Non-Subscriber Extract
Prototype technologies could be useful for strikes
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| 21 September 2001 |
By Nick Cook, JDW Aerospace Consultant, London
Many analysts agree that if the USA is to gain the initiative in what US officials describe as a different kind of conflict, it will have to leverage a number of technologies that are still in their infancy, but which offer a high potential pay-off.
By far the most critical of these are the platforms, systems and associated doctrines that have emerged since the 1990-91 Gulf War aimed at drastically reducing 'sensor-to-shooter' times, the lag between detection of a ground target and its attack by combat aircraft armed with precision bombs or stand off missiles.
Since the late 1990s, the US Air Force and US Navy (USN) have been improving their sensor-to-shooter capabilities, the former in the annual Joint Expeditionary Force Experiment (JEFX), centred on the southwest USA. The latter has concentrated on a converted Lockheed NP-3 equipped with air-to-ground sensors and data-links codenamed 'Hairy Buffalo' (Jane's Defence Weekly 12 September).
In a series of tests, the USN has demonstrated the NP-3's capacity to reduce sensor-to-shooter times towards the 10-minute threshold called for by planners in their remit to find and destroy mobile ballistic missile launchers and so-called 'double-digit' Russian-made surface-to-air missile systems like the SA-10/12.
While Afghanistan's Taliban regime is known to possess a handful of 'Scud' launchers, the greater concern of US and allied military planners is tracking the movement of terrorist groups in the rugged terrain of the region. For this, they are likely to call on another technology in its infancy, the unmanned air vehicle (UAV), as well as more traditional manned reconnaissance platforms.
In a reflection of the 1991 campaign to find and destroy Iraqi 'Scud' launchers - the 10-minute window is critical for aligning and calibrating a missile before firing - UAVs like the General Atomics Predator and the Northrop Grumman Global Hawk will need to transmit intelligence on any terrorist targets they locate quickly.
While the medium-altitude Predator is already geared towards monitoring troop movements and would adapt easily to this role, provided the Bush administration can secure the necessary basing arrangements in neighbouring Pakistan, Global Hawk's existing sensor architecture is aimed mainly at imaging fixed targets. Its great advantage, however, is its ability to fly high for long periods and patrol largely unseen.
Working with stand off reconnaissance assets like the EC-135 Rivet Joint signals intelligence platform and the E-8D Joint STARS battlefield surveillance aircraft, Global Hawk would be able to fly deep into hostile territory and scan otherwise impenetrable terrain for terrorist activity. Through JEFX, the ability of UAVs to network their synthetic-aperture radar and electro-optic imagery with intelligence from Joint STARS and Rivet Joint has been successfully demonstrated. The 'fused' data, which offers a highly accurate picture of target locations, is transmitted within seconds to patrolling combat aircraft.