In a drizzly ceremony today, we will witness Secretary of the Navy Don Winter accept the delivery of the first EA-18G Growler to the USN’s fleet readiness squadron.
This would be a fairly routine affair except for a couple of very distinguishing facts: first, the event is occurring exactly according to the original schedule and, second, Boeing’s five-year-old development program is not over-budget.
It’d be nice to think those two facts weren’t so extraordinary, but, in the world of military acquisition, it is.
To be sure, there remain a few caveats. The operational test phase begins in September, which will expose any unresolved design or technology glitches. The Government Accountability Office reported in March that a few software issues need to be fixed before operational tests can be performed. We’ll see how that pans out, but none of the issues sound like show-stoppers.
Some of the more cynical observers (blush) might also say that Boeing and the Navy cheated with the EA-18G.
This is not the same as starting a new weapon project from scratch. The airframe for the EA-18G is based on the design of the already proven F/A-18E/F Super Hornet and the electronic warfare package is based largely on the ICAP III suite already flying on the EA-6B Prowler. The ALQ-99 jammer is merely a decade-old, upgraded version of a pod that first flew in 1971 (and needs to be retired as threats evolve over the next decade).
But it’s also not fair to Boeing to dismiss the complexity of this project. Repackaging the ICAP III to fit inside the Growler involved no small risk. The “football” ALQ-218 receiver mounted on the EA-6B’s tail was split into two pieces and installed in the more aerodynamically harsh environment of the EA-18G’s wingtips. I’m still curious how they managed to pull off the ALQ-218’s radome, which must be sturdy enough to survive on the wingtip, yet not too sturdy to interfere with the operations of the embedded antenna.
Integrating the all-new Raytheon-made Communications Countermeasures Set (CCS) also added some complexity to the project, as did the introduction of the highly useful interference cancellation system (INCANS), which allows the EA-18G to continue jamming an enemy radar even while the pilot continues to communicate with other friendly aircraft.
It’s reasonable to question whether the navy should have been still more ambitious. Why not introduce an all-new, digital-era jamming pod with the first delivery of the EA-18G? Why not design a next-generation jammer aircraft around a more stealthy platform, like the navy’s forthcoming F-35C due to be delivered in 2015? Why not challenge your contractor — to which you’re paying billions of dollars — to invent something completely new, versus “repackaging” two familiar systems?
At the end of the day, the navy is getting exactly what it paid for, on-time. In this day and age, maybe that’s all you can really ask for.
“Why not design a next-generation jammer aircraft around a more stealthy platform, like the navy’s forthcoming F-35C due to be delivered in 2015?“
Three big reasons pop out at me. First, the F-35’s big selling point is stealth, but EW is an inherently un-stealthy job. Jamming involves massive emissions which, while they confuse sensors and make targeting a pain, also betray the existence and rough location of the jammer aircraft. If the aircraft is doing its job correctly then it also wouldn’t need to be stealthy, as hostile sensors would be blinded by it’s jamming equipment.
Second, the F-35 is a compact single seat aircraft. The EW mission seems to require at least 2 crew members (the EA-6B has 4) which would necessitate a major modification to the F-35. Given the limited space internally, fitting all the electronics, as well as enough fuel for long range and good loiter time, not to mention anti radiation missiles, would be near impossible. You would almost certainly need to use external tanks and jammer pods, which sort of defeats the purpose of the F-35.
Third, the EA-18G is available now, and is pretty much guaranteed to work without too much trouble. The EA-6 is getting old and worn out, and it would be a lot of trouble to keep that aircraft flying for the time it would take to develop an EF-35, assuming such a program would ever prove feasible at all.
On the other hand, why reinvent the wheel, when what we already have is still working fine (if that is true)? I’ve seen far too many instances of gold-plating weapon systems that unnecessarily increased the cost and complexity for no good reason.
Case in point: the Crusader (now cancelled and incorporated into the NLOS Cannon of the FCS. During development, a decision was made to place all of the vital information of the vehicle on the digital crew screen, such as amount of fuel on board, miles traveled, etc.
Think for a few minutes about how much money was required to create the screen design and the software to make it work (untold thousands of dollars in $50 dollar/hour Software Engineer hours) versus simply using the tried-and-tested mechanical displays (like dials or even dot-matrix displays) that already exist and work well and cost practically nothing by comparison.
Any information that was needed in a digital format by other sensors could easily have been created and sent to them without going to the trouble of creating a fancy screen display which looked great but was really unnecessary.
Moral of the story: I think if some good old-fashioned common sense would be used by Defense contractors, costs could be slashed and the defense budget would be far more effective than it is. Unfortunately, I observed first-hand the desire by some to emphasize beauty over utility, which probably did much to end up killing the program in the end.
“invent something completely new, versus “repackaging” two familiar systems?“
The Navy wanted commonality among its airframes thats why.
Where did you find $50/hr software engineers?
It’s more like $150/hr.
I would imagine the automation required by going from 3 bodies down to 1 running the show is enough to take on. Why add new airframe and untested hardware?
“Why not design a next-generation jammer aircraft around a more stealthy platform” ?!?…
Doesn’t anybody remember the A-12 flying Dorito? Sheesh…
Active jammer on a stealth aircraft. Who is the friggen genius that authored that question? Please tell me it wasn’t the author of a post on a supposedly defense-related blog?
Stealth alone isn’t going to be able to cut it in the next decade against modern SAMs and 5th generation fighters, that’s why. Remember the whole planning ahead thing? Yeah, that’s what mounting a stealthy jammer on a stealthy 5th generation plane will be necessary.
The need for stealth even for a jammer isn’t really so difficult to grasp. A first-day-of-war strike package of F-22s and B-2s would be easily compromised on early warning radars by their own escort jammers if they lack basic low-observability characteristics.
SHOCKER 4 LIFE
Well, the average back in 2001 was about 50/hour, and the hot-shot Database jocks would come in for about 70/hour on short assignments, but I don’t recall anybody making $150/hour back then. However, it could be that they just kept it quiet so that nobody would get jealous.
Are you saying that the average is now $150/hour? If that’s true, then its no wonder that so much of the software work has migrated to India and elsewhere where they think $10/hour is a lot of money.
“Active Jammer on a Stealth Airframe“
If that isn’t an OXYMORON then there truly is “Army Intelligence”.
Snicker … snicker.
The Marines are all ready planning on an F-35 jammer. As for stealth, jamming is not necessarily just brute noise screaming through the ether and giving away your position. There are other ways to mess with enemy systems that would be in sympatico with a stealth aircraft. Finally, if they ever get around to fielding a better systems with say phased array and more sophisticated capabilities (read expensive) then this should be even less of a problem.
To me the real drawback of any of these (EA-18 or EF-35) is the reduction in crew members. I learned a long time ago that the more complex the environment (or task) the more likely the automated systems are to lie to you. With only one dedicated operator working the entire EM spectrum while relying on the system to catch the important stuff, we’re setting ourselves up for failure.
Re: Old Sailor
Shipmate, the beam in our collective eye is not that any of the programs, systems, and super whammydynes COULD be brought to the Fleet less expensively, it is that they WILL NOT be.
You wouldn’t believe it if a whore told you she loved you, so why do we believe the procurement wanks and the contractors when they whisper sweet things in our ears about… well… anything.
There is just far too much money flowing through the Pentagon’s teats for it to be any other way.
Cheers,
Chief B.
The EF-111 Raven was about 10 years newer than the EA-6B Prowler, but both were developed from 60s airframes. The Prowler proved a more economical aircraft, using the same jamming system.
During the Cold War, three EF-111s could jam the entire eastern front. The EA-6B has that same ability; as well, the Growler is also capable.
The need for an immediate replacement brought the EA-18G to the forefront, with advancements in developing for a future jamming aircraft already in development. The biggest advantage of the Growler is, it will be armed and able to protect itself.
Jammers don’t have a need for stealth, because they don’t have to fly in harms way to accomplish their mission.
Re: Coolhand77
Growler is an on-time, under-budget bird probably because it is evolutionary, not revolutionary.
We’ve been to the fanroom about this here on DT, oh, about a thousand times. Requirements-creep is the other side of the spiralling costs problem. For whatever reason, the guys in uniform who write the specs for systems just can’t seem to resist the temptation to fiddle with things. We can not expect any builder to deliver aything on time or on budget if the buyer keeps adding, removing, or modifying what’s being built. Ya don’t need an MBA to fathom that one.
A clean sheet EW bird would today still be just a bunch of CAD drawings… with the NAVAIR boys twiddling them every time Mikoyan burps. Much like the NAVSEA boys have done with the erstwhile DD(X) and CG(X) programs. For what we’ve flushed in designing these hulls we could have reactivated, modernized, crewed, and steamed two BBs. Including all the whizbang all-electric propulsion. But I digress…
I suspect that the kids making mushy-balls in their Huggies today, will be flying an evolved EA-18 many moons from now. Much the same as are the daring young folks flying the Prowler today; a fine aircraft birthed from pedigreed stock.
But hey, we’re all just preaching to stones. Ain’t nobody in DC listening… and they probably wish that we’d shut up, too.
Cheers,
Chief B.
I second what you said, Chief! Anchors aweigh!
Heres to evolution!
Now if all our military procurment toads and defense industry manipulators would take notice from this. Evolution in systems leads to progress on time and on budject…waiting for the next revolution is a losing proposition because while you are waiting for your revolution (army not wanting to upgrade till they get their man portable rail/laser/guided rocket gun?) your enemy has been evolving and exceeding your current capabilities with more units fielded for less money (Chinese 5.8mm rifles with high BC/SD bullets and similar ballistics to maybe the Grendel? guessing and projecting, no actual knowledge).
I’m tired of seeing them waiting on the ray guns. and transatmospheric stealth STOVL rockets.
[quote]The need for stealth even for a jammer isn’t really so difficult to grasp. A first-day-of-war strike package of F-22s and B-2s would be easily compromised on early warning radars by their own escort jammers if they lack basic low-observability characteristics.[/quote]
News for you mate,
ECM puts an umbrella around the attack aircraft. Early warning radar won’t see them and as one poster put it, it’s an oxymoron to think stealth would be necessary for the ECM aircraft. :}
Jammers also dont need stealth because they broadcast enormous amount of signals. It looks a bit silly to spend big money on stealth (to avoid bouncing back radar waves) when at the same time sending out masses of multispectrum waves.
Bravo Zulu to all who posted… great comments!
Just one point, and in not meaning to debate present or future air doctrine, but at some point in the future there will be a time, place or terrain (open ocean?) were we wish or need the jamming aircraft to arrive on station without being detected before lighting off. Well, maybe.
Have a great one!