South African State-owned defence industrial group Denel announced at the end of last month that extensive testing of the Denel Dynamics Umkhonto (‘spear’ in English) naval surface-to-air missile, for an export customer, would take place early next year. The Umkhonto forms part of the armaments of two German-designed and -built Meko frigates being acquired by the customer navy. The first of these ships, fitted with the Umkhonto, has already been delivered. The second completed its final sea acceptance trials in October.

The Umkhonto had previously been exported to Finland, and is today fitted to 12 naval vessels at home and abroad. Eight of these are in service in the northern hemisphere. “[This] demonstrates that the South African defence industry can hold its own against the best of the world and that our products and systems are highly competitive,” affirmed Denel Dynamics CEO Tsepo Monaheng.

The programme to supply the missiles and their associated fire control equipment for the two Meko A200-AN frigates is codenamed Javelin. Next year will be its fifth and final year. Production of the missiles ordered by the export client will be completed during January.
“After four years of manufacturing, integration and commissioning, we have now reached the final stages of the programme,” he reported. The final major stage will be live firings of the Umkhonto by the client navy in its home waters.

The prime contractor for the frigates is ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems, while the prime contractor for the warheads is Rheinmetall Waffe Munition. Both are German groups. (Rheinmetall owns the majority stake in South African company Rheinmetall Denel Munition, which produces warheads and rocket motors for Denel Dynamics missiles.)

Denel did not identify the customer country and navy. However, it has been widely reported in the international and local defence media that it is Algeria. Certainly, the Algerian Navy has acquired two Meko A200 frigates, and they are designated A200-AN, which is the designation used by Denel in its press release. The A200-AN design is basically the same as that of the South African Navy’s A200-SAN frigate, although there are likely to be some improvements.

However, there are differences in armament. While the South African ships, known as the Valour-class, are each currently fitted with 16 Umkhontos, the Algerian ships each reportedly carry 32. Likewise, while the South African vessels are each fitted to take eight surface-to-surface missiles (SSMs), their Algerian counterparts are apparently each equipped to carry 16 SSMs. The main gun on Valour-class vessels is of 76 mm calibre, while on the A200-AN ships it is of 127 mm calibre.

Apart from the four South African and two Algerian frigates, the Umkhonto also arms six ships of the Finnish Navy. These comprise two minelayers and four missile boats.

The Umkhonto is a vertical launch missile fitted with a passive infrared seeker and a low smoke emission rocket motor. Denel reports that it is a high-velocity weapon capable of all-round defence. The system can engage up to four targets at the same time and its 23 kg warhead gives it a high kill probability. It can easily be integrated into different ship types and classes. It has a range of 20 km, a maximum altitude of 8 km and a maximum velocity of twice the speed of sound. The Umkhonto missile is 3.32 m long, with a diameter of 0.18 m, a wingspan of 0.5 m and a launch mass of 135 kg. Each missile is carried in and launched from a canister 3.8 m in length and 0.65 m in diameter.