French arms exports stood at “more than 18 billion euros (more than 11,749 billion CFA francs)” last year, making 2024 “the second best year in our history”greeted Minister of the Armed Forces Sébastien Lecornu on January 7, 2025.
Of this total, “nearly 10 billion concern flagship platforms like the Rafale and submarines”he said in Paris.
Twelve units of the Rafale combat aircraft were sold to Serbia at the end of August, while Indonesia formalized in January the last tranche of 18 aircraft out of the 42 ordered two years earlier.
Naval Group for its part formalized on September 30 the sale to the Netherlands of four Barracuda submarines. The amount of the contract was not revealed but Christophe van der Maat, then Dutch Secretary of State for Defense, told AFP in March that the budget for the project was 5.6 billion euros.
With more than 18 billion euros in orders, the year 2024 remains far from the record level of 27 billion garnered in 2022, thanks to a contract for 80 Rafale aircraft with the United Arab Emirates for a little more of 16 billion euros, but well beyond the 8.2 billion of 2023.
Global military spending in 2023 saw its largest increase in a decade, reaching $2.4 trillion due to ongoing conflicts, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (Sipri).
“The year 2025 is shaping up to be an excellent year, which is off to a promising start with the sale of 14 Caracal helicopters to Iraq”also affirmed Sébastien Lecornu.
This year “should be another record year”he hoped, citing the main equipment of the French defense industry: defense and intervention frigates, submarines, radars, artillery, helicopters, Rafale or even new SAMP/T anti-aircraft systems generation.
While the French defense industry must quickly increase its production rates to meet demand, exports are essential to ensure the viability of the economic model, with French orders alone being insufficient.
“Exporting our weapons is vital to developing our defense industrial and technological base. This is just as important for our trade balance and for creating jobs throughout France. But it is also a condition of our sovereignty”insisted the minister.
With AFP
