Lithuania has taken delivery of its first Thales GM200 MM/C radar, a mobile sensor that the defence ministry says will help its army locate artillery firing positions and spot FPV drones. The ministry announced the arrival on Friday 30 October, nearly three years after it agreed the purchase with the Netherlands.
The radar is a detection system. It finds and tracks; it does not fire. Its job is to tell commanders where incoming fire is coming from and what is moving in the air above them.
What the Thales GM200 MM/C is for
According to the ministry, the system’s main purpose is to locate the positions from which an enemy fires indirect weapons such as artillery and mortars. It joins the Lithuanian Army’s national division and is meant to improve the army’s ability to detect those systems in time.
Depending on the configuration and hardware chosen, the ministry says, the same radar can also watch the airspace and be linked into air defence systems. That flexibility is what “multi-mission” means here: one sensor that can be set up for more than one surveillance task.
Defence minister Robertas Kaunas said in the ministry’s release, in TSN’s translation from Lithuanian: “The multifunctional radar system significantly adds to the national division’s capabilities. It helps detect both the enemy artillery positions that are firing and FPV drones, and so increases the protection of our soldiers on the battlefield.” He added (also translated) that such investments strengthen security because “deterring the enemy becomes more effective”, and that the army is “better prepared to operate together with NATO allies”. He also marked the delivery on Facebook.
The technology inside the radar
Thales Nederland, which builds the Thales GM200 family, describes the MM/C version as a 4D AESA radar, meaning an active electronically scanned array that steers its beam electronically. In its January 2024 announcement of the Lithuanian order, the company said the radar detects, tracks and classifies threats at the same time, including drones.
Two other claims from Thales stand out. It says the radar is cyber-secured by design, and that its software-defined architecture allows future upgrades. Other radar makers are working on the same detection problem: Teledyne FLIR recently unveiled a compact radar aimed at small drones, and Danish maker Weibel won a large radar order for Poland.
How the deal was put together
Lithuania did not buy the radar alone. The defence ministries of Lithuania and the Netherlands signed a cooperation agreement in January 2024, and Thales said the contract was signed with COMMIT, the Dutch defence materiel and IT agency. The ministry said at the time that the system was developed with the Dutch armed forces and had been bought by the Dutch and Norwegian militaries.
The price has a short trail. Janes, cited by Militarnyi, puts the programme at about EUR 126.7 million, which matches the project value the ministry gave when the deal was signed in January 2024. That earlier release said the sum also covers logistics support: documentation, training for operators and maintenance staff, spare parts, tool kits and test equipment. Friday’s announcement gives no figure, and neither the ministry nor Thales has said how many radars Lithuania is buying.
A sensor buy built on Dutch support and local integration
The more telling part of this purchase is the support around it, not the hardware. The ministry says it plans continued cooperation with the Dutch defence ministry on maintenance and support, plus a continuous improvement programme. Buying through an ally’s procurement agency, and sharing a type already in Dutch and Norwegian service, gives a small army access to a larger pool of training, spares and upgrade work than it could build alone.
Local industry has a stake too. The ministry names Lithuanian company ELSIS TS as a subcontractor to Thales, and Thales said ELSIS would support integration of the radar onto vehicles. That keeps some engineering skills in the country rather than leaving every repair and modification to a foreign supplier.
The software-defined design is the other bet. If Thales’s claim holds, the radar can be updated as drones and other threats change, which matters more for a sensor than for most military kit: a radar that cannot learn to classify new targets ages quickly. The ministry’s emphasis on improvement as well as supply suggests it sees the contract as a long-term service relationship.
Big gaps remain. The number of radars, the timetable for the rest and the date the system will be fully in service are all unpublished. Nor has the ministry said where the radars will be based.
Part of a wider security picture for Lithuania
The delivery is the latest in a run of Lithuanian security stories this autumn. Earlier this month the authorities named two suspects in an attempted arson at a site storing Starlink equipment. The new radar addresses a different kind of risk.
The next step to watch is whether the ministry publishes the delivery schedule for the remaining radars and the date the Thales GM200 system enters full service.
Sources
- Lithuanian Ministry of National Defence: Lithuania receives the first Thales GM200 MM/C multifunctional radar system (in Lithuanian), 30 October 2026
- Lithuanian Ministry of National Defence: Lithuania is buying Thales GM200 MM/C multi-mission radar system, 3 January 2024
- Thales Nederland: Ground Master 200 Multi-Mission Compact radar strengthens Lithuania’s artillery (in Dutch), January 2024
- Robertas Kaunas on Facebook
Related stories
- Attempted Arson at Lithuanian Site Storing Starlink Gear
- Weibel Wins €84m Order to Supply XENTA-M5 Radars for Poland’s SAN
- Teledyne FLIR Launches Ranger R10-3DX Compact Counter-Drone Radar at AUSA 2026
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