US Army Picks the Diehl–Leonardo Vulcano 155mm Round as One of Three ERAP Competitors

The three partners disclosed the award at Eurosatory 2026 in Paris on 16 June. The US Army's Project Manager Combat Ammunition Systems (PM CAS) selected the VULCANO 155mm Guided Long Range (GLR) round, a guided artillery munition already qualified and fielded by European users, for its Extended Range Artillery Projectile (ERAP) requirement. The Army is pursuing a 155mm shell that strikes moving targets beyond 65 km, with initial operational capability targeted for fiscal 2030.

Under the partnership set out by Diehl Defence and Leonardo, Leonardo is the design authority, responsible for precision guidance, fuze and warhead technologies; Diehl Defence contributes terminal-seeking sensors, weapon-system integration, safe-and-arm devices and industrial manufacturing; and General Dynamics Ordnance and Tactical Systems serves as the US prime contractor and integrator. VULCANO pairs satellite-based navigation with a laser or infrared terminal seeker and reaches up to 70 km. GD-OTS's reported share of the consortium-managed award is roughly USD 38 million; neither company release stated a contract value.

ERAP is a competitive demonstration, not a sole-source buy: General Atomics and BAE Systems Land and Armaments hold parallel awards to mature their own designs. The Vulcano round is therefore the European entry in a US down-select, not yet a fielded selection.

The proprietary read. The flow of munitions across the Atlantic usually runs west-to-east; here a European design has earned a seat in a US Army competition against two American rivals, with the value-creation split keeping design authority in Rome and seeker and integration work in Germany while the production prime sits in the United States. That is a narrow but real reversal of the customary direction — Washington buying European glide-and-guidance know-how rather than exporting it — and its weight depends entirely on surviving the down-select to production. First reported in Signal No. 86.