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Home » Tactical Development » The Hunt for Future Navy Air Weapons

The Hunt for Future Navy Air Weapons

Defense Tech reader Ned Conger just sent us a thor­ough list of weapons and muni­tions the U.S. Navy thinks are key to win­ning the future aer­ial fight.

“Our pro­gram devel­ops a mix of legacy, advanced and next-​​generation weapons that will out­pace the capa­ble threat across the spec­trum of mil­i­tary oper­a­tions,” wrote Rear Adm. Kenny Floyd, the direc­tor of avi­a­tion and air­craft car­rier plans and require­ments (OpNav N880).

“Current com­bat oper­a­tions and ana­lytic sce­nar­ios in a wide vari­ety of tac­ti­cal envi­ron­ments have kept the pres­sure on my Strike Aircraft Plans and Requirements staff to refine weapons require­ments and to work closely with pro­gram man­age­ment and indus­try to ensure the timely deliv­ery of rel­e­vant warfight­ing capa­bil­i­ties to the fleet.“
air-strike.jpg

There’s a lot of red meat on these bones, so Ill include the whole thing to let you all chew over it with­out any of my long-​​winded com­men­tary. There are some inter­est­ing tid­bits in there, so be sure to let other read­ers know what you think about Rear Adm. Floyds shop­ping list.

NEAR-​​TERM DEVELOPMENTS

Direct Attack Moving Target Capability (DAMTC)

DAMTC will be a level-​​of-​​effort weapon intended to pro­vide Naval and Joint warfight­ers with a lethal, inter­op­er­a­ble and cost-​​effective pre­ci­sion strike weapon sys­tem that can engage mov­ing tar­gets. As adver­sary threats advance in capac­ity and mobil­ity, the improved capa­bil­ity to engage mov­ing tar­gets from legacy air­craft becomes cru­cial to strike war­fare. I expect that an open com­pe­ti­tion for DAMTC will result in a retro­fit kit for exist­ing direct attack weapons and be avail­able to the fleet in the near future.

Low Collateral Damage Bomb (LOCO)

The BLU-​​126/​B, also known as the Low Collateral dam­age bomb (LOCO), deliv­ers ord­nance to urban tar­gets with reduced col­lat­eral dam­age. It ful­fills a need for a weapon that is both com­bat effec­tive and adheres to United States Central Commands col­lat­eral dam­age rules of engage­ment. Air-​​to-​​ground weapons his­tor­i­cally were pro­duced to deliver the max­i­mum amount of explo­sives. In mod­ern urban war­fare, there is often lit­tle delin­eation between friendly, neu­tral and enemy forces, requir­ing bet­ter blast con­trol. LOCO allows tac­ti­cal air­craft to employ a pre­ci­sion strike weapon with reduced col­lat­eral damage.

Externally, LOCO is iden­ti­cal to the 500-​​lb. BLU-​​111, but it con­tains less explo­sive mass. Therefore, it pro­duces a reduced frag­men­ta­tion pat­tern and blast radius. Our team devel­oped the weapon for use in sit­u­a­tions in which friendly forces or civil­ians are in close prox­im­ity to the tar­get. LOCO can be used with the same guid­ance kits as the BLU-​​111, includ­ing those for laser-​​guided bombs (LGB), dual-​​mode laser-​​guided bombs (DMLGB) and Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAM). By mod­i­fy­ing an exist­ing weapon sys­tem, the pro­gram reduced costs asso­ci­ated with design, pro­duc­tion and sus­tain­ment of this new weapon.

Dual-​​Mode Laser-​​Guided Bomb

The DMLGB is a retro­fit to legacy LGBs that con­verts them to the dual-​​mode con­fig­u­ra­tion using com­mon com­po­nents. It pro­vides increased flex­i­bil­ity by com­bin­ing proven tech­nol­ogy of laser ter­mi­nal guid­ance with all-​​weather fire-​​and-​​forget capa­bil­ity of Inertial Navigation System/​Global Positioning System (INS/​GPS).

The retro­fit involves replac­ing the exist­ing Computer Control Group (CCG) sys­tem with an INS/​GPS to pro­vide legacy LGBs with an all-​​weather guid­ance sys­tem. By using a retro­fit strat­egy vice devel­op­ing a new weapon, we can stream­line qual­i­fi­ca­tion time lines and put a new weapon capa­bil­ity in the warfight­ers hands faster. DMLGB is cur­rently sched­uled for IOC in August 2007 on both the AV-​​8B and F/​A-​​18 with future inte­gra­tion on F-​​35.

Standoff Land Attack Missile Extended Range (SLAM-​​ER)

SLAM-​​ER is a long-​​range, highly pre­cise air-​​launched strike mis­sile capa­ble of attack­ing high-​​value fixed and relo­cat­able land tar­gets, as well as sur­face ship tar­gets under way or in port. Terminal con­trol of the weapon is accom­plished by the air­crew des­ig­nat­ing the impact point on the imag­ing infrared scene trans­mit­ted from the weapon and dis­played in the cock­pit. Man-​​in-​​the-​​loop com­mands are sent to the SLAM-​​ER via a data link pod, which is car­ried by the launch or sec­ondary con­trol air­craft. Hornet A/​B/​C/​D and Super Hornet E/​F vari­ants can pro­vide ter­mi­nal con­trol of SLAM-​​ER, but only the legacy Hornets can launch the weapon. Launch capa­bil­ity for Super Hornets is sched­uled for release to the fleet in 2008.

MIDTERM DEVELOPMENTS

Harpoon Block III

The Harpoon Block III weapon sys­tem upgrade pro­vides the U.S. Navy and its allies with sur­face war­fare (SuW) capa­bil­i­ties from ships, air­craft, sub­marines and coastal defense sys­tems by retro­fitting Harpoon mis­siles in the exist­ing inven­tory. This upgrade cre­ates a highly capa­ble weapon for the open water and lit­toral war­fare envi­ron­ment by adding GPS capa­bil­ity and inflight tar­get solu­tions. GPS capa­bil­i­ties pro­vide sig­nif­i­cant lit­toral per­for­mance improve­ments such as tar­get dis­crim­i­na­tion, min­i­mized target-​​to-​​shore sep­a­ra­tion and a land-​​attack capa­bil­ity with JDAM/​GPS accu­racy. The addi­tion of a data-​​link sys­tem pro­vides inflight tar­get updates, pos­i­tive ter­mi­nal con­trol and con­nec­tiv­ity with future net­work archi­tec­ture. This enables the weapon to receive infor­ma­tion from intel­li­gence, sur­veil­lance and recon­nais­sance (ISR) tar­get­ing plat­forms and gives the launch­ing plat­form a man-​​in-​​the-​​loop, over-​​the-​​horizon SuW solu­tion for the emerg­ing threat.

The Harpoon Block III upgrade offers the option of an inher­ent spi­ral devel­op­ment path for future Department of the Navy tar­get­ing improve­ments as well as the abil­ity to inte­grate the data link on new plat­forms like the P-​​8A, organic ver­ti­cal take­off and land­ing (VTOL) vehi­cles and unmanned vehicles.

Joint Standoff Weapon C-​​1

The JSOW-​​C-​​1 vari­ant, also known as a JSOW Block III, pro­vides upgraded capa­bil­ity to strike mov­ing land tar­gets as well as mar­itime tar­gets. The JSOW-​​C-​​1 will be intro­duced to the fleet as an engi­neer­ing change pro­posal to the exist­ing Block II JSOW-​​C base line. JSOW-​​C-​​1 will employ a secure, jam-​​resistant, high-​​speed dig­i­tal tac­ti­cal data link using Link-​​16. It also will pro­vide attrib­utes nec­es­sary for launch and con­trol or relay of weapon data links by F/​A-​​18E/​F air­craft. Future incre­ments will address other con­trol plat­forms, weapon and data link options.

The JSOW-​​C-​​1 will incor­po­rate new tar­get track­ing algo­rithms into the seeker for mov­ing tar­gets, giv­ing Joint force com­man­ders an afford­able, air-​​delivered stand­off weapon that is effec­tive against fixed and relo­cat­able land and mar­itime tar­gets. The JSOW-​​C-​​1 sys­tem must main­tain legacy JSOW-​​C func­tion­al­ity to be effec­tive against point tar­gets in or through adverse weather con­di­tions, both day and night. JSOW-​​C-​​1 must pro­vide low and high alti­tude launch capa­bil­ity to enable launch plat­forms to stand off beyond tar­get point defenses. Used in con­junc­tion with accu­rate tar­get­ing infor­ma­tion and anti-​​radiation weapons, JSOW-​​C-​​1 will destroy enemy air defenses and cre­ate sanc­tu­ar­ies that per­mit the rapid tran­si­tion to low-​​cost, direct attack ordnance.

LONG-​​TERM DEVELOPMENTS

Joint Air-​​to-​​Ground Missile (JAGM)

JAGM is crit­i­cal to long-​​term Navy and Marine Corps Aviation. This mis­sile will replace aging Hellfire, TOW and Maverick mis­siles. JAGM will pro­vide extended stand­off, all-​​weather moving-​​target capa­bil­ity in a high-​​countermeasure bat­tle­field envi­ron­ment. JAGM will be the first fixed-​​wing, rotary-​​wing and UAV com­pat­i­ble mis­sile in the DoD inven­tory and will greatly enhance the warfight­ers oper­a­tional flexibility.

Small Diameter Bomb Increment II (SDB II)

SDB II is a Joint inter­est pro­gram pro­vid­ing the capa­bil­ity to attack mobile tar­gets in all weather at stand­off ranges. SDB II addresses the fol­low­ing require­ments attack mobile tar­gets, mul­ti­ple kills per pass, mul­ti­ple ord­nance car­riage, all-​​weather oper­a­tions, pre­ci­sion muni­tions capa­bil­ity, capa­bil­ity against fixed tar­gets, reduced muni­tions foot­print, increased weapons effec­tive­ness, min­i­mized poten­tial for col­lat­eral dam­age, reduced sus­cep­ti­bil­ity of muni­tions to coun­ter­mea­sures and a migra­tion path to net­work cen­tric oper­a­tions capa­bil­ity. The Navy and Marine Corps air­craft planned for inte­gra­tion are F/​A-​​18E/​F and F-​​35B/​C.

SDB II will con­tinue incre­men­tal devel­op­ment to pur­sue net-​​centric inter­op­er­abil­ity. Navy ini­tial oper­at­ing capa­bil­ity (IOC) is sched­uled for Fiscal Year 2016 on the F-​​35B short takeoff/​vertical land­ing (STOVL) air­craft, fol­lowed by IOC on the F-​​35C CV (air­craft carrier-​​capable) variant. 

(Gouge: NC)

– Christian

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September 13th, 2007 | Tactical Development | 373712 Comments »http://defensetech.org/2007/09/13/the-hunt-for-future-navy-air-weapons/The+Hunt+for+Future+Navy+Air+Weapons2007-09-13+20%3A13%3A27Ward You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

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  1. 22lr says:
    September 13, 2007 at 8:10 pm

    Cool stuff. Theres noth­ing really thats to far away from becom­ing a real­ity, like direct energy beams.

    Reply
  2. Stephen Trimble says:
    September 14, 2007 at 11:26 pm

    I’m stunned that AARGM didn’t make the list. That’s the replace­ment for HARM, with the added bonus of being accu­rate even when the enemy is smart enough to switch off their radar.
    I’m also a lit­tle sur­prised the Navy’s HyFly hyper­sonic pro­gram didn’t make the cut either.
    I won­der what the air force’s list would look like? My guess is that it would start with a replace­ment for AMRAAM and work it’s way down.

    Reply
  3. demophilus says:
    September 15, 2007 at 1:13 am

    What about APKWS? If it’s for real, it’ll let any Hydra 70mm/2.75″ pod launch laser guided PGM. That would turn any Navy/​USMC sys­tem that can carry a rocket pod into a sharp­shooter, at a rel­a­tively low price. If they can work in an abil­ity to hit GPS way­points on Block Two, you’d have a rel­a­tively cheap PGM for indi­rect fire from air, sea or land.
    Sometimes “quan­tity has a qual­ity all its own”, and swarm­ing car­ries the day. APKWS is a good fit for that.

    Reply
  4. txzen says:
    September 16, 2007 at 11:48 am

    Good point about the laser guided hydra missles. I have seen video of the aiming/​accuracy and the stop­ping power prob­lems of 30mm chain gun usage from apaches. Hellfire being too much often and they are designed for anti armor and some­time don’t have the anti infantry effect they need, the 1 pound of explo­sive com­ing from a hydra hit­ting in the 2 to 10 meter accu­racy of laser and gps sounds like a great idea. Watching the video of the Hydras now is pretty tough to watch they are wild.
    Also what is so dif­fer­ent about a 250 pound bomb and the 500 pound low coloat­eral dam­age munition?

    Reply
  5. Randy K. Jensen says:
    September 17, 2007 at 3:08 pm

    I’ve seen Designs of all types for planes and bombers but in this age of tech­nol­ogy I have never seen a missle that fires to the reverse of the flight of the air­craft to defend against approching enemy tech­nol­ogy is here its just not being used you can shoot down and approach­ing plane from behind. Randy Jensen

    Reply
  6. step says:
    June 15, 2008 at 6:55 am

    future weapon,lethal weapon,nuclear weapon,military weapon ‚arts mar­tial weapon,medieval weapon,destruction mass weapon,ninja weapon, 2 war weapon world,1 war weapon world,channel dis­cov­ery future weapon,

    Reply
  7. iPod says:
    July 25, 2008 at 5:59 pm

    thank you

    Reply
  8. danny says:
    August 28, 2008 at 3:46 pm

    nice.…! this is a really good idea devel­op­ing weapons and reduc­ing col­lat­eral really impres­sive!
    but if you could devel­oped a weapon that 100% accu­racy and 100% less col­lat­eral dam­age that may work a risk!

    Reply
  9. Joe says:
    September 14, 2009 at 3:05 pm

    yo

    Reply
  10. Joe says:
    September 14, 2009 at 3:05 pm

    yo

    Reply

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