Deep Learning Model Speeds Up, Automates Satellite Image Analysis

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  16 octobre 2018 | International, C4ISR

  Army looking for software, not hardware for electronic warfare

  By: Mark Pomerleau Army leaders say they are looking for more software-centric solutions that would more quickly detect and understand signals in the electromagnetic spectrum, a move away from traditional hardware solutions that perform the same task. In the electronic warfare space, some nations, such as Russia and China, have been able to take advantage of advancements in software capabilities that allow them to rapidly changes signals and signatures, which makes defense and signal classification more difficult. As a result,“we're trying to get away from a hardware solution and go to more of a software solution so that way as that threat evolves we're able to more quickly address it,” Col. Kevin Finch, program manager for Electronic Warfare and Cyber at Program Executive Office Intelligence, Electronic Warfare and Sensors, told C4SIRNET sister site Defense News in an interview during the AUSA annual meeting in early October. “That's been one of our main thrusts.” Nations such as China are “masters of changing their signals,” Jerry Parker, senior vice president of C4ISR and electronic warfare at defense contractor CACI, said at the same conference. “Every day we're seeing new [radio frequency] signatures coming from them for a myriad of things, whether it's a new RF link for communications, a new RF link for controlling [an unmanned aircraft system],” he said. Parker said CACI wants to develop a more open architecture system for the government and other contractors to be able to create their own software based capabilities. This is similar to the iPhone model in which a single hardware box can host a variety of software applications developed my numerous third party organizations. This way, Parker said, companies and the government don't have to build a new platform every time a new signal emerges. https://www.c4isrnet.com/electronic-warfare/2018/10/15/army-looking-for-software-not-hardware-for-electronic-warfare

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  3 juin 2020 | International, Aérospatial

  SOCOM Multi-Mission Plane Competition Heats Up

  SOCOM has budgeted $106 million in 2021 to buy the first five of up to 75 Armed Overwatch aircraft to perform close air support for its troops on the ground, light attack and ISR missions. The planes would replace Air Force Special Operations Command current fleet of U-28 Draco aircraft. By THERESA HITCHENSon June 02, 2020 at 8:01 AM WASHINGTON: Given the fact that the global market for trainers is flat at best, and practically non-existent for light attack aircraft, the competition for Special Operations Command's upcoming Armed Overwatch buy is likely to be fierce. “75 planes is a lot in this market,” Richard Aboulafia, aviation analyst at Teal Group, told Breaking D. SOCOM has budgeted $106 million in 2021 to buy the first five of up to 75 Armed Overwatch aircraft to perform close air support for its troops on the ground, light attack and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) missions. The planes would replace Air Force Special Operations Command's current fleet of U-28 Draco aircraft. Indeed, Teal Group's January 2020 market analysis on trainers (not including supersonic aircraft) and light attack aircraft finds the total market worth only about $2 billion, compared to up to $30 billion for fighter jets. “Having SOCOM do this with 75 planes to train with less capable allied forces almost makes sense, compared with the totally absurd idea of the Air Force buying hundreds as part of their force structure,” Aboulafia said. He was referencing the Air Force's on-again, off-again romance with the concept of buying up to 300 so-called Light Attack Aircraft to use for training, for close air support by Air Force Special Operations Command, and as strike aircraft for US allies involved in insurgencies such as Afghanistan and Lebanon. After almost a decade of dithering, the service finally in February made a final determination to buy only two each of the Textron/Beechcraft AT-6 Wolverine and the Sierra Nevada-Embraer A-29 Tucanos for continued experimentation. SOCOM officials have stressed that the commands requirements are slightly different than those of the Air Force, focused more on mission capabilities than aircraft design. “Armed Overwatch addresses our requirement for a close air support and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capability that can operate in austere, short take-off and landing environments with minimal manning, infrastructure and sustainment,” Lt. Cmdr. Timothy Hawkins, a SOCOM spokesperson, told Breaking D. And while at least one vendor expressed concerns about speaking with the press due to guidance issued to industry by SOCOM, Hawkins said the guidance used standard language asking vendors not to speak about SOCOM's articulated needs with the goal of protecting ‘controlled unclassified' information. The program is slated to hold a prototype demonstration in November or December — a date that may slip, however, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. At least four aircraft manufacturing teams have confirmed participation in the contest: Sierra Nevada-Embraer; Textron Aviation Defense; Air Tractor; and Leidos. In an May 18 interview with Breaking D, Textron Aviation Defense's Vice President of Defense Strategy and Sales Brett Pierson stressed the fact that the Beechcraft AT-6E has already shown that it can perform the multiple missions envisioned by SOCOM by virtue of its participation in the Air Force's Light Attack Experiment over the last several years. “It already has the capability to do the kind of missions that SOCOM talks about,” he said. The AT-6 has proven its chops in austere environments, Pierson said, both in landing on unprepared runways, and in the ability to rapidly refuel and re-arm. “During Light Attack Experiment, one of the things we demonstrated was the ability to have pilots refuel the airplane, re-arm rockets, do a quick turnaround and take back off again,” he said. In addition, Pierson pointed out, Textron Aviation Defense has customers all over the world , giving it an established supply chain, as well as manufacturing capability. According to a company fact sheet provided to Breaking D, the AT-6 has “85 percent parts commonality with the T-6” trainer, which “yields low risk, low cost sustainment, world-wide logistics, and low-footprint maintenance.” On the other hand, newcomer to the competition Leidos argues that its new Bronco II has the advantage of being designed specifically with the SOCOM mission in mind. Leidos is partnering on Bronco II with the US arm of South African defense conglomerate Paramount Group (which manufactures the Mwari light reconnaissance aircraft), and aftermarket service provider Vertex Aerospace, based in Mississippi. And the fact that the Bronco II is a prototype means its specifications can be altered more easily to fit exactly what the customer might desire, Richard Jackson, Leidos VP for Business Development & Strategy Airborne Solutions, Defense, told Breaking D in a May 19 interview. “It allows SOCOM, from our perspective, to have greater flexibility in influencing the future of how the aircraft evolves,” he said. The aircraft design is optimized to meet SOCOM's multi-mission profile, Jackson stressed, using modern, modular design approaches and open standards that ensure future subsystem upgrades are easily accomplished. It also has an “interchangeable conformal mission bay” that allows payloads to be rapidly swapped out by a couple of operators “in hours, not days.” “Multi-mission is key word here,” he said. “It can do the surveillance and combat support and combat attack role simultaneously. That is something that SOCOM has touted and is not easily done.” The Bronco II is built specifically to operate in austere environments, he said. For example, it can be rapidly broken down for transport — with one deconstructed aircraft fitting on a C-130 and two fitting in a C-17. “It was designed from a clean sheet,” Jackson said, “purpose built for austere environments. That's something that no other company can say.” Neither Sierra Nevada-Embraer or Air Tractor were available for comment. The A-29 turboprop not only has been involved in the Air Force's Light Attack Experiment, but also used in combat by Afghanistan's air force in the fight against the Taliban. And on April 17, the Sierra Nevada/Embraer team announced that it has successfully flight tested the first of 12 A-29s being built for the Nigerian air force. Air Tractor had offered, with partner L3, the AT-802L Longsword back in 2017 during Phase 1 of the Light Attack Aircraft experiment, but lost out to the AT-6 and A-29 — with Air Force officials citing lack of an ejection seat as a factor. (Air Tractor last November filed a bid protest with the Government Accountability Office that was subsequently dismissed.) Air Tractor's website now touts the multi-mission AT-802U, which the firm says can support ISR, signals intelligence, border/maritime patrol and remote supply/transport missions. https://breakingdefense.com/2020/06/socom-multi-mission-plane-competition-heats-up

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  6 mai 2020 | International, Aérospatial

  Expand missile defenses during the pandemic, don’t cut them

  By: Rebeccah L. Heinrichs Rogue states are taking advantage of the American preoccupation with the COVID-19 pandemic. North Korea may test another long-range missile according to the head of U.S. Northern Command, Gen. Terrence O'Shaughnessy. He warned Congress in March that the North Korean regime is still a serious threat and is improving its missile program. And last week, Iran's Revolutionary Guard successfully launched a satellite into space. This was the first for the terrorist paramilitary group, though not the first for the regime. The pandemic is likely to prompt Congress to reassess, cut and redirect spending, but safeguarding the American people from missile attack is an essential service the government cannot afford to scale back. Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Rob Soofer said at a recent Hudson Institute event: “[T]oday we are in an advantageous position vis-a-vis North Korea. Forty-four ground-based interceptors. Gen. O'Shaughnessy has complete confidence that the system will work and we can address the threat. Then the question is: Can we wait until 2028?” The Trump administration intends to deploy in 2028 the Next Generation Interceptor, or NGI, meant to handle far more complicated missile threats than what the Ground-based Midcourse Defense, or GMD, system was initially designed to do. Still, as Dr. Soofer explained, threats develop at an unpredictable pace, and so the Pentagon is pushing for initiatives to bolster defense in the meantime. Those initiatives will require serious bipartisan cooperation while concurrently developing the NGI and pursuing other advanced capabilities meant to dramatically increase the ability of the missile defense architecture. It's a tall order, but critical, nonetheless. First, and to be clear, the Pentagon has not yet embraced this step due to its determination to focus on NGI. But Congress should invest in more than just sustaining the current GMD system; it should improve it by adding 20 GBIs to the already fielded 44. The silos will be prepared for the additional numbers since, in 2017, President Donald Trump called for adding more deployed GBIs considering the heightened North Korea missile threat. The Pentagon began work on preparing for their delivery but never emplaced GBIs into those silos because Pentagon officials canceled the Redesigned Kill Vehicle. The Pentagon had anticipated the Redesigned Kill Vehicle for the nation's new GBIs. After evaluating the resources and time it would take to restart the production line of the Capability Enhancement II interceptors or to rapidly develop an improved kill vehicle that leverages new technology, the Pentagon should choose the most cost-effective solution. Recall, the Capability Enhancement II was the kill vehicle that performed well in the last complex flight test, which was the first salvo engagement of a threat-representative intercontinental ballistic missile target by GBIs. Regardless of the option the Pentagon would choose, the result would be a near-term enhanced capability by either increased capacity at a minimum, or an increased capacity with improved kill vehicles on 20 of the 64 at best. Either would be a much better scenario than keeping the backbone of homeland defenses stagnant while we anticipate the NGI in 2028. But that is not all the country should do. It should also move forward with steps the Pentagon has embraced. Those steps include improving the discrimination radar capability in the next few years so GMD can better detect and characterize the evolving threat, and deploying other existing systems to bolster GMD. Utilizing current systems with impressive testing records against missiles shorter than ICBM range as part of a layered homeland defense is called the “underlay.” As a key component of the underlay, Congress has directed the Pentagon to test the Aegis SM-3 IIA interceptor against an ICBM target. Unfortunately, because of the pandemic, the Missile Defense Agency's planned flight tests will be delayed, including for the SM-3 IIA. The threats facing the country will not wait for the end of the pandemic, and the Pentagon should reconsider that delay. As soon as the country can test the system, and if it is a success, it would be wise to prepare to deploy Aegis SM-3 IIA as the threat requires. If there is an ICBM attack against the U.S. homeland, a GBI would have the first shot at the incoming missile while it's in its midcourse phase of flight; and if an enemy missile gets through, and the Aegis SM-3 IIA is positioned correctly, it could have another shot at the missile as it begins its descent. There has been some concern about whether Russia or China have legitimate claims that bolstering homeland defense in this way is destabilizing. But no evidence supports these claims, and, as Dr. Jim Miller, an Obama-era undersecretary of defense for policy, said at a recent Hudson event: “We cannot and must not give Russia or China a veto over the United States' ability to defend ourselves from North Korea and Iran. That is an absolute no-go for any administration.” Another system that is a natural candidate for the underlay is the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense air defense system. Embracing that concept as well, Dr. Miller said: “It makes sense for certain contexts. And if you're looking at a shorter-range missile and a relatively small footprint of coverage, THAAD has a real chance to contribute in that. To me, that's certainly the case for Guam and Hawaii.” But what about cost? That's the $10 billion question — a question that happens to be valued at more than the current president's budget requires for the Missile Defense Agency. The budget request that Congress is currently considering for the MDA is roughly $9.2 billion, noticeably less than previous years, even as the role of missile defense is supposed to be expanding in the country's National Security Strategy. There is no margin for cutting the budget. Congress should rally around this mission and budget, and it should increase funding to sufficiently make these necessary improvements in the near term without paying for them by sacrificing investments like NGI for the not-so-distant future. It can do that without tipping the scale much more than $10 billion this year. That is eminently reasonable given the pressure every government department will feel after the sudden spending splurge due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Rebeccah L. Heinrichs is a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute where she specializes in nuclear deterrence and missile defense. https://www.defensenews.com/opinion/commentary/2020/05/05/expand-missile-defenses-during-the-pandemic-dont-cut-them/