New Missile Plant Will Boost Virginia’s Defense Manufacturing Capacity

Norwegian arms manufacturer Kongsberg announced late last month that it will build a missile manufacturing plant in James City County, Virginia.

The development will be a major boon for the local economy and Virginia’s manufacturing capacity, thanks to a $100 million investment and the hiring of 180 employees. And, of course, the facility will produce a munition critical to naval operations in the Indo-Pacific.

 Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, a Republican, hailed the deal.

“Following our productive meetings in Europe, Kongsberg’s decision to establish its first U.S. defense assembly facility in Virginia reaffirms our status as America’s top state for business,” Youngkin said.

Kongsberg Defense & Aerospace will produce its cutting-edge Joint Strike Missile and Naval Strike Missile in the Virginia county, which includes Williamsburg and is part of the same metropolitan area as military-friendly Virginia Beach, Norfolk, and Newport News.

The Joint Strike Missile is the only long-range precision missile currently available for the Air Force’s elite F-35A stealth fighter that can be deployed inside the aircraft’s weapons bay and maintain its unparalleled stealth profile. The Naval Strike Missile, a superb anti-ship missile, would be crucial in any conflict in the Indo-Pacific.

Kongsberg’s announcement comes as an increasing number of policymakers are waking up to the desperate state of defense manufacturing in America.  In the decades following the Cold War, much of our homegrown industry fled to foreign countries, chasing lower labor costs and less strict regulations. The primary destination: China.

Efforts to move critical defense supply chains away from China will be a long-term challenge, but these efforts are an absolute necessity, especially as we find ourselves on the back foot in a great power contest with the communist regime.

This factory in Virginia is part of a broader trend. Kongsberg also announced a simultaneous expansion of its factory in Johnstown, Pennsylvania.

Recent worldwide disruptions such as the Russia-Ukraine war have highlighted just how fragile our supply lines are. The disruptions also underline the importance of bringing back key manufacturing, particularly defense, to America and away from our geopolitical rivals.

Besides losing significant overall industrial capacity, the dramatic reduction in the government’s defense spending over the past 30 years led to wide-scale consolidation of U.S. military contractors, resulting in higher production costs.

According to a Congressional Research Service report on the defense industrial base, the consolidation was seen most intensely in the production of certain special weapons systems, including precision-guided munitions.

To illustrate just how condensed the defense industry has become, five companies are the primary contractors on over 74% of the Pentagon’s major defense acquisitions. This squeeze allowed inefficiency, cost overruns, and time delays to become the norm as bureaucratic skill at navigating the Defense Department’s complex acquisition process was preferred over actual innovation.

Kongsberg’s investment in the U.S. defense industry augurs well for efforts to undo this bad trend and restore competition.

This is just one step, and much work remains to be done. The next presidential administration must make rebuilding our defense industrial base a top priority and encourage more companies to invest in America and put more Americans to work.