Finmeccanica Targets U.S. Defense Firm

In the past decade, Rome-based Finmeccanica SpA has clawed its way up the ranks to become one of Europe's leading defense-and-aerospace firms by pulling off a string of acquisitions and winning key contracts from Washington to Moscow.

But its plan to bid for defense contractor DRS Technologies Inc. could mark a new hurdle. New Jersey-based DRS makes strategically sensitive technologies such as electronics and equipment used by the U.S. Department of Defense and police forces.

To date, foreign sales of sensitive U.S. defense companies have been almost exclusively to companies from America's closest allies: Britain, Canada and Australia. Britain's BAE ...