Europe Advances MBDA CROSSBOW 800 km Weapon for Ground-Launched Deep Fires After First Firing Trial.

MBDA has fired its CROSSBOW OWE Heavy for the first time, the company announced at Eurosatory 2026 in Paris, advancing a European ground-launched strike weapon designed to hit targets beyond 800 km. The trials mark a step toward giving land forces deeper reach with a 300 kg-class payload as Europe rebuilds long-range fires capacity.

The weapon moved from design to live firing in nine months, using a modular mix of military and commercial off-the-shelf systems from UK and European suppliers. Its rapid development points to a broader shift toward faster production, scalable strike options, and land-based deterrence for future high-intensity conflict.

Related topic: France Selects MBDA Safran Thundart Rocket Artillery to Replace LRU With Sovereign 150 km Deep Fires.

MBDA’s CROSSBOW OWE Heavy has completed its first firing trials, demonstrating progress toward a European ground-launched deep strike weapon with an 800 km-plus range and a payload of up to 300 kg for precision attacks against rear-area targets (Picture source: MBDA).

CROSSBOW OWE Heavy occupies a specific category between short-range rocket artillery and high-end cruise missiles. It is described as a ground-launched deep fires weapon for static high-value targets, not as a reusable unmanned aerial vehicle or a loitering munition designed to search for mobile targets over a wide area. Publicly released data indicate a weapon approximately 5.3 m long, weighing about 750 kg, with a 3 m wingspan, subsonic flight speed, and a modular payload bay able to carry kinetic or non-kinetic effects up to 300 kg. Those figures place it in a heavier class than most expendable attack drones used in Ukraine, while remaining below the cost and survivability profile normally associated with complex cruise missiles.

The armament configuration is the core of the design. A 300 kg payload allowance gives engineers room for several mission packages: a unitary blast-fragmentation warhead for depots, radar sites, command posts, fuel farms, parked aircraft, and lightly hardened infrastructure; a penetrator or delayed-action charge for storage buildings and reinforced command facilities; or a non-kinetic payload for electronic attack, deception, or sensor-related missions. MBDA has not released warhead types, fuzing options, explosive weight, accuracy figures, or seeker specifications, so these effects should be treated as probable payload applications rather than confirmed variants. Still, the payload mass is large enough to make CROSSBOW relevant against operational-level targets rather than only tactical vehicles or small field positions.

The guidance package is equally important because a weapon flying more than 800 km cannot depend on satellite navigation alone in a contested theatre. Public information indicates that CROSSBOW includes artificial intelligence image-based navigation, GNSS with anti-jamming, inertial navigation, and a terminal sensor. In practical terms, this suggests a layered navigation approach: inertial navigation for continuity, GNSS when available, image correlation to reduce drift, and terminal sensing for the final phase. That architecture is relevant against Russian-style electronic warfare, where jamming and spoofing of satellite navigation are now routine battlefield conditions.

Launch and deployment arrangements point to a weapon designed for dispersed firing units rather than fixed launch sites. CROSSBOW is launched from the rear of a vehicle and has been associated with a 20-foot ISO-compliant truck arrangement with one or two launch pods. The use of a container-sized launcher matters tactically because it allows armed forces to separate the weapon from large, distinctive missile vehicles that are easier to detect, classify, and target. A battery could operate from roads, industrial areas, field hides, or pre-surveyed firing locations, fire at targets deep in the enemy rear, and then relocate. This is a different answer to the same operational problem addressed by long-range artillery modernization: how to extend land-force reach without depending entirely on aircraft or naval strike assets.

In operational use, CROSSBOW would most likely be assigned to corps- or theatre-level fires rather than brigade artillery. Its target set is not the immediate close battle, but the rear-area system that sustains it: ammunition storage, rail transshipment points, fuel distribution, air defense radars, headquarters, missile preparation areas, and air bases within the 800 km-plus envelope. A notional mission chain would require target detection by national intelligence, UAVs, electronic surveillance, special operations forces, or allied ISR, followed by mission planning, launch, and post-strike assessment. Because the weapon is intended for static targets, target-quality intelligence and timing remain decisive. A weapon of this type is less useful against mobile missile launchers or air defense systems unless the location is current and the command cycle is short.

The tactical value of CROSSBOW depends on cost, quantity, and survivability, none of which has been fully disclosed. MBDA’s argument is that the weapon balances capability, complexity, lower cost, and production scale, with production possible in 2026 and a wider company target to increase output by 40 percent compared with 2025. That statement should be read as an industrial objective, not yet as evidence of contracted deliveries or operational inventory. The main acquisition question for European governments will be whether CROSSBOW can be bought in numbers sufficient to change strike planning. A munition available only in small batches would compete with cruise missiles; a munition procured in large stocks could be used for repeated interdiction and suppression of rear-area infrastructure.

CROSSBOW also sits inside a broader MBDA deep strike portfolio that now includes THUNDART in the 150 km class, DELUGE for lower-cost saturation missions, and the Land Cruise Missile/NCM-LCM MK2 above 1,000 km. The Land Cruise Missile is positioned as a higher-end deep strike weapon with metric accuracy, time-on-target salvo capability, resistance to GNSS jamming, and improved survivability, with a ground launch system expected from 2029. The distinction is important: CROSSBOW is not being presented as the most survivable missile in the family. Its purpose appears to be to provide a heavier, longer-range expendable weapon that can be produced faster and used more frequently than scarce cruise missiles.

The first firings therefore provide evidence of technical progress, but they do not yet answer the procurement questions that matter most to armed forces: unit cost, accuracy, production rate, launch-vehicle configuration, survivability against layered air defense, and national supply-chain participation. What can be assessed from available data is that CROSSBOW gives MBDA a candidate weapon for the gap between rocket artillery and high-end cruise missiles. For European armies, that gap is no longer theoretical. It is the space where land forces need range, payload, and stockpile depth to attack the enemy’s rear without consuming their most expensive strike weapons on every depot, radar, or command site.

Explore More Defense News

• Land Defense News
• Naval Defense News
• Defense Aerospace News

Written by Evan Lerouvillois, Defense Analyst.

Evan studied International Relations, and quickly specialized in defense and security. He is particularly interested in the influence of the defense sector on global geopolitics, and analyzes how technological innovations in defense, arms export contracts, and military strategies influence the international geopolitical scene.