SysAdmin, Author at Second Line of Defense

Building the Weapons Enterprise for 21st Century Operations

Posted on January 19, 2011 | by SysAdmin | Leave a Comment

01/19/2011

01/19/2011 – In mid-October 2010, Second Line of Defense visited Eglin AFB and the Air Armaments Center. During the visit, SLD sat down with Major General Davis who is finishing his tour at AAC and has been nominated for his third star and the command at the Electronic Systems Center at Hanscom AFB.

SLD: You’re finishing your tour at the AAC and what do you feel are the most important achievements during your time here, especially in supporting the warfighters in Iraq and Afghanistan?

Major General Davis: I came here with this perceived notion that we — the USA — had gotten behind in our weapons planning and development activities compared to our platform development. I guess in some ways this turned out to be true. For the AORs we are fighting in today — for the operations the AF and coalition forces are conducting today — there is hardly a weapon being used today that hasn’t been significantly modified is some way. In many cases the weapons we are using today are being employed in a very different scenario than they were originally designed for.

And the Air Armament Center team has been very good at adapting something that was believed to be the perfect solution five years ago, to the entirely new situation of today’s combat. They’ve demonstrated an inherent flexibility, engineering-wise, test-wise, production-wise, to be able to take some of these weapons and give the folks that are in Afghanistan just what they need.

In at least in a couple of these cases — one in the Afghanistan AOR, one in another part of the world — we probably not could have anticipated how the weapons were going to be eventually use. But we have other situations where I think if we had followed the right disciplined approach, we could have anticipated needing the weapon that we’re now working in a quick reaction mode to deliver ASAP. We could have anticipated that this weapon was going to be needed now, or very close to now, if we had done things a little bit differently, five or six years ago. This process must start with future target set playing a key role in leading the design process. The process must not start with a set constraints defined by specific legacy platform dimensions.

(See an example of this development with the Small Diameter Bomb 1 Block 9.)

As we go forward on limited budgets our next challenge we will have to do a much better job of anticipating what the next need is going to be. How we get limited funding for what the next weapon requirement will be—a requirement that probably is not part of today’s battle—will be a real big challenge in the very constrained budget future.

SLD: One way to look at it is that weapons that you’ve modified here for use in Iraq and Afghanistan are really a function of investments made 30, even 40 years ago in the weapons enterprise? And I think folks tend to forget that you do have to make a significant investment for anything to last 30 or 40 years, that you can then leverage that investment.

So you’re making an investment, then you’re leveraging the investment, and so that’s an important characterization. And then the other issue, it seems to me that you’re raising, is, can we be smarter in anticipating future needs as we lay down new baselines for new weapons?

Major General Davis: What we’re seeing is we’ve got to do a couple of things. First of all, we absolutely have to realize that the weapons we’re going to build today have to anticipate tomorrow’s battles — in other words they will be used differently that originally designed and they must be flexible enough to adjust. Today we’re building a weapon that is in essence a very small sensor and attack platform that’s got to go find its own target and in some cases, delineate the target from various confusers. It’s got to be able to do its mission often without GPS and in all kinds of weather. Tomorrow’s weapons must be flexible enough to be effective in a constantly changing threat environment.

The threats are getting very, very intelligent and so, what used to be considered an acceptable level of investment for weapons may not provide what we need in the future. Yesterday’s weapon investment levels may not give us the capability to counter the threats that are growing out there today.

And this is the really challenging part the interesting part. Some of the threats that we have to deal today — using very interesting and creative methods –are already appearing on operational threat systems today. It is not just a future concern. Five years from now, they’re going to be evolved even further into the next generation, particularly, in the air-to-air jamming systems. We are already a little behind the timeline we need to track to be able counter some threats.

So it’s hard for most folks in this day and age to appreciate the level of investment that’s got to go into a new weapon program—because that weapon is now essentially a small airframe with a complete radar system, with a complete sensor system, a complete guidance system and a contains autonomous targeting capability. It is no longer just a missile or just a bomb. Our challenge, again, is meeting these needs with level or decreasing investment budget.

It’s interesting to see that when the Russians started building their new aircraft, touted as a 5^th generation aircraft, they also started to develop the new weapons that would go with it at the same time. We’re not quite there yet in our airframe/weapons development processes. Our weapons are often have to play catch-up after the airframe gets built — in other words, the bay size, the dimensions you have to fit into, are fixed and this makes it difficult to optimize a weapons for a mission.

We have an opportunity to do better, as we look into what’s probably coming on the horizons out there in this thing called a “family” of long range strike systems. We have an opportunity to drive synergy from the start – and really, if you did this the right way, instead of defining your platforms and what platforms you need, you go figure out what your target set is that would help define what the effect you need really is and could quite possibly help define the size and shape of the platform.

That would help define what the weapon you needed is. That would help define what the platform size needed to be and what the platform characteristics would be. So as I mention the process must start with target set and work its way to the platform bay design. This is hard concept for most of us engineer and pilot types to accept.

If we can shape that process now, as we’re getting into new systems like the next gen platform, or the next generation bomber — if we can do this a little bit more effectively then maybe, maybe sometime in the future, senior leadership won’t have to ask, “How come we couldn’t anticipated this five or ten years ago?”

SLD: Let me ask you a final question. As we were about to build the F-35, and we have the F-22 in small, but significant numbers, where are the weapons for these platforms? The F-35 is really a 360-degree operational airplane and we really haven’t built the weapons yet for the 35 or the 22. In fact, one way to understand the F-35 is that it is the first airplane able to operate in 360 space and to manage that space with its integrated combat weapons enterprise. We clearly need to shape weapons strategy with this in mind.

Isn’t there an opportunity to build a weapon’s enterprise that could be highly synergistic with this stealth platform that could allow one to also think about, to use your phrase, the other assets that you might add? The remotely piloted aircraft and even support from surface ships and working with the long range strike platform. Isn’t that an opportunity to, as one builds towards the new aircraft, think beyond that to kind of a modular approach to get an effective outcome?

Major General Davis: I think there’s a lot of opportunity now because as I mentioned — in the past we’ve had to build weapons to match the hard confines of existing aircraft weapons bays. We are doing that today with the F-22 and the F-35. Or there are other cases where we built the aircraft around existing operational weapons. The F-35 was built around weapons like the JDAM and AMRAAM.

In the future I believe, the networks and interactions between an airplanes, or manned aircraft and UAVs, or aircraft/UAVs and ships on the sea will determine what weapons you are going to use and how they will be controlled. The weapons could be launched from a wide variety of airplanes and controlled through a variety of different nodes along the way –this will be a major factor in the kill chain of the future.

Credit: http://www.boeing.com

We’re already started on what would be considered the next generation of weapons for both the F-22 and the F-35, and the only thing that we’re really constrained with right now is still weapon’s bay size but not much else.

The next gen bomber may be a different story, if we do the planning and requirements process correct, the bay will not be a limitation. This will allow us to really see what is the next limiting component of the kill-chain technology.

So we will deal with the fifth gen platforms, the F-22’s, the F-35’s, and we’ll figure out how to shape the weapons enterprise. We will shape an interactive system to make the weapon highly effective from the time it either gets information from the F-35, or the F-22, or is put in the battle space and picked up and controlled by another node in the grid — that node could be a Global Hawk, F-35, F-22, a regional Air Operations Center, or another platform acting as a picket battlefield airborne control.

There’s an unlimited set of options of how we will manage and employ the entire kill. How we throw the weapon out of that bay is still somewhat constrained, but for the period from the time from launch to target destruction is still basically limited only by a clean sheet of paper.

Towards New Task Force Capability with A400Ms and A330MRTTs

Posted on January 19, 2011 | by SysAdmin | Leave a Comment

An A330 MRTT Update

A Discussion With Pablo Quesada Ramos, Head of Market Development, MRTT and other Airbus platforms derivatives

01/19/2011 – Recently, Second Line of Defense received an update from Airbus Military with regard to the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) program. In the course of the conversation, ways of thinking about complementarity between the two new aircraft, the tanker and the airlifter were discussed as well.

The discussion was held with Pablo Quesada Ramos, Head of Market Development, MRTT and other Airbus platforms derivatives. Pablo Quesada was appointed Head of Market Development for Multi Role Tanker Transports and other Airbus platform derivatives in March 2009. Previously, he held several positions in Airbus Military since 2000, including Chief Engineer for the A330 FSTA Program, Chief Engineer for the Airbus Military Aerial Refueling Boom System (ARBS) Program as well as Avionics Systems Engineering leadership for the A310 MRTT and other military programs. Before joining Airbus Military, he undertook Project Management and Systems Engineering Lead responsibilities at several aerospace companies including the former Douglas Aircraft Company, McDonnell Douglas Corporation. Pablo also served at the Spanish Air Force as Second Lieutenant, Engineering Corps. He graduated from the Polytechnic University of Madrid with a Masters degree in Aeronautical Engineering.

Airbus A330 
Credit: EADS

SLD: A couple of months ago, I noticed that you had a press release on military certification for the A330 MRTT. Could you describe what that means and why that’s an important step?

Pablo Quesada: This means that we have successfully demonstrated the safe operation of all the military systems on the aircraft, including the refueling systems that are going to be delivered to the customer. There have been more than 1,900 refueling contacts with the MRTT. More than 1,500, including our A310 boom demonstrator aircraft, for the boom; which is the only new generation boom in service. And almost 1.5 million pounds of fuel have been transferred, during hundreds of sorties, with more than 1,000 flight hours.

What this means is that we have a fully certified, integral system, the solution is low-risk, and is in production right now. And it meets fully our expectations when we started this program.

SLD: So, the Spanish Civil Aviation authorities have done the certification?

Pablo Quesada: The certification processes for the A330 MRTT include both civil and military certification elements. The civil certification was achieved at the beginning of the year with the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) and now we have successfully completed military certification.

The authority in this case is the military certification authority of Spain – called INTA – which has been recognized by the Commonwealth of Australia as the certification authority for the program.

SLD: Could we move to a discussion of the current state of the Australian program?

Pablo Quesada: The delivery process of the first aircraft to the Royal Australian Air Force is on-going. Final hand-over will take place once the lengthy review of all related documentation, as well as all the required qualifications, are complete.

Deliveries will then continue during 2011 and 2012 until we complete the five units that are under contract with the Australians.

SLD: We are discussing a fully operational aircraft?

Pablo Quesada: The objective is to deliver a fully capable aircraft. After delivery, the Royal Australian Air Force will undertake initial operational test and evaluation. And then the objective is to have the aircraft in service before the end of next year. In parallel to that, some other activities are going on with the readiness of the full flight simulator and other training devices, which are certified and delivered as part of the program, .

SLD: Which devices? Could you clarify?

Pablo Quesada: The training system is composed of a full-flight and mission simulator (FFMS), air refuelling operator part-task trainer (PTT) and a cockpit integrated procedures trainer (IPT).

SLD: As I remember it, one consideration for the Australian Air Force was that the A330 was already in the Qantas fleet, so that they already had pilots familiar with the A330 who functioned as reserve pilots Was that an important consideration in the selection and now ties in with the training effort for the A330MRTT.

Pablo Quesada: Definitely. The fact that the local flagship airline Qantas is operating A330s is a great advantage and not only in terms of training, and particularly the possibility of cross training between all the models of the Airbus family, but also because of the maintenance, repair and overhaul capabilities of Qantas, which is a partner in this program.

SLD: The Australians have a refuelable version of the A330MRTT. How do you think they will use the refuelability of this aircraft to their advantage? How do you think they might think about that?

Pablo Quesada: When the Australians launched their Project Air 5402 to acquire new tankers, they knew from experience they needed a big versatile tanker with plenty of fuel, range and capability.

With the A330 MRTT they got not only plenty of fuel, range and capability, but superior takeoff performance in hot and humid conditions (typical of Northern Australia) and therefore a considerably higher takeoff weight in all RAAF airfields. And the fact that the aircraft is refuelable will allow them, of course, to further extend the reach of their fleet.

SLD: The advantage of a refuelable tanker clearly is that you can land with much less weight, because in the current operation of Air Force tankers, they’re often coming in at 40 percent full, which is a huge waste of ops tempo and ops cost. Explain a little bit about why a refuelable tanker allows you to come in much lighter when you land?

Pablo Quesada: When you have sustained operations, you have fuel in the tanker that has not been used, and it can be passed to another tanker that is keeping on station so that you don’t need to take this fuel back to base. And so you can sustain the operation, and be more effective as well as more efficient.

SLD: Could we talk about potential synergies between the A400M and the A330MRTT? The fact that the tanker holds the fuel in its wings, frees up the space inside the aircraft for cargo or passengers. Conceivably, this could allow flexibility in shaping a tanker-lift task force?

Pablo Quesada: Indeed, but not only in terms of the A400M providing lift and the A330MRTT providing the tanking. The A400M can be a tanker as well, which can allow an interesting combination of tactical and strategic refueling capabilities over a long distance, which can then operate at low altitudes via the A400M to refuel tactical assets.

In terms of complementarity with the A400M; the A400M is easily configured to refuel a wide range of types from helicopters to fighters, and by taking advantage of the great stability it provides in flight, it is a very effective tanker for lower altitude refueling to the last tactical mile – from a forward operating base, for instance.

In terms of transport, the complementarity of the A400M and A330MRTT is also clear. The A400M is a superb transport aircraft, which combines tactical and strategic capabilities in a single aircraft. It could be effectively used in long-range deployment missions either with refueling or with stopovers. But the combination of the operation of the A330MRTT with its true multiple capabilities, plus the tactical capabilities of the A400M will provide a very effective insertion force for either humanitarian or military operations.

Although, either one of them in isolation is also able to fulfill the kind of missions that you are mentioning, the combination of the tactical features of the A400M or the strategic and global reach of the A330 MRTT, could allow one to craft an extremely capable task force.

Shaping Adaptive Innovation for the Warfighter

Posted on January 19, 2011 | by SysAdmin | Leave a Comment

The Air Armament Center Functions as the Linchpin

An Interview with Randy Brown, Norma Taylor, and Wally Messmore

01/19/2011 – The Air Armament Center at Eglin AFB designs weapons for the U.S. and allied warfighters. We earlier described a key effort to modify the Small Diameter Bomb to provide a weapon for the warfighter in Afghanistan. The AAC has engaged in innovation not only in terms of technology, but in terms of delivering capability to the warfighter during the Iraq and Afghan operations. A core need is for weapons with lower collateral damage both to allow weapons to be used closer to the operations of the warfighter and to reduce the threats to civilians.

During a visit to Eglin AFB in October, discussions were conducted regarding these efforts. In a follow up interview, Second Line of Defense discussed with key officials in the center how they are accomplishing this core mission for the warfighter.

The two weapons under discussion are the Precision Lethality MK82 (BLU 129/B) and the SDB Focused Lethality Munition (FLM). In White Papers accompanying this interview, the nature of these programs is presented in greater length. For now, the core point is simply that the center has been working with the labs and the warfighters to shape a close proximity weapon with lower collateral damage.

The interview was conducted with Randy Brown, Director, Armament Directorate, Eglin AFB, Norma Taylor, Program Manager of the MK 82 Quick Reaction Capability (QRC), and with Wally Messmore, Program Manager assigned to the Air Armament Center Program Execution Group who worked on the FLM.

A B-2 Spirit dropping Mk 82 bombs into the Pacific Ocean
 in a 1994 training exercise off Point Mugu, California.
Credit: http://en.wikipedia.org

SLD: I think what the commonality for the two programs is that both of these were programs to develop close proximity weapons for the use of our forces in Afghanistan, and that you are working to give the forces a useable lower collateral damage weapon to be deployed on existing weapons. In both cases, we’re talking about a warhead modification. Is that correct?

Randy Brown: That’s right. We’re building a composite case warhead versus a steel warhead. In the case of the Mark 82 there is different explosive fill in there as well, but they’re very similar between the two so the technologies really are very similar between FLM and on what Taylor’s doing. It’s a little bit bigger warhead. BLU 129 is the nomenclature of the QRC warhead.

Norma Taylor: The BLU 129 is a form fit replacement for the standard MK 82 500-pound category warhead. So in terms of weight and dimensions of the warhead, BLU 129 is equivalent to the MK 82.

SLD: How does the composite casing as opposed to steel affect the ability to deliver low collateral damage, and what’s the advantage there?

Randy Taylor: With our classic steel warheads today, a majority of the lethality and collateral damage effects are due to the fragmentation of the steel warhead. With the composite warhead case, instead of producing those lethal fragments, it basically turns into composite dust, so to speak.

SLD: So the point really is that with the steel casing, you get fragmentation from the explosion itself, whereas the composite casing turns into dust, so you’re reducing significantly the fragmentation generated by the blast. Is that the basic point?

Norma Taylor: That’s correct. It’s a slightly different variant of the standard MK 82 explosive fill partly to help out with creating a warhead with similar weight to that of the standard MK82. Since the composite cases are so light, we need to bring the weight of the warhead up to that of the MK 82 so that the JDAM and Paveway guidance kits can carry it with no problem. So, the fill is slightly remixed from that aspect of the consideration on lethality.

SLD: So you’re taking the tested JDAM, the tried and true JDAM, so to speak, which has a flight envelope with a certain weight on the warhead and you’re trying to replicate that weight so that you don’t have to do a lot of testing on flight deviation due to a different weight on the warhead.

Norma Taylor: Exactly

SLD: But that would be a crucial part of your ability to deliver the warhead in a very timely fashion.

Norma Taylor: That’s correct.

Loading Small Diameter Bomb (Credit: http://www.boeing.com/defense-space/missiles/sdb/index.html)

SLD: Could you talk a little bit first to the FLM process of going from the requirement to actually delivering the capability to meet that requirement in a fairly short period of a time?

Wally Messmore: We’ll start it back in the 2005 timeframe when the Air Force Research Lab was conducting research on this particular capability. The labs were running a research and development program for the composite case and explosive fill technologies. They got to a certain point of maturity that the war fighter elevated their interest in it, thus a requirement came out of United States Central Command Air Forces (CENTAF), now known as United States Air Forces Central (AFCENT). So, in 2006 a requirement was then generated for the FLM weapon, and the acquisition approach chosen was to use a Joint Capability Technology Demonstration (JCTD). This approach allowed us the kind of flexibility that you would need to fine tune the development and field a new weapon relatively quickly.

SLD: So the requirement was shaped by the availability of your technology demonstrated by the lab, that Central Forces Command saw the utility of that technology and then it was turned over to you to figure out how to develop this in a timely manner?

Wally Messmore: That is correct.

SLD: I presume that in this process you had to have a fairly open communication approach to determine best paths actually to deliver this capability in a fairly short period of time. How did you address that issue in terms of making sure that the industry and yourselves and the lab work on the same page in a very short period of time?

Wally Messmore: The requirement was expressed in a fashion that drove both lethality and the collateral damage requirements to fit into a 250-pound class weapon at the time, so the natural selection was a small diameter bomb. We worked with AFRL, with Boeing, who is the SDB I manufacturer, and with U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM), who ended up sponsoring the JCTD.

SLD: So at that point, several months had passed and now you’ve got the requirement pretty well established in terms of what CENTCOM wants and what the labs think is feasible to do, so that you got a feasible requirement so to speak. Now your task is to drive the feasible requirement into an actual reality of the bomb. Is that a fair way to characterize this process?

Wally Messmore: That is correct. However, there are some nuances that go along with a JCTD, which are slightly different than a standard program of record in that it’s a capability demonstration. For example, the requirements aren’t necessarily as firm as a traditional program.

SLD: So you have some flexibility in the JCTD to shape what the realistic requirements are?

Wally Messmore: Correct.

SLD: So essentially rather than establishing a set of tight requirements at the outset of what essentially is an experiment, the prototyping, you’ve got some real flexibility in terms of execution. The key to do doing this in a short period of time is that you have flexibility in shaping how to achieve the outcome. Isn’t that the point? They’re giving you more flexibility to essentially shape the execution of the program.

Wally Messmore: That is correct.

SLD: That makes a lot of sense. Well then let’s talk about the process for what is an open project, what is still the MK82. Is this a similar kind of process where you’re doing JCTD or how is this being approached to get a timely resolution of developing the weapon?

Norma Taylor: Yes sir, it’s a different process, but we are leveraging off the technology lessons learned from FLM. For the Precision Lethality MK 82, again, the need came from a U.S. CENTCOM requirement that was validated in late January of this year. The Air Force and Navy spent a couple months looking at their options to support the need for a 500-pound category low collateral weapon that could be easily integrated across the board on a variety of Air Force and Navy Aircraftraft and in March determined that basically the big brother to FLM was the appropriate option to pursue.

One of the differences is, as Messmore indicated, FLM used a technology demonstration program. With the MK 82 variant, we went straight into a program of record with firm requirements that we really worked hard with the users to make sure that we were focused on the most critical requirements to them, and that helped set our threshold and helped set us in our design and our test program to be able to get out in the field very quickly.

So we have an acquisition category III quick reaction capability program, and again, it’s a very open communication where we’re constantly working with CENTCOM, with Air Combat Command, with the Navy and Marine Corps to understand how they employ weapons, and determine how we can meet those needs and get that done very quickly.

SLD: So going back to a statement you made shortly at the beginning of this conversation, the ability to talk to the users in the theater, in the area of operations, has been a critical capability for you to shape the most desirable outcome in the most repid fashion possible. So that dialogue is really crucial for the process to work?

Norma Taylor: Absolutely correct. We’ve teamed with the National Laboratories, in this case Lawrence Livermore National Labs. They are the warhead designer and they’re the government agent for the warhead design from that aspect, and so they basically took the warfighter inputs and their technology from the earlier work and then applied it to the 500-pound variant. From there we went to industry for support for manufacturing of the composite warhead cases. The Aerojet Corporation was selected to support the case manufacturing for this very limited QRC activity.

SLD: When you refer to Livermore’s earlier work, you mean with FLM?

Norma Taylor: It’s both the earlier work with AFRL and the FLM activity. Livermore was involved, as with AFRL in all those activities.

Lawrence Livermore National Lab
Credit: http://www.lasg.org

SLD: So this has allowed you at Eglin to be a center of excellence for migrating capabilities to lower collateral damaged bombs. You’re a low collateral damage bomb enterprise of excellence by following these processes, which have highlighted the ability to talk to the war fighter in the AOR, which has been a key driver for how to do define what you will then develop.

Norma Taylor: I think it’s two aspects. It’s a close relationship with the war fighter and it’s a close relationship with the technology developers in the laboratory and Lawrence Livermore.

SLD: So you’re kind of the linchpin between those two?

Norma Taylor: Correct.

Randy Brown: What Norma Taylor is demonstrating now is that they developed a very good and beneficial working relationship with Livermore, Industry, AFRL, and in the acquisition community to get a product out of the lab, onto the production floor and into the hands of the customer in the shortest amount of time, and that we’re acting as the integrator on this effort.

We’re taking off-the-shelf components and we’re integrating this technology into a capability. But the unique thing here I think, which is different than what’s been done in the past, is we are in the middle of this. We’re bringing it all together. And in the end, it’s Taylor and her team that will deliver that full-up weapon system capability to the war fighter.

***

ANNEXES

The following white papers were provided to enhance understanding of the two programs by the AAC.

ANNEXE I
Evolution of Small Diameter Bomb I (SDB I) Focused Lethality Munition (FLM)

25 October 2010

The Focused Lethality Munition (FLM) is an ultra low collateral damage variant of the Small Diameter Bomb I (SDB I) weapon. FLM exploits a composite warhead case and multiphase blast explosive fill developed and matured by the Air Force Research Laboratory Munitions Directorate during an 11-month period. FLM’s warhead creates a more lethal near-field blast and eliminates the metal fragments from traditional warheads. Additionally, with the exception of the warhead, FLM’s design utilized all existing SDB I common components, software, and aircraft interfaces which greatly enhanced the accelerated acquisition schedule of the FLM system.

In April 2006 US Central Command, based on US Central Air Force’s identification of an urgent operational need for a low collateral damage weapon, sponsored an out-of-cycle Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) Joint Capabilities Technology Demonstration (JCTD) to determine the military utility of FLM. In August 2006, the SDB I Branch under the Armament Directorate at Eglin AFB, FL and Boeing entered into a contract arrangement for the integration and test of the FLM warhead into the SDB I Weapon System.

The JCTD acquisition strategy for FLM included a concurrent AFRL technology maturation as the SDB I Branch executed the FLM acquisition contract. The SDB I Branch’s contract with Boeing had a segregated “off-ramp” to mitigate government risk if the new developed technologies did not prove viable. The team jointly established detailed technology readiness “entrance criteria” for FLM maturity testing and performance assessments that had to be demonstrated prior to entering a formal Technology Readiness Review and transition of the technologies from AFRL to the FLM system. The AFRL technologies proved successful and transitioned to the SDB I Branch and the FLM weapon system in March 2007.

Extensive testing occurred during the AFRL and SDB I Branch development effort including arena tests to characterize the warhead, penetration tests, design verification testing, static live fire tests against simulated targets, guided test vehicle flights to evaluate weapon accuracy, and live FLM flight testing to validate FLM’s weapon effectiveness. The first 50 FLM weapons were delivered to the Air Force in March 2008, approximately two months ahead of schedule. FLM met and/or exceeded all requirements established by CENTCOM. The FLM program has transitioned to production and has delivered several lots of additional weapons.

The major players in the development of the Focused Lethality Munition JCTD were the OSD Office of Advanced Systems and Concepts, the AFRL Munitions Directorate, the SDB I Branch, The Boeing Company, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Aerojet, and CENTCOM. Open communication during weekly teleconferences with all key teammates and monthly reviews co-chaired by AFRL and the Miniature Munition Division leadership were critical to program success.

ANNEXE II
Evolution of Precision Lethality MK82 (BLU 129/B)

25 October 2010

The Precision Lethality MK82 (officially designated the BLU-129/B) is a Quick Reaction Capability (QRC) program directed to develop and field a very low collateral damage 500 pound class warhead. BLU 129/B exploits both a composite warhead case and multiphase blast explosive (MBX) fill developed and matured by the Air Force Research Laboratory Munitions Directorate and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL). Once completely developed, the BLU 129/B warhead will create a more lethal near-field blast and drastically reduce the quantity of metal fragments as compared to traditional warheads. The BLU 129/B warhead matches the outer mold line and mass properties (with the exception of roll inertia) of a traditional MK82 warhead and, therefore, minimizes the effort required to integrate the munition with existing weapons systems.

In January 2010, the Joint Chiefs of Staff validated a Joint Urgent Operation Need (JUON) for a very low collateral damage weapon capable of immediate integration on aircraft currently certified to employ the MK82 series warheads. In March 2010, the Office of the Secretary of Defense’s (OSD) Joint Rapid Acquisition Cell (JRAC) directed the Air Force, in collaboration with the Dept of Navy, to “rapidly develop, test and field the PL MK82, consistent with the urgency of the operational need, and the safety and risk inherent in weapons development.” In August 2010, Air Combat Command (ACC) further identified the program requirements to include, as a threshold, compatibility with both the Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM) and Laser JDAM (LJDAM). Additionally, ACC identified the F-15E, F-16 and A-10 as the threshold aircraft platforms and the need for 50 warheads to satisfy an Initial Operational Capability (IOC).

In May 2010, the Air Force Research Laboratory’s (AFRL) Munitions Directorate initiated a five month risk reduction program to mature the composite warhead case and MBX fill technologies to a readiness level sufficient to begin a rapid system development, test and fielding program. AFRL completed the risk reduction program in October 2010 after developing the initial warhead design and demonstrating its performance characteristics by conducting two full scale blast arena tests and a target penetration test.

In August 2010, the Air Armament Center’s (AAC) Armament Directorate initiated a QRC program to finalize the warhead design, conduct design verification, system safety, aircraft integration and warhead performance testing (to include lethality arena and penetration tests), and field 50 warheads by the end of March 2011. For an acquisition strategy, AAC entered an agreement with LLNL to finalize the warhead design and conduct design verification testing. AAC selected the Aerojet Corporation to manufacture the initial warheads for aircraft integration, system safety and warhead performance testing.

Currently, the program is on track to complete all warhead design and fabrication activities along with the required development and operational tests to support both the delivery of the first 50 warheads as well as a favorable fielding recommendation by March 2011.

Pakistan and the Afghan End Game

Posted on January 4, 2011 | by SysAdmin | Leave a Comment

01/04/2011

Dr. Richard Weitz (Credit: The Hudson Institute)

By Dr. Richard Weitz

12/22/2011 – Following the November 26 incident, the Pakistani government convened an emergency session of the Defence Committee of the Cabinet (DCC), Pakistan’s highest forum for defense policy consultation and coordination. The DCC decided to retaliate for the attack by closing Pakistan’s two Afghan border crossings at Chaman and Torkham to NATO’s supply convoys.

Pakistan also gave U.S. personnel 15 days to vacate an air base in Baluchistan used to assist drone attacks against insurgents and terrorists in northwest Pakistan. The Pakistani authorities also suspended certain joint activities, withdrew Pakistani liaison officers from the border coordination centers and NATO headquarters in Kabul, boycotted the December 5 Bonn conference, reinforced their Afghan border defenses, and launched a comprehensive review of Pakistan’s security cooperation with NATO and the United States.

Despite pleas from Afghanistan and other foreign governments, Pakistan boycotted the December 5 Bonn conference that was convened to secure diplomatic and economic support for the Kabul government as NATO withdraws its troops from Afghanistan in coming years. More than 50 countries sent representatives to the meeting, designed to underscore the international commitment to Afghanistan’s security and to reassure potential foreign investors. But Pakistan’s absence deprived the conference of most of its impact.

As the DCC demanded, all U.S. personnel left Shamsi Air Base in western Pakistan by December 11. The expulsion from Shamsi was neither unexpected nor a major loss.

Almost half of the supplies to the 140,000 members of the ISAF still pass through Pakistan. (Credit: Bigstock)

The CIA had earlier used its small airstrip in southwestern Pakistan extensively to launch drone attacks in northwest Pakistan, but the deteriorating relations between the United States and Pakistan led the United States to relocate its main drone bases to Afghanistan earlier this year. Pakistani officials had asked the United States to vacate the base on several previous occasions, but relented under pressure from Washington and the United Arab Emirates, which formally owns the base but has allowed the United States to use it.

For the past year, the United States has used the Shamsi base only as an emergency-landing zone for drone attacks cancelled due to weather, mechanical difficulties, or other problems.

The number of U.S. personnel based there had fallen to under a dozen by late November 2011. Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, subsequently said that the United States has other options for “stationing aircraft and other resources around the region.” Asked about its impact, Dempsey explained that, “It’s a serious blow in the sense that the Pakistani government felt that they needed to deny us the use of a base that we’ve been using for many years” but he added that, “It’s not debilitating militarily.”

In fact, the drone strikes have been so successful in the past few years that most of the key al-Qaeda leadership targets in northwest Pakistan has been eliminated. Al-Qaeda leaders Ayman al-Zawahiri and his second in command, Abu Yahya al-Libi, are the last remaining high-value targets in the region.

Most importantly, there is no evidence that the Pakistani authorities have banned the use of the Predator surveillance and strike operations over their territory or stopped providing targeting data and other counterterrorist intelligence to the United States. The government has never ordered the Pakistani Air Force to shoot down the drones, which it could easily do.

Pakistan has benefited from the strikes against the militants because some of them wage terrorism against the Islamabad government. The Pakistani army claims it lacks the capacity to occupy and fight the insurgents and terrorists in some of the more remote tribal regions such as South Waziristan.

More worrisome is the fact that the Pakistani military has adopted less restrained rules of engagement in the Afghan-Pakistan border region.

In a command communiqué issued on December 2, Pakistani Army Chief Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani authorized Pakistani forces to return fire in self-defense against any future acts of NATO “aggression” without requiring their superior’s approval. “I do not want there to be any doubt in the minds of any commander at any level about the rules of engagement,” Kayani said in the communique. “In case of any attack, you have complete liberty to respond forcefully using all available resources.”

The recent order is but the latest of several that have relaxed the rules of engagement in the border area.

After the earlier September 3, 2008 cross-border incident, the Pakistani army announced it would shoot any U.S. forces attempting to cross the Afghan-Pakistan frontier. On several occasions since then, Pakistani troops and militia have fired at what they believed to be U.S. helicopters flying from Afghanistan to deploy Special Forces on their territory, though there is no conclusive evidence that the United States have ever attempted another raid after the September 3 incident.

These Pakistani response measures may aim to strengthen the troops’ morale and reduce discontent with Kayani’s leadership, but they could lead to reciprocal escalation between NATO and Pakistani forces that stumble into an accidental firefight. In a concurrent move, the Pakistani military announced that it was strengthening its air defenses along the Afghan border. Capt. John Kirby, a Pentagon spokesman, acknowledged Kayani’s authority to reaffirm Pakistanis “right of self-defense,” Kirby added that, “We certainly respect that right of his. We have it as well.”

In addition to the risk of reciprocal escalation, another problem with Pakistan’s deploying more air defenses in border areas is that the weapons could fall into the hands of insurgents and terrorists there. They could then use these arms, or transfer them to terrorists who would use them, to shoot down civilian airliners as well as Western military aircraft.

For now, the Pakistani government has chosen not to terminate NATO’s use of Pakistani territory to send food, fuel, and equipment by ground transport to their ISAF contingents in Afghanistan. They have also refrained from closing the Pentagon’s use of a Pakistani airspace to convey some critical combat supplies, including ammunition, directly to air bases in Afghanistan. Shortages in transport planes and the high expense of air shipments preclude a major expansion of this airlift, but it is the main mechanism for delivering weapons and ammunition to the NATO forces in Afghanistan. U.S. Navy carrier aircraft also routinely fly over Pakistani airspace, through designated corridors, to strike targets in Afghanistan.

Instead of curtailing these essential logistical activities, Pakistani authorities have suspended the shipment of NATO supplies by ground transport to Afghanistan. On past occasions, the Pakistani authorities have temporarily closed only one of the two major crossing points into Afghanistan to NATO supplies. These earlier stoppages have lasted at most ten days and did not appreciably affect coalition operations. Last year, the Pakistani authorities closed only the Torkham crossing in the northwest Khyber tribal area. This time, they have closed both crossings, including the one at Chaman in southwestern Baluchistan province. Pakistan officials are also considering revising the terms of their transit trade agreement with Afghanistan, claiming that Afghan contractors were exploiting the agreement to move NATO supplies through Pakistani territory.

The present closure may also be designed to prevent the looting and burning of the trucks carrying NATO supplies that happened during the last blockade. Some of the arson was due to insurance fraud, but other burnings, which injured Pakistani drivers and security forces, were committed by extremists seeking to punish NATO. On this occasion, many trucks have prudently relocated to more secure areas.

Even so, hundreds of truck drivers are waiting at the port of Karachi and the Chaman terminal to deliver their goods to Afghanistan. They and other Pakistanis involved in the ground transport effort are suffering financial hardship since NATO only pays for supplies after the contractors have delivered them to their destinations in Afghanistan.

During the last few years, the ISAF coalition has developed additional supply routes through the countries north of Afghanistan. This Northern Distribution Network (NDN) has decreased the volume of food, fuel, and equipment shipped through Pakistan, but these northern routes cost more, are less efficient, and present their own problems.

Logistic bottlenecks prevent a rapid expansion of these alternative routes, especially during the harsh weather of the upcoming winter months. At present, many of the NDN transit countries exclude the transportation of weapons, ammunition, or other combat supplies through their territory.

As a result, almost half of the supplies to the 140,000 members of the ISAF still pass through Pakistan.

Each country is responsible for supplying its own forces in Afghanistan. The United States, which still has almost 100,000 soldiers in Afghanistan, ships more than 30 percent of its non-lethal supplies through Pakistan. Some other coalition members send a much higher percentage through that route.

The United States and other NATO countries cannot wait long for these supply lines to reopen. The U.S. Defense Department increased its stocks inside Afghanistan following the 2010 cross-border incident, but these stockpiles will be exhausted in a few months even if NATO forces slow the pace of their operations to conserve supplies.

Speculation is that the Pakistani government will permit these shipments to resume only after tempers have cooled and NATO agrees to some kind of concessions. It took apologies from U.S. and NATO leaders before the flows resumed after a less serious incident in 2010,when Pakistan closed one of its Afghan border crossings to NATO supplies for ten days after U.S. helicopters accidentally killed two Pakistani paramilitary soldiers.

Additional concessions will probably be required to overcome the current impasse given the higher number of Pakistani casualties and the other blows to the Pakistani-U.S. relationship in 2011.

Download Form for PDF: An Update on the Osprey

Posted on January 4, 2011 | by SysAdmin | Leave a Comment

Download PDF: An Update on the Osprey

Posted on January 4, 2011 | by SysAdmin | Leave a Comment

An Update on the Osprey Special Report 6

RFID Technology: From Cattle Herds to Military Use

Posted on January 3, 2011 | by SysAdmin | Leave a Comment

01/03/2011

By Kirsten Ashbaugh

[email protected]

01/02/2011 – In September 2010, Second Line of Defense attended IDGA’s Military Logistics Summit 2010 in Vienna, VA. At the conference, Dr. Robb Clarke of Michigan State University discussed RFID and other Auto-ID technologies and their role with supply chain optimization.

RFID, or Radio Frequency Identification, uses a system of readers and tags to store information about an object or product. The technology is hardly new; one of its first uses was to identify cattle and livestock. The system works when the reader sends out a signal to the tag, which, using the power generated from the reader’s signal, sends back a signal identifying its material or product. Not all tags are equal: passive tags, which are the cheapest, do not transmit active signals; semipassive tags, slightly more expensive, may be able to monitor qualities of the material, such as climate, but also do not transmit active signals; active tags, the most expensive of the three, have a power source and are able to continuously send active signals.

A passive RFID tag showing the embedded microchip (Credit: http://www.almc.army.mil/alog/issues/JulAug07/jav_hard.html)

RFID is already subject to a great deal of scrutiny and research; the implications of the technology are enormous for many industries. As Dr. Clarke explained, food and pharmaceutical industries can use it for safety and sterility as well as identification; consumer industries may use it for marketing. According to the Economist, smart sensors such as RFID are used in oil exploration and government systems such as public transportation, toll roads, and power meters.

The military recognizes the vast opportunities RFID and similar technology would afford. RFID technology has the ability to answer these questions, Dr. Clarke says:

Where are (or aren’t) things?
How many are there?
Are they time sensitive?
Are they real?
How will this provide safety or security?

As with any form of automation, RFID saves time by automatically identifying the qualities of the characteristic by answering the above questions. Improved efficiency will lead to faster and better responses to the needs of the warfighter. Dr. Clarke lists the benefits of Auto-ID, including more accurate inventory, quick product recalls, increased safety, decreased product diversion, and verification of product authenticity, to which one could add efficiency gained from automation; more broadly, this all leads to enhanced asset-tracking. RFID in a military sense would allow troops to track what supplies they have as well as the transportation of new supplies coming to them. The US Army, working with the DoD, has begun to implement RFID, using the Radio Frequency In-Transit Visibility (RF-ITV) System—reportedly the world’s largest RFID-enabled asset visibility system—to track the identity, status, and location of cargo as it is transported (Defense Industry Daily).

Another field of the military that can and will benefit is medical care. In the DoD’s FY 2007 Budget Estimates, there was a focus on using RFID “to improve the end-to-end visibility and tracking of medical supplies, resulting in enhanced medical care for the warfighter.” There has also been discussion of whether RFID may be used to track the actual physical condition of soldiers coming into medical centers; according to Defense Industry Daily, the US Navy’s combat casualty care unit has used RFID to track casualties in Iraq, using RFID chips sewn into soldiers’ cuffs to track the wounded arriving for treatment at field hospitals.

Testing the placement of sensor tags in medical sets (Credit: http://www.almc.army.mil/alog/issues/JulAug08/enhancelog_w_sensortech.html)

There are issues holding RFID back. Because these are radio frequencies, Dr. Clarke points out that they will not penetrate water and they are affected by the shape of the material as well as what the material is made of or surrounded by, be it metal, plastics, glass, or paper. They are limited to the distance over which the tag can draw enough energy from the reader. Price can limit the implication; active tags, for instance, are considerably more expensive than passive tags. Dr. Clarke also states that passive tags have a virtually limitless life, while active tags may require more maintenance or replacement of their power source.

One of the major concerns is over security. RFID tags may be read by anyone, which means they may not just be read by their military owners but also the military’s enemy. The Department of Defense certainly recognizes this concern; the great amount of research on RFID does include research into better security, such as cryptographic methods.

Defense Industry Daily also states that the DoD has not been able to achieve widespread implementation of the technology because of its inability to demonstrate to the return on investment, arguing that “it does not uniformly collect information on both the costs and benefits associated with implementation.”

With increased research on RFID, the military and other industries will benefit from the improved efficiency and accuracy of this technology. Increased visibility of supplies means the warfighter will be better equipped—faster, more accurately, and at a lower cost than he previously was before.

A New Capability in Search of a Platform

Posted on January 3, 2011 | by SysAdmin

By Richard Weitz

01/02/2011 – Although the concept of a rail gun is not a novel idea, and has been considered by militaries and science fiction writers for decades, only in the last few years has the technology developed sufficiently to allow fiction to become fact. This progress became evident in December, when the Office of Naval Research (ONR) broke kinetic energy performance records with a test of its Electromagnetic Railgun (EMRG) laboratory launcher at its Naval Surface Warfare Division in Dahlgren, Virginia on December 10.

The widespread use of rail guns on modern-day big-gun dreadnaughts is still in the future. Despite its record-breaking qualities, the recent test had only half of the power that the Navy wants for a militarily effective rail gun. The Navy estimates that a rail gun might be tested at sea by 2018 and might begin appearing on operational warships by around 2025, providing the substantial technical and cost barriers can be overcome.

Nonetheless, rail guns could fundamentally transform how navies fight one another and how they provide ground support for their army, marine, and even air force colleagues.

A rail gun uses rapid electric pulses to create a magnetic field to shoot a projectile that accumulates sufficient kinetic energy through its flight path to obliterate anything it impacts. It consists of two long metal rails. The rail gun works by moving large quantities of electricity from one rail to the other through an armature that connects the two. When switched on, the current moves up one rail, across the armature or projectile, and down the other. The resulting magnetic field forces the armature down the rails and out of the gun at supersonic speeds, as much as seven times the speed of sound (Mach 7), or 2-3 times faster than a conventional ship gun. The projectile could be the armature itself or something attached to it.

(Credit: http://en.rian.ru/infographics/20101216/161806525.html)

These properties make rail guns safer in several ways. Since neither the projectile nor the firing of the gun itself require any explosive charges or chemicals, both the ship and the rail gun itself are safer to operate — and keep in port or sail through constricted maritime passages — than conventional weapons and missiles.

And the projectiles fired by rail guns would leave no unexploded ordinance or “duds” on the battlefield to be destroyed by troops later — or that, if unattended, would inflict casualties on local civilians for years to come. Finally, supply chain management becomes easier and safer with rail guns since logisticians need only handle inert projectiles rather than explosive warheads and propellants.

In the recent EMRG test, the projectile breached Mach 7 and carried a potential energy of 33 megajoules (MJ). A megajoule is a measurement of energy for a mass traveling at a certain velocity. One MJ is equivalent to the energy released when a one-ton vehicle rams into a wall at 100 miles/160 kilometers an hour. The EMRG laboratory entered into service in 2006. The previous record, also established by the Navy, was set in 2008, with a 10 MJ shot.

Another advantage of a rail gun is its extended range. These electromagnetic cannons can launch a projectile approximately 20 times further than the conventional cannons now in use. This extremely long range of the rail gun also enables ships to support ground operations that occur much farther inland than the existing conventional guns on vessels. The estimated range of a ship-mounted 33 MJ rail gun would be about 110 nautical miles at an impact speed of around Mach 5 (3,840 miles/6,180 kilometers per hour).

These figures mean that a projectile could obliterate a target located 100 miles away in six minutes, which is faster than a cruise missile, and with the same pinpoint accuracy thanks to GPS. The ONR wants a laboratory test to achieve a range of 200 miles and power of 64 MJ before attempting to construct a real prototype. The enhanced range a power would further decrease the ship’s vulnerability to adversaries’ potential access-denial strategies.

The use of rail guns for combat could prove to be a revolutionary weapon for a number of reasons, giving its operators unique capabilities. Thanks to their technologies, GPS and other support, rail guns can be extremely accurate.

As in the case of missiles, where their “circular error probable” is very important, higher accuracies can boost destructive power much more than increases in explosive yields. The Chief of Naval Research, Rear Admiral Nevin Carr, has remarked that, due to its high accuracy, “the gun could be aimed at a magazine on an enemy ship and ‘let his explosives be your explosives.’” Carr also wrote in his report on the test that “the high velocities achievable are tactically relevant for air and missile defense.”

One of the main goals behind the development of rail gun technology is to create a weapon that could provide close-fire support for friendly ground forces from a greater distance. Besides allowing the ship to cover a wider range of potential targets, the enhanced distance provides greater protection against anti-ship weapons. Furthermore, a ship-mounted rail gun could be directly used against enemy ships.

In theory, with much further technological progress, smaller rail guns could even be mounted on airplanes to provide a substitute for the stand-off capabilities now offered by air-launched ballistic and cruise missiles.

Some missile defense experts believe that rail guns could also shoot down ballistic missiles. For that reason, they were in the roster of weapons included in President Reagan’s “Star Wars” Strategic Defense Initiative.

Despite these revolutionary capabilities, the concept and design of rail guns date back to World War II. As with many modern weapons used by militaries today, the first and earliest design of rail guns were developed by German scientists and technicians during the Nazi era. The Soviets created a bureau to study the feasibility and potential design of such a project, but decided not to pursue it.

More recently, the Iraqi Survey Group discovered when it entered Iraq after the March 2003 war that Saddam Hussein’s regime had sought in the late 1990s to produce rail guns to create better antiaircraft weapons — presumably to challenge the various no-fly zones the coalition forces established after the 1991 Persian Gulf War — and be able to attack Israel with additional weapons besides the SCUD ballistic missiles. The fact that the same scientist in charge of Iraq’s rail gun research, Dr. Khalid Ibrahim Sa’id, also led Iraq’s pre-1991 nuclear weapons program has encouraged speculation that Iraq’s rail gun project was a cover to study and harness technology that was applicable to both rail guns and nuclear weapons. Regardless, Iraq was unable to develop either unconventional weapon.

Iraq’s motivation to develop rail guns may have been inspired by Russia. Iraq’s pursuit of rail gun technology began in 1993, after an Iraqi scientist returned from his studies in Russia and wrote a paper heavily advocating the development of rail guns. Russia’s research into rail gun technology began a century ago, but apparently never reached the level where its government sought to invest enough resources to develop the technology. The progress demonstrated by the U.S. Navy may reinvigorate Russian interest in electromagnetic weapons. The Chinese almost certainly will seek to develop these weapons.

Developing an effective and practical rail gun requires overcoming substantial technological and logistical challenges. For example, further advances are needed to develop improved cladding and compaction technologies to reduce the wear on rail gun barrels, which remains a persistent problem given the friction created by moving objects at such high speeds along the rails. The strong current will melt even the sturdiest materials in a couple of shots.

The ONR anticipates that the current laboratory gun could only be used 2-3 times before the rails would be destroyed by the rapid passage of the armature along them. But perhaps the most complex problem is that Congress has mandated that the next generation of Navy cruisers be nuclear powered, but utilizing nuclear power creates incompatibility issues with the electric transmission needed to energize a rail gun.

Furthermore, designing a platform from which a rail gun, which has the size of a bus, can be successfully mounted is difficult. Because of the nature of the rail gun and the need to utilize large amounts of space and electrical power, about the only mobile weapons platform that could carry an electronic rail gun would be a large warship.

In addition, the U.S. Navy must design a ship from the start to house and power a rail gun. Given the slow pace of U.S. Navy shipbuilding, this means that it could take decades before the entire fleet is equipped with rail guns.

Before assuming office, Under Secretary of the Navy Robert O. Work recommended that, “The Navy should immediately begin designing a new modular large battle network combatant (LBNC). The new combatant should have a spacious hull, with plenty of installed electric power (so as to employ future weapons such as electromagnetic rail guns and lasers), a modular combat system suite, room for a substantial VLS battery, and an ability to employ a variety of offboard systems.” Work calculated that these new combatant ships could be built for less than $2.5 billion per vessel.

Rail guns differ from directed-energy weapons (DEWs) like lasers, which destroy targets by transferring a concentrated beam of energy to the target. DEWs have a number of advantages over traditional projectile weapons such as missiles. For instance, since a laser beam travels at the speed of light, there is no need to compensate for target movement when firing over long distances. The lack of kinetic effects also allows for more precise targeting, which can minimize collateral damage.

As with rail guns, the Navy has assumed a lead role in deploying DEWs, but primarily as weapons for close air defense rather than long-distance power projection, and mainly as a complement rather than substitute for existing kinetic weapons, which for at least a while will remain more effective at attacking faster manned warplanes as well as ground-based targets.

The main problem with moving DEWs from the laboratory to the fleet has been their enormous energy requirements, the high temperatures they produce, and their delicate construction and maintenance. Modern Navy ships have enormous power-generation capacity, readily available coolant in the form of water, and typically sail with skilled maintenance crews in charge of well-integrated combat, communications, logistics, and other integrated systems.

It is perhaps no accident that supporters of the rail gun recommend integrating rail guns and DEWs on new ships. The Navy sees rapid-fire DEWs as especially useful in countering the growing threat of anti-ship missiles, high-speed small boat attacks, and other close-in threats.

And the longer-range of the rail gun will enable the ship to operate from much greater distances from these potential threats, reducing the quantity of threats the DEWs and other defensive ordinance will need to address as well as giving them more time to do so.

Finally, the high speed and accuracy of a rail gun could also allow them, with adequate targeting information, to destroy a hostile ship or plane at much greater distances than DEWs, potentially even while they are moving as well at stationed on base.

The Royal Navy’s new Type 45 destroyers are the first warships to employ electric transmission for their main full-speed propulsion. This electrical power source is more than compatible with rail gun requirements and can supply more than 40 megawatts of electricity. If a rail gun in its current proposed state were mounted on one of these ships, the electric power plant on the ship could recharge the gun in a mere second and a half after firing. The caveat is that at this firing rate, the ship would not be able to move or navigate as all power would be directed towards the rail gun. But if a rail gun dreadnought were constructed to the same size as the largest ship afloat, a U.S. Navy Nimitz-class carrier but with electric transmission rather than the Nimitz’ twin 550-megawatt nuclear reactors, it could in theory fire 15 Mach-7 projectiles every second while still moving (an important capability if the Chinese and others are able to develop anti-ship ballistic missiles).

Even so, the high costs of the large platforms required by rail guns could pose a greater barrier than the technical obstacles to their widespread use on Navy ships in coming years. (The gun complexes themselves are fairly inexpensive; the Navy has spent only $211 million so far on its rail gun demonstration project.)

The Pentagon has decided to cut back purchases of the multipurpose Zuwait-class DDG-1000 destroyers, which are potentially ideal platforms for rail guns. The U.S. Navy now plans to purchase only three such ships, which can better overcome increasingly lethal, land-based, maritime reconnaissance and strike systems than existing Navy ships.

But these kinds of large, modular surface combatants have copious hull and considerable electric power for DEWs and rail guns. The absence of expensive missiles and munitions could make rail guns and lasers more cost effective than many conventional warships. And the greater survivability and more effective striking power of ships armed with rail guns means that a fleet of such vessels could be smaller in number but more powerful in application.