AIDEWS For Nearly Everyone

AIDEWS For Nearly Everyone

January 26, 2012: so far, nearly 200 of the American ALQ-211 AIDEWS (Advanced Integrated Defensive Electronic Warfare Suite) pods have been sold to six foreign customers. Most use it for their F-16 fighters. The ALQ-211 allows the aircraft to detect radar, jamming, and laser signals hitting the aircraft, as well as the presence of chemical weapons. ALQ-211 also provides some jamming of its own and assistance on where the signal is coming from, so the pilot can move the aircraft away from the threat. ALQ-211 is also installed in helicopters but not as a pod. Rather, the individual components are installed in the helicopter where space is available.

The ALQ-211 has been in service for a decade and there have been several upgrades and variants. Foreign customers do not get an ALQ-211 with the same capabilities that American aircraft receive. Components of ALQ-211 are programmable, so that the system can quickly be updated for newly discovered enemy equipment. The pod version, the ALQ-211(V)9 (version 9), costs about $3.5 million each.

MICA Reaches Out

MICA Reaches Out

January 12, 2012: India has ordered 500 French MICA long range (80 kilometers) radar guided missiles for its 51 French Mirage 200 fighters. The 112 kg (247 pound) MICA costs about $700,000 each and is similar to the U.S. AMRAAM.

India is upgrading its Mirage 2000 fighters, at a cost of $35 million each, so they can handle the MICA. The aircraft are getting new radar and fire control systems, as well as modern electronic warfare systems and digital communications. Other components (like the airframe and engines) would also be refurbished. After the upgrade, the twenty year old Mirage 2000s would be good for another twenty. While expensive, the upgrade would turn the Mirage 2000 fighters into long range air-to-air killers. These aircraft could very efficiently knock down their Pakistani or Chinese opponents (which are equipped with less capable Chinese FD-60 long range missiles).

Roll On Knowledge

Roll On Knowledge

January 4, 2012: The U.S. Air Force has taken a U.S. Marine Corps idea for an "instant gunship" and developed an "instant reconnaissance aircraft" along the same lines. The "instant gunship" is known as "Harvest Hawk" and it's a system that enables weapons and sensors to be quickly rolled into a C-130 transport and hooked up. This takes a few hours, and turns the C-130 into a gunship (similar in capabilities existing AC-130 gunships). The sensor package consists of day/night vidcams with magnification capability. The weapons currently consist of ten Griffin missiles and four Hellfires. These are lightweight missiles, so more can be carried.

The "instant reconnaissance aircraft" is known as "Senior Scout" and it quickly equips a C-130 with equipment that enables the transport to collect visual and electronic data from areas it flies over. On the larger C-130J, this leaves room for the aircraft to carry passengers and cargo as well as Senior Scout. This means that a C-130J that regularly makes trips between two bases, can just as regularly carry out surveillance on the ground below. The route the C-130J follows on these cargo runs can be modified a bit to suit intelligence needs on the ground.

Harvest Hawk enables marine KC-130J tankers to be transformed into gunships with the addition of the portable weapons and sensors. The marines had long noted the success of the U.S. Air Force AC-130 gunships that SOCOM (Special Operations Command) uses. But they couldn't afford them, as an AC-130 costs more than three times as much as a marine KC-130J aerial refueling aircraft. But the marines developed a solution. This is something the marines often do.

The KC-130J is the latest, and largest, USMC version of the C-130 transport used for aerial refueling. The KC-130J can also carry cargo, and weapons (bombs and missiles) hung from the wings; thus the Harvest Hawk version of the KC-130J.

The big thing with gunships is their sensors, not their weapons. Operating at night, the gunships can see what is going on below, in great detail. Using onboard weapons, gunships can immediately engage targets. But with the appearance of smart bombs (GPS and laser guided), aerial weapons are more available to hit any target that is found. So Harvest Hawk would be able to hit targets that were "time sensitive" (had to be hit before they got away), but could also call on smart bombs or laser guided missiles for targets that weren't going anywhere right away. Most of what Harvest Hawk does in Afghanistan is look for roadside bombs, or the guys who plant them. These marines want to track back to their base, and then take out an entire roadside bomb operation.

Ultimately, the air force and SOCOM saw the potential for the Harvest Hawk approach replacing custom built AC-130 gunships. There would still be a need for specially trained gunship crews. But they, and the several cargo containers of Harvest Hawk gear, could be held ready to go wherever they are most needed. SOCOM will be using their version of Harvest Hawk (the Precision Strike Package) in their MC-130 transports (which are already equipped for all-weather operations.)

The success of Harvest Hawk has got the air force considering other "ro/ro" (roll on/roll off) applications, thus saving the cost of custom aircraft for many jobs, and providing more opportunities to use specialized aircraft.

The Unstoppable Carl GustavJ

The Unstoppable Carl Gustav

January 1, 2012: After two decades of resisting calls from the troops for the Swedish 84mm Carl Gustav portable recoilless rifle, the U.S. Army has relented and ordered about a hundred Carl Gustav launchers. After watching U.S. Army Special Forces use this weapon in Afghanistan and Iraq for the last decade, the army brass reconsidered. This weapon has been around for over 60 years and is used by several dozen countries. It is simple but very effective.

The Carl Gustav was adopted by SOCOM (first for the Ranger Regiment) in 1990. The Carl Gustav is basically a lightweight 8.5 kg (19 pound) recoilless rifle. It is 1.1 meters (3.6 feet) long. The barrel is rifled and good for about a hundred rounds. Range is 500-700 meters (depending on the type of round fired). The 84mm projectiles weigh about 2 kg (4.4 pounds) each and come in several different types (anti-armor, combined anti-armor/high explosive, illumination, and smoke.) The anti-armor round is very useful in urban areas and against bunkers.

The army had earlier adopted the single shot version of the Carl Gustav (as the AT4), but the Special Forces showed that the Carl Gustav is better because you get more shots for less weight (the AT4 weighs about 6.8 kg each). It's easier to carry one Carl Gustav, at 8.5 kg, and a bunch of rocket propelled shells at about 2.2 kg (5 pounds, with packaging) each.