New Delhi: Poland’s Armament Agency announced it has halted a procurement process covering the acquisition of 32 S-70i Black Hawk utility helicopters as it looks to reassess equipment priorities in light of Ukraine war developments.
Pawel Beja, Poland’s deputy minister of national defence, said, “A procedure was conducted and closed” relating to the rotary acquisition, according to a translated post from the Polish Ministry of National Defence on X. “The geopolitical situation, the situation in the east — the war in Ukraine, what Russia is currently buying, equipping its army … is being analysed by the General Staff of the Polish Armed Forces, our pilots, specialists and experts.”
Beja said in a separate post on the social media platform that “the decision [from the] Armaments Agency to terminate the [S-70i] acquisition process resulted from the needs of the Armed Forces,” and refuted reports that supposedly connected the move to the cancellation of a production contract. He noted a contract does not exist.
As part of a broader modernisation spending spree, Warsaw has also invested heavily in other helicopters in recent years, chiefly through orders of 96 Boeing AH-64E Apache Guardian attack aircraft and 32 Leonardo AW149 multirole types. Additionally, Poland is also prioritising the acquisition of a new helicopter trainer to support Apache and AW149 aircrews.
