Tomahawk, but a **multi-layered deep-strike architecture**: long-range missiles like the Flamingo for distant strategic targets, jet drones like the Bars for intermediate-range objectives, and eventually hypersonic systems co-developed with the United Kingdom. **Germany is building at high speed an autonomous strike doctrine that it did not possess eighteen months ago.**

### The doctrinal void filled by Kyiv

The consideration of the Bars also reveals a change in intellectual posture within the Pistorius ministry. For decades, German strategic culture rejected any long-range offensive strike capability for historical reasons. The stubborn refusal to deliver Taurus missiles to Ukraine under Scholz was the last manifestation of this. **In 2026, Germany is crossing a doctrinal Rubicon: it is deliberately equipping itself with the capacity to threaten Russian targets deep inside their territory using Ukrainian weapons.** The circularity of this evolution should provoke reflection in European chancelleries.

For Berlin, the stakes are not just about acquiring missiles. It is about demonstrating to Moscow—and to Washington—that Germany can exist as an autonomous strategic actor. That Central European security no longer depends exclusively on the moods of an unpredictable American president. **Boris Pistorius said during his visit to Kyiv that "the technological advances in Ukraine are remarkable."** This is not facade diplomacy. It is the public admission of a new—and accepted—dependence on the Ukrainian war industry.

*The Bars, of which little is yet publicly known, fascinates me precisely because it reveals one thing: Ukraine didn't put all its eggs in the same Flamingo basket. It developed a range of strike systems, at different ranges and different costs. This is exactly the philosophy of an army that has learned to survive in real war, not in NATO's PowerPoint simulations. And that army is becoming Europe's defense design bureau.*

## Diehl Defence: The German-Ukrainian Industrial Marriage

### The announcement at the ILA Berlin Air Show

On June 11, 2026, on the sidelines of the **ILA Berlin Air Show**, the CEO of **Diehl Defence, Helmut Rauch**, publicly confirmed what the sector had been whispering for weeks: his company is in discussions with **Fire Point** to establish a production line for the Flamingo FP-5 in Germany. His words, reported by the **Financial Times**, are measured but explicit: **"We are discussing how we could work together. I think it could really happen. In the coming weeks, we have several meetings on this subject."** He added that for a new product, **"it makes a lot of sense to also have it in Germany or in other countries"**. Diehl says it is **"optimistic and positive"** about this cooperation.

This is no trivial announcement. **If this project succeeds, it will be the first known case of a Ukrainian strategic strike weapon manufactured within the industrial base of a NATO member state.** Diehl is not a third-tier subcontractor: it is the manufacturer of the IRIS-T air defense system, a pillar of Ukraine's protection against Russian missiles. The company had already signed a technological cooperation agreement in April 2026 with Fire Point, the details of which were not disclosed. The two firms thus had an established working relationship well before the ILA announcement.

### German added value: the precision seeker head

Diehl's potential contribution goes far beyond industrial assembly. According to Helmut Rauch, the company could provide the Flamingo with **a significantly more advanced seeker head than the one currently used**. Diehl possesses recognized expertise in imaging infrared guidance through the IRIS-T missile, as well as in semi-active laser and passive anti-radiation guidance. A **multi-mode seeker system** combining infrared, electro-optical, and passive radiofrequency would offer the Flamingo far superior resistance to Russian electronic countermeasures and allow it to **strike a specific building, a production hall, or a command post within a large industrial or military facility**.

This improvement in terminal precision is crucial for a missile that must penetrate increasingly dense Russian air defenses. It would also allow for **reduce collateral damage**, an essential criterion for making these systems politically acceptable within the context of NATO doctrine. And on an industrial level, German-Ukrainian production would resolve several constraints simultaneously: access to European supply chains, improved electronic integration, increased testing capabilities, and certification for export customers. **It would also protect production from Russian strikes against Ukrainian infrastructure.**

*Diehl's contribution is surgical precision added to a mass-warfare missile. The Ukrainian Flamingo hits hard and far. Diehl wants to teach it to aim exactly. This complementarity seems to me the perfect formula: Ukrainian speed and boldness combined with German rigor and technology. If this partnership materializes, it could become the model for 21st-century European defense—built not on Washington's promises, but on know-how forged in real war.*

## Trump, Iran, and the Disintegration of the Biden Promise

### The 2024 NATO summit and its illusions

To understand the scale of the rupture, one must return to the July 2024 NATO summit in Washington. **Joe Biden and Olaf Scholz announced together that the United States would begin deploying long-range strike systems in Germany starting in 2026.** The planned package included Tomahawk cruise missiles, SM-6 missiles, and eventually hypersonic weapons under American command. It was a massive strategic reassurance for Central Europe, designed to deter any Russian adventures west of Ukraine.

What no one had anticipated with sufficient seriousness was Trump's ability to demolish this architecture in a few weeks. **His decision not to deploy the long-range strike battalion in Germany occurred amid personal friction with Chancellor Friedrich Merz regarding the war in Iran.** Friction that led Trump to also withdraw at least 5,000 American soldiers from German soil. The signal sent to Moscow—and to Berlin—is unambiguous: under Trump, American security commitments in Europe are subordinate to presidential whims and internal political calculations.

### Stocks emptied by Iran, the other reality

But Trump is not the only culprit. The war in Iran has ravaged the American arsenal. **Washington used approximately 850 Tomahawks during the first weeks of the conflict—about a quarter of the total American inventory.** Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth himself admitted to Congress that it would take "months and years" to replenish stocks. The Navy is requesting 785 Tomahawks in its 2027 budget, but initial deliveries are not expected until March 2030 after a 34-month production delay. **Under these conditions, exporting Tomahawks to Germany is simply impossible in the short term, regardless of Berlin's political desires.**

Chancellor Merz spoke the naked truth on the ZDF network: **"The Americans don't have enough for themselves right now."** And Boris Pistorius, who had submitted his formal request to acquire Tomahawk missiles in July 2025, is still waiting for an answer. **"We are still waiting for a response. But to be honest, in the current state of the world, I don't have much hope about this"**, he told German public television. Rarely has a defense minister of a major Western democracy so explicitly expressed disillusionment with his primary ally.

*I'm not going to defend Trump here. His cancellation of Tomahawks for Germany is a strategic blunder that objectively weakens NATO deterrence. But I’d be dishonest if I didn't recognize that the problem goes deeper: America spent its missiles in Iran, and much of that usage was predictable for anyone following Trump's Middle East strategy. Europe watched without anticipating. Berlin made the mistake of believing Washington would always be available. That mistake is being paid for now—and Ukraine is, paradoxically, the industrial beneficiary.*

## Berlin's Four-Step Plan: A Sovereign Strike Doctrine

### From urgency to strategic depth

Faced with the void left by Washington, the German Ministry of Defense has developed a **deep-strike strategy in four parallel tracks**, revealed by internal documents examined by Politico. The first track: acquiring the American **Typhon** launcher, capable of firing Tomahawk missiles, starting in 2029. The second: deploying low-cost cruise missiles—potentially including the Flamingo and the Bars—starting in **2027**. The third: co-developing a high-performance cruise missile with the **United Kingdom** by 2032. The fourth: a hypersonic glide vehicle, also in British cooperation, for 2035.

This architecture is remarkable in several respects. It first shows that Berlin is finally taking the need for an autonomous offensive strike capability seriously—a historical taboo linked to World War II that the Pistorius-Merz generation is now moving past. It then reveals the **temporal hierarchy** of priorities: low-cost Ukrainian missiles arrive first (2027), even before the American Typhon (2029). **Kyiv, in terms of timing, is ahead of Washington.**

### The economic logic of saturation

The German Ministry of Defense spokesperson clearly formulated the underlying doctrine: **"Cost-effective systems can overwhelm enemy air defenses through mass attacks and therefore have high operational value."** This is the explicit recognition that the war in Ukraine has made the dominant thinking of surgical precision at all costs obsolete. Sending a hundred Flamingos at $500,000 apiece is tactically better than sending ten Tomahawks at $2.5 million each if enemy defenses can intercept the majority of them.

This economic logic of saturation is exactly what Ukraine developed against Russia. **Kyiv understood before anyone else that 21st-century industrial warfare is won in the factory, not just on the battlefield.** Fire Point produces 200 Flamingos per month and can scale up. Diehl can industrialize this flow in Germany, protecting it from Russian strikes and inserting it into NATO standards. The combination of Ukrainian speed and German industrial solidity could produce something historically unprecedented: a truly European strategic strike capability.

*The saturation doctrine is, in reality, the doctrine of industrial survival. Ukraine learned it in the pain of the first two years of war, when ammunition stocks were running low and every shell counted. Today, this doctrine is being exported to Germany and, through it, to the whole of NATO. There is something deeply ironic in the fact that Europe is learning mass defense strategy from a country that has been fighting for its survival since 2022.*

## Real Obstacles: Export, Law, Politics

### Legal locks on the Flamingo

The path to German-Ukrainian production of the Flamingo is fraught with real obstacles. German planning documents themselves highlight **complex export restrictions surrounding the Flamingo missile that must be legally resolved before an acquisition path can materialize**. These restrictions notably concern foreign-origin components integrated into the missile—engines, electronics, guidance systems—which may be subject to American ITAR rules or the export controls of other nations. Every component must be traced, every transfer authorized.

Added to this are NATO certification issues. A missile produced in Ukraine, even with Ukrainian components, is not automatically certified for integration into the Alliance's command and control systems. **Bringing the Flamingo up to NATO standards—communication interfaces, friend-or-foe identification protocols, security procedures—represents a considerable amount of work** that cannot be done in a few weeks. Diehl could play a key role in this certification, precisely because the company knows these processes better than anyone in the German sector.

### German strategic culture in forced mutation

Beyond legal hurdles, there is the question of **German political and strategic culture**. For decades, Berlin carefully avoided deploying long-range offensive strike capabilities, sensitive to the collective European memory of World War II. The refusal to deliver Taurus missiles to Ukraine under Scholz was the latest manifestation of this paralyzing caution. **Acquiring Ukrainian missiles that have already struck targets in Russia constitutes a strong symbolic break with this tradition.**

But the pressure of reality is irresistible. The **CEO of Fire Point, Iryna Terekh**, presented Ukraine's rapid development philosophy at the Eurosatory show in Paris as a model difficult to replicate within the structured framework of German defense. She is right. The contrast between the Flamingo's development cycle—a few months—and traditional German armament programs—several decades—is striking. Germany will have to find accelerated acquisition procedures, as it did for air defense systems destined for Ukraine. **The strategic urgency is a formidable bureaucratic solvent.**

*I often think about what Adenauer or even Kohl would say seeing Germany considering arming its Bundeswehr with Ukrainian missiles. Probably amazement. But I also think they would understand: geopolitics imposes its logic on every generation, and this one is the generation of real European insecurity. What strikes me is that this profound cultural mutation is occurring without much public debate in Germany. It is driven by a technical and strategic urgency that bypasses the usual hesitations. Sometimes history doesn't wait.*

## Israeli Competition: Covenant's Anthem in the Race

### An Israeli-American startup on the shortlist

The German Ministry of Defense has not put all its eggs in the Ukrainian basket. Parallel to its contacts with Fire Point, it also solicited **Covenant**, an Israeli-American startup founded in 2024 and backed by renowned venture capital funds such as **Founders Fund** and **Andreessen Horowitz**. This firm is developing the **Anthem** missile system, and its tests in Israel were scheduled for the third week of June 2026. German defense officials were invited to observe these test-firings.

Covenant plans to establish localized production lines in Germany and the United Kingdom. This approach directly addresses Berlin's concerns regarding dependence on geographically exposed supply chains. **But Covenant is starting from further back operationally: the Anthem does not yet have the real-world strike record of the Flamingo.** In a competition where combat credibility counts, Ukrainian experience is an advantage that Covenant cannot yet replicate. It took four years of total war to forge that record, and no laboratory can accelerate it.

### A healthy competitive architecture for Europe

Covenant's presence in the competition is nonetheless healthy for Europe. It avoids exclusive dependence on Ukraine and creates beneficial competitive pressure on prices and performance. The fact that Germany is simultaneously examining Ukrainian and Israeli systems—two allied countries engaged in existential conflicts—signals a profound transformation of Berlin's acquisition doctrine. **Gone are the days when the Bundeswehr only purchased from major American houses or a European oligopoly.** War has produced innovators among nations in survival mode, and Berlin is beginning to recognize this.

For Ukraine, this competition is a signal to be taken seriously. The Flamingo must continue to demonstrate its reliability and precision to remain at the top of this shortlist. **The masterstroke would be a firm order, not just for acquisition, but for joint production in Germany**—which Diehl and Fire Point are actively negotiating. If this production line sees the light of day, it will place Fire Point in a category of its own: no longer a war supplier, but a long-term strategic industrial partner of one of the world's largest economies.

*I look at the list of contenders with a critical eye. Covenant, whatever the quality of its product, has not fired in real combat situations. The Flamingo, however, has struck Kapustin Yar, Votkinsk, Cheboksary. These names are references. In the cruise missile business, the operational record counts more than trade show brochures. Berlin knows this. Which is why I think that if the Diehl-Fire Point project moves forward, it has a high chance of prevailing in the long term—even if Covenant lands an intermediate order to show diversification.*

## Ukraine as an Emerging Weapons Power

### From survival to exportable expertise

What is happening with the Flamingo is not an accident. It is the result of a radical industrial and doctrinal transformation that Ukraine conducted under the most extreme conditions imaginable. **Four years of total war have converted Ukraine from a country seeking aid into a source of combat-proven designs**, according to Euromaidan Press. Fire Point is just one example among many: Kyiv also produces interceptor drones, is developing a domestic ballistic missile program, and its engineers have accumulated experience with guidance systems under intense electronic jamming that no one else in the Western world possesses to the same degree.

**The Ukrainian defense industry has understood something that Westerners took decades to admit**: in modern warfare, the ability to produce quickly, in mass, and at low cost is at least as important as the individual sophistication of each system. This philosophy produced the Flamingo, but also hundreds of reconnaissance, attack, and electronic warfare drones that have transformed the nature of the conflict. The partnership with Diehl could be the first in a long series of reverse transfers—from Kyiv to Europe—that will reshape the continent's defense industry.

### The Zelensky model: industrial sovereignty as a political weapon

Volodymyr Zelensky has long understood that industrial sovereignty is a political weapon as powerful as the missiles themselves. By developing weapons systems that Europe wants to buy, Ukraine is building durable diplomatic leverage that transcends situational dependence on military aid. **Every Flamingo sold or co-produced in Europe is a strategic interdependence link between Kyiv and its partners.** It becomes politically costly for a European capital to abandon Ukraine when it depends on Ukrainian industry for its own defense.

This logic is not new—it is exactly what Russia used for decades with its energy exports to create dependencies and political hesitation in Europe. Ukraine is reversing the model: it is creating technological and industrial dependencies that work in favor of its long-term security. **Fire Point CEO Iryna Terekh, presenting her model at Eurosatory, was not just a company head promoting herself—she was an ambassador for the Ukrainian survival strategy.**

*Zelensky has achieved something many would have deemed impossible in 2022: transforming Ukraine's existential vulnerability into a lever of power. Ukraine selling missiles to Germany is Ukraine saying to Europe: you need us as much as we need you. It’s a message of dignity and reciprocity. I find that remarkable. And I think this dynamic is irreversible—whatever the outcome of the current conflict.*

## Implications for NATO and European Deterrence

### A precedent that changes everything

**If the Diehl-Fire Point production line materializes, it will be the first known case of a Ukrainian strategic strike weapon manufactured within the industrial base of a NATO member state.** This precedent would have implications that go far beyond the German-Ukrainian case. It would pave the way for similar partnerships with Poland, the Baltic states, Scandinavia—all nations seeking to develop deep-strike capabilities in the face of the Russian threat and who are looking with interest at Ukraine's operational record.

More profoundly, this precedent would alter the structure of European deterrence. Today, NATO's conventional deterrence in Europe relies almost entirely on American systems—Tomahawk, HIMARS, Typhon—which Washington can refuse, delay, or condition according to its political moods. **An industrial base of long-range cruise missiles on European soil, combining Ukrainian know-how and German industrial capabilities, would be a sovereign asset that Trump cannot cancel with a tweet.** That is the real issue here—far beyond a simple weapons contract.

### The European Long-Range Strike Approach and the new landscape

Germany is also participating in the **European Long-Range Strike Approach (ELSA)**, bringing together six European countries to develop long-range precision strike capabilities. This multilateral framework and the bilateral German-Ukrainian negotiations are not contradictory—they are complementary. ELSA works on the long term (2030+), while the Flamingo meets the immediate short-term urgency (2027). **Europe needs both: an immediate solution to fill the void left by Washington, and a long-term sovereign program to never find itself in this situation again.**

The Taurus Neo, the German successor to the Taurus missile with improved deep-strike capabilities, is also on the drawing board. But this program will not be available for several years. In the meantime, the Ukrainian Flamingo—and perhaps the Bars—could be the systems that hold the line. It is a form of historical relay between missile generations that would have seemed unthinkable in 2022: **the weapon forged in Kyiv's war standing guard over Berlin while Europe develops its own sovereign solution.**

*What I see being built here is the draft of a European defense that would have real teeth. Not press releases, not commitments to 2% of GDP, not plans for a 2040 horizon—real missiles, mass-produced, capable of deep strikes. It's the kind of thing Putin understands. And it's the kind of thing he fears. Deterrence only works if it's credible. For the first time in decades, the credibility of European conventional deterrence is being built independently of Washington. It is a historic change.*

## Moscow's Reaction: Between Bluff and Real Threat

### The Russian pretext in the American decision

One of the arguments put forward by Washington to justify canceling the Tomahawk deployment in Germany was the **fear of a Russian reaction**. According to two European officials and one American official cited by Politico, the United States feared that Moscow would perceive the positioning of long-range precision missiles in the heart of Europe as an escalation. This logic deserves careful dissection because it reveals a deep pathology in American strategic thinking under Trump.

Putin's Russia systematically uses the threat of escalation as a psychological deterrent to paralyze Western decisions. Every time a Western country considers delivering a weapon to Ukraine or strengthening its own defense, Moscow screams provocation and "red lines." **Yielding to this logic means giving Putin a veto over NATO defense decisions.** That is what Trump did by canceling Tomahawks for Germany—not because the threat was real, but because the White House did not want an additional front.

### What Moscow cannot prevent

But here is the twist: by blocking American Tomahawks for Germany, Washington unintentionally pushed Berlin to turn to more independent and potentially more powerful solutions. The Ukrainian Flamingo has a **range of 3,000 km—roughly double that of the unclassified Tomahawk Block V**. Manufactured in Germany, it could theoretically reach a substantial proportion of European Russia, including targets well beyond what the Tomahawk could have threatened from the same point. **By fearing the Tomahawk, Putin may have facilitated the emergence of an even longer-range threat on his western borders.**

Moscow understands this arithmetic. The fiery declarations of Russian spokespeople about Western "provocations" are part of Putin's information warfare handbook. But behind the rhetoric, **the Russian strategic assessment must recognize an uncomfortable reality: Europe is equipping itself, for the first time since 1987 and the INF Treaty, with long-range land-based conventional cruise missiles deployed in Western Europe**. And this time, they are not under American command—which makes them potentially easier to authorize in a crisis.

*The Russian logic of calculated escalation is brilliant in its simplicity and deeply perverse in its effects. By systematically threatening, Putin has conditioned part of Western strategic thought to self-censorship. But this mechanism has its limits: when the threat is sufficiently intense—as it has been for Germany since 2022—it ends up producing the opposite of what it intends to accomplish. Berlin is arming itself precisely because Moscow has not stopped threatening. Putin's politics of fear is turning against him. Slowly but surely.*

## The Question of Cost and Industrial Scale

### $500,000 vs. $2.5 million: the arithmetic of mass deterrence

The financial argument in favor of the Flamingo is so solid that it deserves to be examined in all its rigor. A Tomahawk Block V costs approximately **$2.5 million**—some estimates even go as high as 3.4 million according to Meta-Defense. A Flamingo costs **approximately $500,000**, a fraction. For the same budget, Germany can therefore procure five times more Ukrainian missiles than American Tomahawks. If the tactical objective is to saturate Russian air defenses through mass—as explicitly formulated by the emerging German doctrine—this cost difference is not a detail, it is a strategic force multiplier.

With a budget of one billion euros—the amount mentioned for the acquisition of 400 Tomahawks—Germany could theoretically acquire more than **1,500 Flamingos** at the current list price. And if production is done in Germany, additional economies of scale could further lower this unit cost. **At this scale, we are talking about a strike capability that would fundamentally change the risk calculation of any Russian military commander in Europe.** This is exactly the deterrence that NATO seeks to restore after the budget cuts and years of disinvestment in conventional capabilities.

### Challenges of industrial scale-up

Fire Point's current production—approximately 200 missiles per month—is impressive for a wartime startup but remains insufficient to simultaneously supply Ukrainian needs and a significant German order. The main bottleneck identified by Fire Point management is the availability of **AI-25s engines**. A production line in Germany with Diehl's support could resolve several of these constraints in parallel: access to European supply chains for electronics and propulsion systems, expanded testing capabilities, stable financing. **The announced objective of exceeding 200 missiles per month would become achievable on a much broader scale.**

For that is indeed the ultimate stake of the Diehl-Fire Point partnership: transforming war production into a sustainable industrial infrastructure. **Moving from a flow of 30 missiles per month at the start of serial production to a capacity of several hundred per month on German soil, NATO-certified, and integrated into European C2 systems.** This transition will not be without friction—regulatory, political, financial. But Fire Point management, whose founder has already removed the bureaucratic obstacles that slowed development in Ukraine, has shown it knows how to get things moving. Germany needs to do the same on its side.

*I might be naive, but I believe this partnership can work precisely because both parties have something the other does not. Fire Point has the speed, the audacity, and the real-world combat experience. Diehl has the certifications, the laboratories, the industrial networks, and institutional credibility in Europe. Together, they form something greater than the sum of their parts. The engine of necessity—Kyiv surviving, Berlin filling its strategic void—is powerful enough to overcome regulatory hurdles. At least, I hope so.*

## Historical Significance: A Generational Shift

### The end of the post-Cold War security model

What is happening in the negotiations between the German Ministry of Defense and Ukrainian companies is not simply a matter of armaments. It is a tangible sign of the dissolution of a European security model that had lasted more than thirty years. Since 1991, Europe has lived under the implicit assumption that the United States would guarantee its security against any existential threat, that Western markets would remain open, and that energy flows would be stable. **These three presuppositions were simultaneously undermined between 2022 and 2026.**

Putin's war broke European energy security. China's rise has called the trade order into question. And Trump has cracked the American security guarantee. In this fractured world, Europe must learn to defend itself with means that do not depend on the goodwill of an unpredictable White House. **Ukrainian missiles in German planning documents are not a symptom of weakness—they are a sign that Europe is finally starting to take its security seriously.** With a four-year delay, certainly. But better late than never.

### The legacy of Ukrainian resistance

In the long run, this moment will perhaps be remembered as when Ukraine began to pay its entrance fee to the Western Alliance not in money or territory, but in **industrial know-how and combat experience**. Kyiv resisted the largest army on the European continent for more than four years, developed weaponry that the rest of the world is starting to want, and is transforming its defense industry into a top-tier diplomatic asset. **This is not the Ukraine of 2014, nor even that of 2022.** It is a nation that has learned, through the most extreme pain, to fight and innovate simultaneously.

Germany eyeing the Flamingo and the Bars is the West implicitly recognizing this transformation. It is not charity toward a country at war. It is a cold strategic calculation: **Ukraine produces the best weapons of the current war at the best cost-effectiveness ratio on the market, and Berlin wants access to them.** For Zelensky, this industrial recognition is almost as important as the arms deliveries themselves—because it anchors Ukraine's future in the European defense architecture, durably and reciprocatively.

*I think we are living through one of those pivotal moments that historians will later say changed everything. Europe arming itself with Ukrainian missiles, Ukraine becoming a defense supplier for the continent's leading economic power, the United States retreating from its role as guarantor of European security—all of this is happening at the same time, in a few weeks of June 2026. I don't know how it will end. But I know that the Europe that follows will be profoundly different from the one before. And that Ukraine, whatever happens, will have helped build it.*

## Conclusion: The American Void, the Ukrainian Fullness

### A reversal that goes beyond defense

The strategic void left by the American refusal to deliver Tomahawks to Germany is being filled by Kyiv. This is not a scenario anyone anticipated eighteen months ago. It is the direct consequence of two simultaneous things: American unpredictability under Trump, which pushed Europe toward autonomy, and the Ukrainian industrial rise, which provided concrete solutions where Europe had none. **The Flamingo FP-5 is at the heart of this convergence: a Ukrainian war missile that has become a serious candidate for the rearmament of Germany.** This is a generational shift, not just a simple tender.

### What Berlin must now decide

Germany has all the cards in hand to make a historic decision: quickly conclude a co-production agreement with Fire Point via Diehl, order sufficient volumes to make the production line viable starting in 2027, and integrate the Flamingo into its deep-strike doctrine as a transition solution while waiting for next-generation European systems. **Every month of delay is one more month without a credible deterrence capability.** And in the world of 2026, where Putin tests the limits of every Western hesitation, hesitation itself has a strategic cost. **Ukraine has forged the weapon. Germany must now have the courage to grasp it.**

**By Maxime Marquette, columnist**

## Columnist's transparency note

### Editorial stance

I am not a journalist but a **columnist and analyst**. My expertise lies in observing and analysing the geopolitical, economic and strategic dynamics that shape our world. My work is to take political strategies apart, to understand global economic movements, to put the decisions of international actors in context and to offer analytical perspectives on the changes that are redefining our societies.

I do not claim the cold objectivity of traditional journalism, which stops at reporting facts. **I claim analytical clarity**, rigorous interpretation and a deep understanding of the complex issues that concern us all. My role is to give meaning to the facts, to place them in their historical and strategic context, and to offer a critical reading of events.

### Method and sources

This text keeps the basic distinction between **verified facts and interpretive analysis**. The rule never changes: a factual claim is published only when a verifiable source supports it, and the sources this article actually used are listed under **Sources**, never here.

**Primary source families** used by the publication, when the story has them: official statements from governments and international institutions, public statements by political leaders, reports from intergovernmental organisations, dispatches from recognised international news agencies.

**Secondary source families**: specialised publications, internationally recognised news media, analyses from established research institutions, reports from industry organisations.

When an article cites statistical, economic or geopolitical data, it comes from the institutions that produce it (intergovernmental organisations, central banks, national statistics offices), and the exact institution is named under **Sources**.

### Nature of the analysis

The analyses, interpretations and perspectives in the analytical sections of this article are a **critical, contextual synthesis** based on the information available, the trends observed and the expert comments cited in the sources consulted.

My role is to interpret these facts, to set them in the context of today's geopolitical and economic dynamics, and to give them a coherent meaning within the larger story of the changes shaping our time. These analyses reflect expertise built through continuous observation of international affairs and an understanding of the strategic mechanisms that drive global actors.

This article describes a documented state of affairs on its publication date, not a prediction: later developments may shift its outlook. No update is promised in advance; when an article is corrected or completed, the change is dated in the text.

## Sources

### Primary sources

- [RBC Ukraine — Ukrainian missiles competing for major European defense contract — June 19, 2026](https://newsukraine.rbc.ua/news/ukrainian-missiles-competing-for-major-european-1781875456.html)

- [Army Recognition — Germany could produce Ukrainian FP-5 Flamingo cruise missile — June 19, 2026](https://www.armyrecognition.com/news/army-news/2026/diehl-defence-ukraine-fp5-flamingo-cruise-missile-germany)

- [Euromaidan Press — Germany’s Diehl in talks to produce Ukraine’s Flamingo cruise missile on German soil — June 12, 2026](https://euromaidanpress.com/2026/06/12/germanys-diehl-in-talks-to-produce-ukraines-flamingo-cruise-missile-on-german-soil/)

### Secondary sources

- [Militarnyi — Germany turns to Ukraine and Israel for missiles after US refusal — June 20, 2026](https://militarnyi.com/en/news/germany-ukraine-israel-missiles-us-refused/)

- [Ukrainska Pravda — German Defense Ministry interested in missiles from two Ukrainian and Israeli companies — June 19, 2026](https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2026/06/19/8040179/)

- [United24 Media — Germany eyes Ukrainian and Israeli startups for low-cost cruise missiles — June 19, 2026](https://united24media.com/world/germany-eyes-ukrainian-and-israeli-startups-for-low-cost-cruise-missiles-19999)

- [Politico — Pentagon likely to cancel Tomahawk deal with Germany — June 4, 2026](https://www.politico.com/news/2026/06/04/us-germany-tomahawks-missiles-cancel-00950284)

- [Army Recognition — Germany rushes to save 400 Tomahawk missile deal after Trump withdraws 5,000 troops from the country — June 12, 2026](https://www.armyrecognition.com/news/army-news/2026/germany-rushes-to-save-400-tomahawk-missile-deal-after-trump-withdraws-5-000-troops-from-the-country)

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Source: Maxime Marquette, MadMax. When citing, name the author and link https://mad-max.co/en/article/analyse-l-allemagne-lorgne-les-missiles-ukrainiens-pour-combler-le-vide-laisse-p-2