The Royal Navy reportedly confirmed that the Plymouth-based Type 23 frigate HMS Somerset launched the Naval Strike Missile (NSM) for the first time during Exercise Aegir 25 in Andøya, Norway.
Kongsberg’s Naval Strike Missile (NSM) is a fifth-generation anti-ship and land-attack cruise missile designed to be highly survivable against layered defenses: it flies at very low altitude, remains completely passive throughout much of the kill chain, and performs high-G terminal maneuvers before impact. Manufacturer-listed specifications include hypersonic speed, a weight of 407 kg, a range exceeding 300 km for the latest model, and an imaging infrared seeker and automatic target recognition capability, enabling it to identify and lock onto its intended target even amidst clutter and decoys. Raytheon, Kongsberg’s US co-production partner, emphasized the missile’s sea-skimming flight profile, advanced seeker, and approximately 500-pound warhead with a programmable fuze for optimized terminal effects.
The test firing from HMS Somerset took place during Exercise EGIR 25 in early September, in coordination with Norwegian and Polish forces operating land-based Naval Strike Missile launchers. The weapon’s nomenclature and ship installation progress within the Royal Navy indicate that several frigates, including HMS Portland and HMS Richmond, are already equipped with the pod-type launcher. The UK Ministry of Defence previously outlined a rollout path, confirming in December 2024 that HMS Portland would become the second Royal Navy frigate, after HMS Somerset, to be equipped with the new missile, with the remainder of the Type 23 and Type 45 fleet to follow. The official update highlighted the Naval Strike Missile’s near-Mach flight profile, sea-skimming approach, and range exceeding 100 miles, and described integration work conducted with Kongsberg and the Defence Equipment and Support Agency at Haakensfjörgen Naval Base in Norway. These announcements foreshadowed the live-fire firing conducted by HMS Somerset today.
HMS Somerset (F82) is a Type 23 Duke-class frigate commissioned into the Royal Navy in 1996. Originally designed for anti-submarine warfare, the frigate has undergone a series of upgrades to enhance its capabilities in multiple areas, including surface strike and air defense. Equipped with advanced sonar, radar, and combat systems, and supported by Merlin or Wildcat helicopters, HMS Somerset plays a central role in NATO maritime operations and high-readiness deployments. With a crew of approximately 185, the ship, homeported in Devonport, has become the first British warship to successfully test-fire a Naval Strike Missile.
The Naval Strike Missile uses GPS-assisted inertial navigation for cruise control, updates its altitude via a laser altimeter to maintain close contact with the sea surface, and can employ terrain following over land before handing over to a high-resolution imaging infrared seeker for terminal guidance. Kongsberg documents emphasize the missile’s composite low-observable airframe and sophisticated automatic target recognition technology, which enhance its survivability against modern ship-based electronic countermeasures and point defense systems. This passive approach deprives defenders of the early warning signals provided by the active radar seeker and reduces the risk of radar-homing counterfire.
In terms of lethality, public manufacturer documentation categorizes the warhead as approximately 120 to 500 pounds, depending on description and publication. However, both partners position the Naval Strike Missile as a precision, hardened target engagement weapon rather than a blunt force weapon. Designed to defeat medium-sized warships and key upper-tier targets, its programmable fuze and terminal trajectory allow for customized effects against ship hulls, mission systems, or shore-based targets. Raytheon emphasizes that the Naval Strike Missile (NSM) also supports a limited land-attack capability against fortified coastal nodes, a useful transitional capability while the UK awaits the entry of its heavier Franco-British future cruise/anti-ship weapon on its next-generation frigates.
The test launch from HMS Somerset re-establishes a reliable over-the-horizon surface strike capability for Royal Navy frigates following the retirement of the Harpoon missile, which created a gap in long-range anti-ship capabilities. Combined with the missile’s coastal defense systems deployed by regional allies, the NSM forms a distributed, networked threat matrix at sea and ashore. The missile’s passive guidance and low signature are particularly well-suited to the complex electromagnetic environments of the Norwegian and Barents Seas, where clutter, geography, and electronic warfare compress engagement timelines, favoring weapons that can shorten the defender’s detection and response window. The system’s ability to engage land targets also provides British commanders with a flexible tool for interdicting choke points, disabling forward operating bases, or striking maritime logistics nodes in the circumpolar Arctic.
A tactical lesson learned from the Aegir 25 exercise is interoperability: Norway, Poland, and the UK practiced a common kill chain that blends ship-based, shore-based, and airborne sensors to deliver firing solutions to Naval Strike Missile launchers on different platforms. This architecture is precisely what the missile was designed to exploit. The Royal Navy’s own roadmap indicates that the Naval Strike Missile will serve as a transitional strike force until the heavy future cruise/anti-ship weapon family, sometimes referred to as “Stratus” in British documents, is deployed on Type 26 and Type 31 frigates in the 2030s. In the short term, NATO will be able to rapidly assemble reliable anti-ship firepower and attack from multiple axes without generating radar signatures or datalink communications that defenders rely on to cue hard-kill interceptors.
The test took place in a challenging Arctic security climate, with Russia’s Northern Fleet remaining central to Moscow’s second-strike posture and NATO’s sea lines of communication connecting North America and Europe closest to the contested Arctic region. The UK Defense Journal report placed the test launch at the Andøya range, which Norway has long used to hone its allies’ high-altitude combat capabilities. In the year leading up to the test, London had significantly advanced the Navy’s contribution to NATO’s northern deterrence posture. In their respective reports, British officials and industry partners also described the Naval Strike Missile as a symbol of rapid coordination and alignment among Anglo-Norwegian defense industries, an assessment echoed in concurrent national media reports on the program’s rapid installation on Royal Navy ships.
For the Royal Navy, its significance was twofold. First, the test validated integration work on the legacy Type 23 combat system and paved the way for its wider fleet deployment, including the Type 45 destroyers, which are needed to defend carrier battle groups while also threatening enemy surface ships. Second, it bought time and deterrence: With a modern, sea-skimming missile proven aboard British ships in the Arctic, London could make a credible contribution to allied sea denial operations in the North Atlantic while furthering its heavier-strike fleet plans for the next decade. The weapon’s deployment also signaled a clear political commitment to demonstrating to potential adversaries the resolve of the UK and its allies to maintain security and stability in the Arctic.
