"Bulgaria buys great American weapons, the best in the world," said US President Donald Trump about five years ago, during his first and only meeting with then-PM Boyko Borissov. Trump was referring to the main reason for the Bulgarian PM's visit to Washington, the defense deal signed earlier in 2019 worth 2.2 billion levs for the purchase of eight newly manufactured US F-16 Block 70 fighter jets for the Bulgarian Air Force.
The largest weapons order for the Bulgarian armed forces in the last 30 years had de facto become Borissov's informal "pass" to the White House and to a face-to-face meeting with Trump that served to publicly legitimize GERB's Euro-Atlantic orientation. In order to get there, Borissov's government rewrote the tender for the selection of new fighter jets, removed the Gripen fighter jets ranked first (despite the fact that Sweden offered 10 aircraft instead of 8 for about 800 million levs less), and switched to direct intergovernmental negotiations with the US, arguing that it was a "strategic partnership." Three years later, Sofia ordered eight more F-16s, and the total cost of the project together with the still dragging reconstruction of the Graf Ignatievo airbase now exceeds 5 billion levs
It is now 2025. The first newly produced F-16s for Bulgaria will (finally) arrive soon, and Trump is back in the White House, once again determined to make America great again (as well as its defense industry). If five years ago he was claiming that NATO was obsolete and that European allies should pay to be protected by the US military, giving at least 2% of GDP to defense, now he's demanding that Europeans spend a shocking 5% of GDP on their armed forces - a target that is likely to prove unaffordable and politically unfeasible for most.
Bulgaria is also ruled by a coalition government dominated by GERB, just like five years earlier. Borissov has certainly listened to Trump's message on defense and will try again to catch the new "wind of change" in his political sails. His hidden coalition partner, the emerging "Euro-Atlantic" oligarch Delyan Peevski, who desperately wants to be removed from the US sanctions list, is likely also going to lend a hand. In this context, it is very likely that in the coming months we will witness a series of new major weapons projects for the modernization of the Bulgarian army to be awarded to US defense companies.
Smart rocket artillery
The likeliest next major weapons order from the US is for the acquisition of advanced precision rocket systems for volley fire - the popular HIMARS missile systems, which gained particular popularity for their effectiveness in Ukraine. Chief of Defense Admiral Emil Eftimov spoke about their possible purchase as early as August 2022. At the moment, however, the project has already moved beyond the conceptual phase and concrete steps have been taken to collect bids, according to a statement by Deputy Defense Minister Adelina Nikolova to Armymedia.bg. "I can note here that we are in the process of exploring potential contractors for the project and I expect that we will find an option for the implementation of this project as well very soon after a thorough analysis," she said.
The direction in which the modernization programme is likely to evolve is clear even from its name - "Acquisition of a High Mobility Increased Rate of Fire Missile System (HIMARS)," i.e. the name of the specific US weapon system is in the title. According to Capital weekly sources, requests for preliminary non-binding bids have nevertheless been sent not only to its US manufacturer Lockheed Martin, but also to the Israeli military corporation Elbit Systems, which offers the PULS missile launchers, and to South Korea's Hanwha Aerospace with its K239 Chunmoo systems.
The latter two rival companies are likely to offer much more attractive prices than the US and accelerated delivery schedules, especially in the context of Lockheed being inundated with orders for years to come given the successful performance of HIMARS on the Ukrainian front. "If we want to acquire HIMARS, we will need 8 years from order to arrival. We have made a specific request and we have specific information," former interim defense minister Dimitar Stoyanov said in an interview for Capital weekly in early 2023.
There are two major problems with acquiring the US system, however - price (which has been steadily increasing as other countries, including Poland, Morocco and Norway, had been making bids in recent months) and ammunition, as the US is pressing for clients using only American-made shells. In the end, Bulgaria will probably choose to order HIMARS from the US, no matter what the price and how stretched out the delivery time will be.
Radar, Strykers and more...
Another military deal, which is also likely to end up in American hands soon, is for 3D radars. It is a project worth about 400 million levs and five leading defense companies want it: Lockheed Martin, Leonardo (Italy), Elta (Israel), Indra (Spain) and Thales (France). During the term of Defense Minister Todor Tagarev, the French bid was ranked first as it offered a 25% lower price. However, no contract was signed, as the declassified bidder Indra appealed the procedure in court. Meanwhile, the rotational WCC-DB-GERB government fell from power, and Atanas Zapryanov, in his role as interim defense minister, chose to wait.
Now, as a regular minister, Zapryanov, who was the main architect of the first F-16 deal, could award the radar project to Lockheed Martin again through interstate negotiation. Moreover, the Defense ministry can bring up the arguments for strategic partnership with the US and better integration between fighters and localization systems from the same manufacturer.
A third modernization program, which could lead to new military contracts with the US, is that of the equipment of the Stryker armoured fighting vehicles, bought by the US, with additional equipment, so that they comply with NATO standards. These include systems such as mobile tactical air defense units, mortars, 120mm guns for close fire support of infantry, etc. All these weapon systems can be installed on a Stryker wheeled chassis, which means more orders for General Dynamics Corporation. Moreover, at some point rearmament with similar war machines is to be carried out in the other main combat arm of the Army, the 2nd Tunjan Brigade.
The country's Navy is also likely to join the strategic partnership with the US soon by ordering new Naval Strike Missile (NSM) coastal anti-ship missile complexes produced by a Norwegian-US consortium of defense companies Kongsberg and RTX. According to Capital weekly sources, Bulgarian admirals are inclined to use NSM missile batteries for the coastal missiles, as they could also be integrated for use by the incoming F-16 fighter jets or the Navy's Panther helicopters, which would lead to a new military contract with the US.
"Bulgaria buys great American weapons, the best in the world," said US President Donald Trump about five years ago, during his first and only meeting with then-PM Boyko Borissov. Trump was referring to the main reason for the Bulgarian PM's visit to Washington, the defense deal signed earlier in 2019 worth 2.2 billion levs for the purchase of eight newly manufactured US F-16 Block 70 fighter jets for the Bulgarian Air Force.
The largest weapons order for the Bulgarian armed forces in the last 30 years had de facto become Borissov's informal "pass" to the White House and to a face-to-face meeting with Trump that served to publicly legitimize GERB's Euro-Atlantic orientation. In order to get there, Borissov's government rewrote the tender for the selection of new fighter jets, removed the Gripen fighter jets ranked first (despite the fact that Sweden offered 10 aircraft instead of 8 for about 800 million levs less), and switched to direct intergovernmental negotiations with the US, arguing that it was a "strategic partnership." Three years later, Sofia ordered eight more F-16s, and the total cost of the project together with the still dragging reconstruction of the Graf Ignatievo airbase now exceeds 5 billion levs
