Does China Have new Air to Air Missiles?

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US Air Force Seeking Interim CHAMP EMP Weapon Capability, New Air to Air Missiles

The US Air Force plans to introduce Boeing and Raytheon’s “CHAMP” high-power-microwave emitting cruise missile into the combat force on board the 1990s conventional air-launched cruise missile as an “interim capability” while the technology transitions to Lockheed Martin’s JASSM-ER.

Air Combat Command chief Gen Hawk Carlisle says the computer-killing capability, which knocks out electronic equipment with bursts of high-frequency electromagnetic energy, is a “great capability” that will be fielded in small numbers initially with US Global Strike Command – the air force’s nuclear combat force.

“We’ve talked about the transition of that capability for Global Strike Command, but that will probably be small numbers because what we really want to do is get CHAMP into next-generation missiles, so JASSM-ER,” Carlisle said at an Air Force Association event in Washington.


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In terms of air superiority weapons, Carlisle says the development of next-generation air-to-air missiles is also “an exceptionally high priority”.

Raytheon’s AMRAAM is the current go-to Western weapon for beyond-visual-range air combat, but new long-range missiles being fielded by Russia and China are a significant concern to the Pentagon.

Carlisle says outmatching the Chinese PL-15 air-to-air missile in particular is an “exceedingly high priority”.

“The PL-15 and the range of that missile, we’ve got to be able to out-stick that missile,” he says.

The air force is currently exploring a range of next-generation weapon concepts as it also pursues a sixth-generation fighter aircraft.

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Japan Revisits Slow Aircraft Capable Of Firing Huge AAMs

Almost 60 years ago, the U.S. Navy looked at replacing fleet-defense fighters with low-performance aircraft firing high-performance missiles. The program was canceled in 1960, replaced with development of aircraft that could do more than loiter and lob missiles at distant air targets. But now Japan, challenged with a numerically superior Chinese fighter force, is taking another look at the idea.

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I touched on the idea using Avenger drones as the carrier fleet air defense.  Amusingly, this was being considered for the A-12 Avenger II stealth bomber the US Navy cancelled. 

However, let's take it a few steps further and consider the FA-XX.

The US Navy has stated they will no longer be buying manned fighters after the F-35C.   Rather than a traditional fighter, we have a tactical combat controller.  Imagine instead an aircraft which is closer akin to the EA-6 Prowler.  It has a four seat cockpit, like the Prowler.  One seat in the aviator.  One is the electronic warfare/cyberwarfare officer.  Another two are drone operators, ahem, UCAV. 

It might be fast - to get in and out of a situation - and it might be stealthy so as to not compromise the stealthy UCAVs its working with.  However, its highly unlikely to be a highly maneuverable aircraft.  You're looking at a speculative 4 G turn max. It will have a long endurance and long range.  It may operate at high altitudes.  It will almost assuredly be under 80k lbs max take off weight.

As for armament, its likely to have a self defense laser much like the Avenger FD drone and an internal missile bay.  This will be for somewhere between six to eight long range missiles and probably four short range, smaller missiles which are the inheritor in spirit of the Sidewinder.  It might even have something crazy as a gun besides the laser.  Maybe something like an overgrown, 20mm EXACTO.

It might even have laser com links rather than radio for when its communicating with the UCAVs. 

There are likely to be a large number of sensors, many of them are likely to be passive.  I can see something like the ARGUS pod being standard and embedded in the skin of the aircraft.  For that matter, IR cameras as well.  The IRST and EOST capability is in constant use to track and ID everything around: target designation is done in software rather than painting the target.  Yes, there would still be a radar and possibly even a long range LIDAR. 

The point of all of this is the FA-XX may go zoom and be stealthy and be able to protect itself, but its really meant to be a long range command and control asset. 

As for what it looks like, I think irony might work best here.  The start point might look like Republic's TFX proposal, updated, stealthy and tailless.  Make the swing wings be longer and made from a radar transparent composite to allow for longer loiter time, but still swing them back to go zip away if things go pear shaped.

I may try a doodle.  I may not.

US Navy Tests SM-6 AAW Missile at White Sands Missile Range

The Navy’s Standard Missile is, as the bland name says, the Navy’s standard missile to defend the fleet against incoming strikes by enemy aircraft and anti-ship missiles. (Attacking enemy ships and ground targets is done by other missiles altogether). In recent years, though, the Raytheon-made missile has branched out. The standard Standard, the SM-2, is a straightforward fleet-defense weapon, with some capability to intercept targets over the land and even hit enemy ships. But the military is developing a long-range, high-altitude SM-3 variant to intercept ballistic missiles as they coast through space.

Then there’s the SM-6, first issued to the fleet last fall. “It’s the latest evolution of the Standard Missile family,” said Navy Cdr. Sidney Hodgson, the deputy program manager for the Standard series. (SM-4 and SM-5 never saw service). “It doesn’t replace the SM-2,” which will stay in service alongside the SM-6, he emphasized, but “it gives you increased firepower, it gives you extended range.”

To save costs, the Standard Missile Six is an unholy hybrid of the long-range rocket motor from the SM-3, the agile aerodynamic body of the SM-2, and the nose of an AMRAAM air-to-air missile, normally carried by fighter planes. It’s the borrowed AMRAAM components in particular that let the SM-6 pick out tricky targets like a cruise missile maneuvering at low altitude and low speed over land. Even in the desert, the land is never as smooth and flat as the sea, so a low-flying target can hide itself amidst the “ground clutter” of natural features — hills, rocks, buildings — that also show up on radar.

“What we were attempting to show was, [given] something that was subsonic, very low, could we discriminate and engage it?” said Raytheon’s senior program director for SM-6, Mike Campisi. “It was wonderful to see.”

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US Navy Testing Over the Horizon Air Defense Systems

The Navy is preparing for another test of a new cruise missile defense system that can identify and destroy threats from beyond the radar horizon, Lockheed officials said.

The system, called Naval Integrated Fire Control – Counter Air, or NIFC-CA, uses a Standard Missile 6 and an airborne sensor to track and destroy approaching cruise missiles at much longer distances than existing technologies can.

“The NIFC-CA capability pushes out the engagement envelope that these ships have not had previously. You are pushing the engagement envelope beyond the radar horizon,” said Jim Sheridan, director of Aegis U.S. Navy programs at Lockheed Martin. “There’s an airborne sensor that’s involved. Once the missile leaves the ship you are actually firing it at something that the ship itself cannot see because the engagement takes place beyond the horizon.”

The test is slated for this coming June aboard the USS John Paul Jones, DDG 53. The first test firing, which involved a successful demonstration of the defensive technology, took place last August aboard a Navy cruiser — the USS Chancellorsville, CG62.

“This is the next step in the testing. Previously it was tested from a cruiser configuration and now we’re testing it in a destroyer configuration. Some of the parameters of the target and the flight profile are a little different. Let’s just characterize it as a more stressful test than the one on board the USS Chancellorsville,” Sheridan added.

The SM6 interceptor missile uses an active seeker to zero in on an approaching target at distances greater than a ship’s on-board sensors can detect. Sheridan said the SM6 used for NIFC-CA leverages technology similar to the active guidance system engineered into an air-to-air beyond visual range missile, the AIM-120 Advanced-Air-to-Air Medium Range Missile.

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Turkey to Start Next Gen Air Defense Ship Program in 2H2014

Turkey expects to pick up the pace on its next-generation TF-2000 anti-air warfare frigate programme in the second half of 2014 with the launch of Phase 1 design studies.

Progress on the programme has been effectively stalled since a feasibility study for TF-2000 was completed by the Defence Industries Undersecretariat (SSM) in 2010. However, Mustafa Seker, head of the SSM's naval systems department, told IHS Jane's that the design process was now set to move forward following a long-awaited green light from the SSM's executive committee in late 2013.

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