DÉFENSE Les Armées détaillent la feuille de route du porte-avions de nouvelle génération (PANG) La coque du futur porte-avions de nouvelle génération (PANG) sera construite et assemblée de 2031 à 2034, avant les essais en mer en 2036 et l'entrée en se

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  9 mai 2019 | International, Aérospatial

  Smart drones to command and launch smarter missiles

  By: Kelsey D. Atherton The future of war is a synergy in euphemisms, launched as a co-branding event. AeroVironment — maker of missile systems, including the one-way guided flying “switchblade” missile — announced May 7 that it is partnering with Kratos, maker of target and combat drones. The desired effect is cheap but smart drones to launch cheaper but smart missiles. It's an attempt at answering a question that has plagued the United States since the dawn of the jet age: As the costs of piloted craft go up, can anything be done to restore a numerical advantage in the sky? “AeroVironment tube-launched small unmanned aircraft and tactical missile systems to be integrated with Kratos high-speed, low-cost attritable drones to dramatically enhance situational awareness and system effectiveness,” reads the announcement. Switchblade is tube-launched, and it flies like a small unmanned aircraft up until the point where it hits its target and explodes. “Tactical missile system” is the formal term, though it's also known as a kamikaze drone or a suicide drone. Its flight time is too short to lump it in with the larger category of “loitering munitions,” but they're kindred spirits in function. As sensors got cheap and powerful and small, smart missiles with drone-like navigation systems became possible. The high-speed low-cost attritable drone made by Kratos is the Mako, an adaptation of the company's BQM-167 Aerial Target. Like the roughly $900,000 apiece target it's based upon, the Mako is designed to be cheap enough that it can be fielded in numbers and replaced without straining the Pentagon's budget. (In 2017, the combat-capable Mako was pitched as costing between $1.5 million and $2 million each. Not cheap in most senses, but relative to the going rate for a fifth-generation fighter, it's a bargain.) Taken together, the Switchblade and the Mako could be “attritable aerial assets,” flying things that are useful, but not so expensive that losing them drastically alters the ability of commanders to direct fights or of pilots to win them. Cheap and flying alone doesn't win much on its own; the craft have to prove that they can actually perform the tasks assigned them. Here, here is that crucial synergy. Kratos and AeroVironment are working together to see if the Mako can launch, communicate with and control Switchblades. The larger drone would serve as a node in a network between a human and the airborne munition. The exact location of control, between the drone and the flying munitions and the human directing them, is unclear. Would the Switchblades seek targets based on what the Mako's sensors could spot? Would that information get relayed to the human controller in time to approve of or call off the strike? These are questions that can be answered in the course of a development. If the combination of drone mothership and munition wingmates works, it could reduce the overall material cost of conducting an airstrike, while likely leaving unchanged the potential human toll. https://www.c4isrnet.com/unmanned/2019/05/08/smart-drones-to-command-and-launch-smarter-missiles

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  5 novembre 2020 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité

  US Army’s tactical network modernization team requests industry pitches for future capabilities

  Andrew Eversden WASHINGTON — The U.S. Army's Network Cross-Functional Team released a solicitation outlining capabilities it's interested in acquiring as part of future tactical network tools. The broad agency announcement was posted last week on beta.sam.gov. It lays out future research areas the Army's tactical network modernization team made up of the NetworkCFT and Program Executive Office Command, Control, Communications-Tactical, wants to explore as part of future capability sets — new network tools it's delivering every two years. “The Network-CFT is focused on integration of tactical network efforts and ensures disciplined innovation as it works with speed and precision,” the announcement read. “The Network-CFT is conducting experimentations and demonstrations of proven joint and special operations solutions, commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) technology, and Non-developmental items (NDIs) with operational units to inform future requirements.” The tactical network modernization team is seeking technology that aligns with its four lines of effort for upgrading the network: unified network; common operating environment; joint interoperability/coalition accessible; and command post mobility and survivability. All proposed technologies must be at a technology readiness level of six, the announcement read, meaning they're ready to be demonstrated as a prototype in an environment similar to the field. For the unified network effort, the Network CFT-PEO C3T team are seeking “available, reliable and resilient network that ensures seamless connectivity in any operationally contested environment.” Capability Set '23, the next iteration of tactical network tools, is focused on increasing network capacity and reducing latency. Unified network includes capabilities such as advanced waveforms to improve resiliency. The common operating environment line of effort “is interested in the means of ensuring a simple and intuitive single-mission command suite that is easily operated and maintained by Soldier.” The joint interoperability/coalition accessible team is looking for tools that can “more effectively” interact, both technically and operationally, with joint and coalition partners. The final line of effort, command post mobility and survivability, is interested in means of improving the “deployability, reliability, mobility and survivability” of command posts. The Army's current vision for future command posts are those that can be quickly set up and torn down, while also having low electromagnetic signatures to avoid detection by adversaries. “Certainly, any time that you adopt a lot of commercial technologies you start to look at how your signature is on the battlespace, so I really look to industry and how they can bring some of their best ideas and technologies for how we can potentially do spectrum obscuration, as well as decoys so we can minimize our footprint on the battlefield,” said Brig. Gen. Rob Collins, commanding general of PEO C3T. The Army's announcement is valid through the end of October 2025. https://www.c4isrnet.com/battlefield-tech/it-networks/2020/11/04/us-armys-tactical-network-modernization-team-requests-industry-pitches-for-future-capabilities/

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  21 juin 2019 | International, Aérospatial

  Typhoon’s 'Digital Stealth' Can Evolve To Meet Changing Threat

  by Jon Lake Mark Hewer, Leonardo's v-p for the Integrated Mission Solutions Business Area, believes that the company's open/reprogrammable electronic warfare (EW) suite for the Typhoon represents what he calls “digital stealth.” This will confer a high degree of survivability, even in a threat environment whose lethality is growing exponentially, with the emergence of a plethora of high-end, software reprogrammable, multi-spectral threats, including surface-to-air missile systems. These threat systems are being updated more regularly and are frequently networked, allowing them to share intelligence of the air situation. EW systems are able to evolve to deal with this dynamic and rapidly changing threat, in a way that fifth-generation stealthy aircraft cannot. While stealth aircraft are hard to detect, they are not invisible, and counter-stealth technology is developing rapidly. Moreover, the skin, internal structure, and configuration of an aircraft cannot be easily altered. “You cannot easily modify a stealth platform to counter new high-end threats,” Hewer said. Typhoon's EW capabilities are provided by Leonardo's Praetorian Defensive Aids Sub-System (DASS), which incorporates an onboard podded ECM system and off-board ECM, with a towed radar decoy, as well as missile approach, laser, and radar warning systems and a flare and countermeasures dispensing system. These systems will soon be augmented by the new BriteCloud, an active, highly programmable Digital RF Memory (DRFM) decoy that will allow the Typhoon pilot to better counter the highest-end threats. BriteCloud will give a discriminatory capability that is not on any other platform, providing a world-leading expendable active decoy capability on the Typhoon that none of its rivals will have. The MoD's Desidermagazine has predicted that initial operational capability on Typhoon will be declared in late 2019. Arguably more important than the performance of the individual hardware elements within Typhoon's DASS is their ability to be reprogrammed. “What is really important for the high-end customer buying Typhoon is that their EW system is highly programmable,” Hewer said. “There's no point in directing your ECM if it is going to be ineffective against a threat because you're not exploiting its vulnerabilities.” The Typhoon's EW system is undergoing continuous evolution, with regular upgrades to the hardware and a spiral software development process, but the most important factor is getting the right threat intelligence or “mission data” into the system. This is used to interpret the information that the sensors receive, and drives the behavior of the EW system. Mission success will often depend on having the most up-to-date data set to ensure relevance to the environment. This makes the rapidity of the upgrade cycle of paramount importance. Leonardo believes that many customers want a sustainable sovereign mission data capability, and it can offer to provide this as a service or as a fully tailored sovereign solution. The company can help customers to set up a national EW database or an aircraft specific database and has a suite of software tools available to customers. While F-35 naturally incorporates advanced EW systems, there is still a very heavy reliance on the U.S. for mission support, with a relatively cumbersome mission data cycle. Hewer believes that Typhoon is “many years more mature in its operational use of programming for EW.” While Leonardo's emphasis is currently on highlighting its ability to produce robust and agile high-end sovereign mission data generation capabilities for customers, the company is already looking to the future. Greater automation and machine learning promise a solution to the increasing complexity of the threat environment, and the company is also looking at the potential for sharing information across platforms as well as the possibility of reprogramming an EW system in flight. https://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/defense/2019-06-19/typhoons-digital-stealth-can-evolve-meet-changing-threat