UK used Block 1E Javelin missile in record 4 km hit with lightweight launch unit

A Block 1E model Javelin missile with a standard (live) warhead being fired from a LWCLU during a test on Salisbury Plain in the UK in May 2025. (RTX)

The British Army successfully engaged a target at 4 km with a Javelin anti-tank guided missile (ATGM), in an extended-range live firing record for the system's Lightweight Command Launch Unit (LWCLU), RTX, part of the Javelin Joint Venture (JJV), announced on 21 May.

RTX company and Javelin inventor Raytheon said its LWCLU is 30% smaller and 25% lighter than its non-lightweight Block 1 Command Launch Unit (CLU) with double its target detection and recognition capability.

Back-compatible with all previous Javelin variants, Raytheon said the LWCLU maintains day and night engagement capability and surveillance opportunities. Ground troops have frequently used the visual and thermal optics on CLUs and LWCLUs, without the Launch Tube Assembly (LTA)attached, for battlefield surveillance.

Andy Amaro, JJV president and Javelin programme director at Raytheon, said the test, held on Salisbury Plain, validated the “range and target detection capabilities” of the LWCLU.

The UK is a partner in the Javelin programme, supplying components to support production in the US, which will increase to 3,960 Javelin rounds annually by 2026 and 900 LWCLUs by 2030.

The UK bought an unknown number of Block 0 Javelin systems in 2005, but these are not known to have been upgraded since.

Although not known to have been acted on, in August 2022 the US Department of Defense's (DoD's) Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) approved a possible Foreign Military Sale (FMS) of 513 Javelin LWCLUs to the UK, valued at the time at USD300 million.