The situation isn’t too bad right now, fighting a low-tech foe. But Air Force planners are deeply worried about the future, and the service’s abilities to take out enemy radars. The flyboys’ airborne electronic attack (AEA) efforts — zapping opponents’ air defenses, with big bursts of radar energy — are in disarray, reports Air Force magazine.
“Last year, the Air Force canceled its central AEA program, the B-52 Standoff Jammer.” Then, the Air Force was taken off the Joint Unmanned Combat Air System killer drone project, which the Air Force was planning to use “as a radar jammer loitering directly over enemy air defenses. It is no exaggeration to say that the Air Force AEA roadmap, which was years in the making, virtually collapsed.”
The Air Force faces a hard deadline for bringing on new operational AEA capability. Since 1999, it has been sharing the Navys four-seat EA-6B Prowler escort jammer aircraft, but the Prowler fleet begins retiring in 2009… For some time, plans have called for USAF by then to be out of the Navys program and fielding its own system.
The airborne electronic attack business comprises five primary disciplines, each taking the action progressively closer to the target… [From long-range, stand-off strikes to point-blank jamming to cyber attacks which] cause an enemy radar to think its a washing machine and go into the rinse cycle.
The problem is, these are all very different jobs. No single aircraft is going to be able to handle them all. Not a revamped B-52 or F-15E, not the Navy’s Prowler $100 million-per-plane replacement, and not even the new F-22 fighters, equipped with next-gen radars.
So now the idea is patch together lots and lots of different types of aircraft, including the Joint Strike Fighter and “the Miniature Air-Launched Decoy… a smallish missile that emulates the radar signatures of other aircraft and, it is hoped, will draw the fire of enemy air defenses.“
There are “so many different components and pieces and parts,” one Air Force official tells the magazine. “It gets very complex. … Its just a matter of what we can afford and what kind of risk will we assume if we dont have all the pieces together.”
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
GoodMorning Guys,
I know this post has nothing to do with the above story about Radar, but I’ve been waiting a week or so for a follow up on North Korea’s “nuc” here and it hasn’t happened so, sorry Noah, I will change the subject.
I’ve read over on other sites the post many of you have made in regard to the North Korea’s recent weapons test. Many of you have posted very impressive “facts” that only can come from people involved on a daily basis with these types of questions. Some of you have gone to great efforts to try and determine exactly what happened and as usual our national media has droped this story like a hot rock.
So here is my question. There is international court that is trying to determine if the DPRK did in fact touch off a Nuclear Event. All of you out there are sitting on the jury, you have seen the evidence and have considered the “facts”, did the North Koreans set off a Nuclear Explosion or not?
Besides an up or down yes or no and unlike in a real court I would like your rational for how you reach your conclusion.
ALLONS,
Byron Skinner
The US continues gearing up for high-tech engagements when there is a utter lack of high-tech opponents. It’s as if nobody noticed that the Cold War has been over for more than 15 years.
The primary convern seems to be with with defeating systems originally developed for the US that are now widely exported … a twist on the concept of planned obsolence, with no winners except military contractors.
As to Byron’s query, it is entirely irrelevant. The DPRK event will be played up or down by various governements and agencies according to their own specific agendas. The truth is entirely subjective and actual events will never be publicly disseminated.
North Korea – Nuke or Not ?
From the reports that I’ve read & heard, North Korea had a very low yeild explosion with nuclear emissions.
This would seem to indicate that they did in fact have a plutonium nuclear bomb constructed like “Fat Man” (the 2nd atomic bomb that the US dropped on Nagasaki) that did not implode simiutaneousily, resulting in a low yeild “dirty bomb.”
Resulting in North Korea getting nothing more than the effective result of using X-ray cobalt waste and high explosives to create a “dirty bomb.”