WARSAW, Poland — The Polish Ministry of National Defence has selected the country’s new submarine, opting for the A26 Blekinge, a design offered by Sweden’s Saab.
The decision followed an intense competition between six European and Asian nations. Poland aims to procure three submarines for the country’s Navy, with plans to have a contract signed by the end of this year.
“This is a great day for the security of the Polish state, a great day for the Polish Navy. We are finalizing our promise, fulfilling what we have declared. Poland will acquire three submarines under the Orka program,” Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz, the country’s deputy prime minister and defense minister, said at a Nov. 26 press conference.
“This decision builds a new security architecture in the Baltic Sea,” he added.
Kosiniak-Kamysz said he wants to have an agreement with the Swedish government signed “in the coming weeks.”
In the past months, delegations from the Polish ministry visited Sweden, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain, and also met with South Korean officials to discuss the countries’ sub offers. A key factor that weighed on the final recommendation of the ministry’s program team was the respective industries’ readiness to cooperate with Polish defense companies on the procurement.
The new subs are designed to strengthen Poland’s deterrence capacities in the Baltic Sea, as the country is intensifying naval modernization efforts in the aftermath of Russia’s invasion of neighboring Ukraine. The Polish government plans to equip the three subs with cruise missiles.
The deputy prime minister said the government aims to have the first of the three submarines delivered to the Polish Navy in 2030.
Before the three A26s enter service, Warsaw aims to procure a ‘gap filler’ boat for the Polish Navy which will be used to train the country’s sailors. That submarine is to be made available to the nation’s naval forces in 2027.
The government’s decision to select a European Union member state as its partner for the sub procurement is in line with plans to use loans from the EU’s SAFE program. Brussels has allocated to Warsaw €43.7 billion ($50.7 billion) in loans for arms purchases under the scheme.
A Polish think tank analyst told Defense News that, though Poland initially planned to spend around PLN 10 billion ($2.7 billion) on the sub purchase, the forthcoming acquisition “will most likely cost more than this. It is also unclear at this point what will be the scope of the Polish industry’s involvement.”
“We already know the delivery of the A26s to Sweden has been delayed. Taking this into account, the delivery of the first of these subs to Poland in five years’ time is not certain,” the analyst said.
Saab brands the A26 as a vessel enabled with fifth-generation sub capabilities, offering very low acoustic and magnetic signatures which, combined with “Saab’s heritage of Baltic Sea stealth,” would make the A26 “among the world’s hardest-to-detect submarines.”
The acquisition is considered urgent as the Polish Navy operates a single, outdated Soviet-designed submarine, the Kilo-class ORP Orzel.
Under the program’s premises, Saab will be required to cooperate on the procurement with PGZ Naval Shipyard, an offshoot of Poland’s leading state-run defense group.
“We look forward to the coming negotiations with the Armaments Agency in Poland. The Swedish offer, featuring submarines tailored for the Baltic Sea, is the right choice for the polish people. It will significantly enhance the operational capability of the Polish Navy and benefit the Polish economy,” Micael Johansson, the president and CEO of Saab, was quoted in a statement.
With the latest announcement, Poland is set to become the second nation to order the A26 Blekinge for its naval forces, preceded by Sweden.
In October 2025, Saab announced it had received an order from Sweden’s military procurement agency, the Defence Materiel Administration (FMV), for the last phase of the manufacturing and additional scope for material and services for two Blekinge-class subs previously ordered by Stockholm. The order is worth around SEK 9.6 billion ($1 billion), with the vast majority of deliveries scheduled for the years 2026 to 2032, the Swedish company said in a statement.
Jaroslaw Adamowski is the Poland correspondent for Defense News.
