A few days ago, the 23rd Steering Committee Meeting took place in Lisbon (Portugal): for the first time, representatives of the Italian and German Navies were joined by representatives of the Portuguese Navy with the aim to set up strategy and course of action for the common logistical support of their respective submarines U212A and U209PN (the latter resulting from the German project U214).

The Steering Committee is the highest level for strategic action plan provided for in the new Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) related to the Common In-Service-Support (CISS) between Italian, German and Portuguese Ministries of Defence, entered into force in July 2019. The new MoU enlarges to Portugal the agreement in the field of In-Service Support between German and Italy, in force since September 2002, strengthening even more the broader cooperation in the underwater field between Italy and Germany.

The aforementioned agreements are the natural follow up of the U212A MoU dated 1996, based on that the two Nations built a total of 10 new-generation, high-performance submarines (6 for Germany and 4 for Italy) equipped with AIP (Air Independent Propulsion) technology, and are an absolute new entry in the European Defence scenario: the cooperation for the new construction of high-performance underwater units, having as a result sharing of non-recurring costs and achievement of economies of scale and risk reduction, enabled also procedures, workflows and processes related to the logistic support of such technologically advanced and complex submarines.

The new MoU enlarges significantly cooperation in the field of In-Service-Support of submarines, and allows further economies of scale both in the management of maintenance contracts with Original Equipment Manufacturers, as well as to optimize the common logistic support due to an increasing in the exchange of experience based on returns from the field. The agreement establishes the enlargement of the proven Italian-German cooperation to the Portuguese Navy, with a total of 12 units jointly managed in term of In-Service-Support, and is open to further enlargements to other Nations, i.e. future Italian U212NFS and German/Norwegian U212CD and other Navies, whose submarine fleets share communalities (in terms of system configuration, maintenance approach, spare parts or training) with Units/fleets already managed under the CISS cooperation.

New Participants could join the cooperation either as an Observer or as a Member: in both cases no standing financial commitment is required. As a matter of facts, the MoU provides for a “pay as you go” approach, according to which each Participant can only take advantage of CISS procurement/technical activities of their own interest, having financial commitment only for that.

In conclusion, if on one hand the cooperation program between German and Italy has been the turning point in the scenario of submarines since, for the first time, governmental and industrial sides are cooperating at strategic level on a broad scale (technology, personnel and In-Service-Support), on the other the enlargement of the cooperation to the Portuguese Navy has strengthened and broadened it at European level in view to the possible future set up of a wide common fleet of submarines, to allow other European and NATO Nations, sharing same technology, to be able to take advantages of synergies and communalities.