“Beyond the 12 Caesars already delivered, I made the decision to deliver six additional Caesars.” Emmanuel Macron took advantage of his visit to kyiv, Wednesday, June 16, to announce the sending to the Ukrainian forces of new copies of the French cannon. Its mobility and its precision must make it possible to relieve the units engaged on the Eastern front.
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Ukraine has been demanding heavy weapons from its Western partners for several weeks to deal with the Russian offensive in the Donbass. Franceinfo comes back in five questions on the artillery pieces provided by France.
1What is the Caesar Cannon?
Entered into service at the end of the 2000s, this armament is the major piece of French artillery. Produced in Bourges (Cher) by the French industrial group Nexter, the Caesar is a 155 mm self-propelled gun, capable of firing six shots per minute at a distance of 40 kilometers, with very high precision. It is composed of a total of 500 parts, for a weight of 18 tons. While other guns are mounted on tanks, such as the Dutch Panzerhaubitze 2000 howitzer, the Caesar is based on an armored truck (its name is an acronym for “truck equipped with an artillery system”), which gives him great mobility in the field.
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A major asset for the Ukrainian army, which only had old non-mobile systems before the war. “As the President [Volodymyr] Zelensky said it, the Caesar made the difference on the ground, by the precision of his shots and by his ability to escape the opposing ripostes “, commented the Ministry of the Armed Forces on Wednesday. Moreover, these guns are famous “easy to use”military engineer Marc Chassillan told AFP.
2How is it used on the Ukrainian front?
The Caesar cannons already sent to Ukraine have notably been deployed in Donbass, the region in eastern Ukraine on which the Russian army is currently focusing its offensive. A France 2 team was able to observe their use in the field on June 5. That day, the Ukrainian armed forces fired against Russian artillery pieces positioned 17 kilometers away. Three Caesar guns were deployed in concert – even if the custom is to deploy six trucks – for an operation of less than five minutes, in order to avoid an enemy response. Surveillance drones then flew over the targets to assess the success of the strikes.
>> Report closer to the Ukrainian gunners who use the Caesar guns
This precious material does not use the roads. Most often it is moved across fields at night. The Ukrainian army also conducts short training sessions behind the front, with around forty Ukrainian artillerymen trained in France in the Canjuers camp (Var). “We received a lot of information and we had to understand everything as quickly as possible, in less than two weeks”told one of them to France 2. The equipment supplied to kyiv was “adapted to make them compatible with Ukrainian command systems, through a contract with Nexter”explained Joël Barre, general delegate for armaments within the Ministry of the Armed Forces, during a hearing in the Senate in early May.
“This system is very manageable. It is an important factor in a contemporary war like this”explains a Ukrainian commander interviewed by AFP, opposing the Caesars “to old non-mobile Ukrainian systems. We gain a lot of time, so the enemy cannot attack us or retaliate quickly.”. French guns destroyed about 100 Russian targets – “command posts, entrenched camps, artillery pieces, tanks and armored vehicles” – according to a report from the Ukrainian army quoted by TF1.
3What other countries have Caesars?
Because of its qualities, the French cannon, whose unit cost reaches 5 million euros, is a commercial success and is exported to many countries. Nexter has notably concluded contracts with the Czech Republic, Denmark, Indonesia, Morocco, Thailand and Saudi Arabia. The latter is also accused by NGOs of having used it against civilians in Yemen. On Monday, Lithuania also signed a letter of intent to acquire 18 Caesar guns, on the sidelines of the Eurosatory exhibition near Paris.
4Are deliveries to Ukraine depleting French army stocks?
At the start of the conflict, the French army had 76 Caesars. The 18 guns sent to Ukraine were taken from these reserves, explains the Ministry of the Armed Forces. For the time being, no order has been placed to replenish the French inventory, which is therefore reduced by almost a quarter by deliveries to kyiv. “The choice to give six additional Caesars responds to an immediate need for Ukrainian survival against the Russians”justifies the ministry.
5Will France strengthen its capacities?
Most likely. “Ahead of the President of the Republic’s trip to kyiv, the CEO of Nexter (…) was asked to review his organization and be able to work on a ‘war’ mode to be able to produce Caesars much more quickly for the French army”says the Ministry of the Armed Forces, without further details. “These deliveries will be compensated”had already declared Emmanuel Macron during an interview with the regional press at the beginning of June. “And I asked our industrialists to accelerate the production of armaments, it is not only a question of replenishing our stocks, but also of strengthening our independence”.
Moreover, an order had already been placed before the start of the war. In February, the then Prime Minister, Jean Castex, signed a 600 million euro contract with Nexter to develop an armored and modernized version of its gun, the “Caesar NG”, and acquire 33 copies, deliverable to from 2026. These are to replace guns still in service which date from the early 1980s.
The manufacture of a Caesar system with its truck currently takes more than 18 months, Nexter explained in mid-May. But difficulties in sourcing electronic components and raw materials can lengthen lead times. “If we had to go to 300 guns per year, that wouldn’t pose any particular difficulty”then assured AFP Alexandre Dupuy, director of institutional affairs for the company. “It’s all about anticipation”he nuanced, “because we are not alone, we all have our suppliers” and some professions are in tension, such as “mechanical welders” and “pyrotechnic specialists”.