16 décembre 2021 | International, Aérospatial
Public-private team in Turkey unveils drone with laser gun
The Eren was on display at the Konya Science Festival this month.
2 octobre 2020 | International, C4ISR
WASHINGTON — In what some observers might view as back to the future, the U.S. Army is altering the way it fights to keep up with sophisticated adversaries, which means shifting from the brigade-centered focus of the last decade to bringing the division and corps levels into the fold.
As a result, new capabilities are under development to increase range, fight deeper and bolster presence on the nonphysical battlefield, such as the electromagnetic spectrum.
Officials said a fight against a nation-state like Russia or China must begin at the corps level, where the focus is destroying high-priority systems to lay the groundwork for lower echelons. They added that the corps level must eliminate these targets first, passing them to the lower echelons to include division and brigade, which are both designed for a closer fight to move the enemy back.
“We have got to be able to see deep. If we don't have the ability to sense at the corps level, really what we're doing is we're deferring that fight down to the brigade level,” Col. Clint Tracy, III Corps cyber and electromagnetic activities chief, said during a Sept. 29 virtual panel hosted by the Association of Old Crows. “If we build the other way up, from the brigades to corps ... they may not necessarily be equipped without additional enablers to kill those things in the battlespace.”
Enter what officials are calling the Terrestrial Layer System-Echelons Above Brigade, or TLS-EAB, formerly referred to as TLS-Extended Range.
Army leaders this week detailed the first initial notional concepts and timeline for the new capability, which will be mainly a division and corps asset capable of reaching and prosecuting targets that the TLS system at the brigade combat team level cannot.
“TLS-EAB is intended to provide commanders at echelons above brigade the ability to sense, provide improved precision geolocation, conduct non-kinetic fires and support kinetic targeting for a broad coverage of targets ... [that] are unreachable by TLS at BCT,” Col. Jennifer McAfee, Army capability manager for terrestrial layer and identity, said during the same event. TLS-BCT, or Terrestrial Layer System-Brigade Combat Team, is the Army's first brigade-focused, integrated signals intelligence, electronic warfare and cyber platform.
“TLS-EAB also provides defensive electronic attack to protect our critical nodes, i.e., our command posts and other critical nodes vulnerable to the adversary's precision fires,” McAfee added.
She also said TLS-EAB will address several gaps in large-scale combat operations to include deep sensing to help target enemy systems in anti-access/area denial environments, and to conduct reconnaissance and security at long ranges.
It will also provide capabilities for signals intelligence and electronic warfare teams within the Multidomain Task Force's Intelligence, Information, Cyber, Electronic Warfare and Space (I2CEWS) battalion, as well as signals intelligence and electronic warfare battalions at the division and corps levels.
How is TLS-EAB different from existing capabilities?
The key difference between TLS-EAB and other electronic warfare, intelligence and cyber platforms — both airborne or ground-based — is that the former protects static assets from enemy missiles and unmanned systems that use radar fusing and homing.
Officials said the new system will be broken into two broad threat categories: the aforementioned protection against precision-guided munitions dependent on the electromagnetic spectrum; and theater, corps and division targets to include ISR, command and control, low- and mid-altitude beyond-line-of-sight comminutions, navigation, and air and ground radars.
The service will achieve these effects through advanced electronic attack techniques, radio frequency-delivered cyber effects, military information support operations (formerly called psychological operations), and the deception of adversary sensors.
More granularly, TLS-EAB will be broken into two subsystems for those two missions: one for long-range collection, electronic support and effects; and one for defensive electronic attack. Each will include a trailer attached to the eventual vehicle the Army determines for TLS-EAB.
While a specific platform hasn't specifically been identified for TLS-EAB, officials said they are eyeing something wheeled from the family of medium tactical vehicles.
Interoperability and long range
Moreover, the system will connect with other reconnaissance systems in an attempt to shorten the sensor-to-shooter timeline, which involves rapidly delivery sensitive data from sensors to the platforms or individuals who take action.
These include the Tactical Intelligence Targeting Access Node, or TITAN; the Multidomain Sensing System; TLS-BCT; the Electronic Planning and Management Tool; the Multifunction Electronic Warfare-Air Large; and the integrated tactical network.
TLS-EAB is one of the top priorities of the Army's ISR Task Force, which is modernizing the service's ability to see across huge ranges through a layered approach that involves the ground, air and space domains.
U.S. adversaries have invested in capabilities that aim to keep forces at bay, such as advanced missiles and radars. To allow American forces to penetrate those capabilities and move back ground-based adversaries, larger echelons such as the corps must be able to see and understand these regions in full, which could be over thousands of miles.
This also means sifting through all the noise in the congested electromagnetic spectrum to understand and prioritize specific targets.
As such, the corps level must see more of the spectrum than the brigade, said Tracy of III Corps, because if the higher echelons did their jobs right, there shouldn't be a whole lot left for brigades to deal with in the non-kinetic realm when they are eventually deployed.
Timeline
Units aren't expected to first receive TLS-EAB until at least fiscal 2022, the same year as TLS-BCT.
The current plan outlined by officials, which they stressed is all notional, is to have a total of 67 TLS-EABs: four per I2CEWS equaling 16; three per corps equaling nine; four per division equaling 40; and two at training locations.
The sketch provided by Army leaders is an industry day in January, with a draft request for proposals set for February and bids in October.
16 décembre 2021 | International, Aérospatial
The Eren was on display at the Konya Science Festival this month.
2 juin 2020 | International, Terrestre
Le bilan des exportations d'armement françaises 2019 atteint le montant de 8,3 milliards d'euros, selon les chiffres de La Tribune. Les ventes d'armes françaises baissent de 11,1% par rapport à 2018 (9,1 milliards), une année où la France avait enregistré sa troisième meilleure performance en 20 ans ; toutefois les prises de commande en 2019 consolident la place de la France dans le top 5 des exportateurs mondiaux. La Tribune rappelle que sur 10 ans, l'industrie d'armement française a vendu pour plus de 86 milliards d'euros d'armements à l'exportation. La part des achats de systèmes d'armes français par des pays européens progresse par rapport à 2018 (25%), avec 45 % du total des prises de commande de 2019, gr'ce notamment à la signature de trois grands contrats : Naval Group en Belgique, Airbus Helicopters en Hongrie (hélicoptères H225M et H145M) et Thales et Airbus en Espagne (satellites de communication sécurisée, Spainsat NG I et II). La Tribune du 2 juin
27 novembre 2020 | International, Naval
Il y a une dizaine de jours, les équipes de MBDA ont réalisé le dernier tir de qualification du missile antinavire Sea Venom/ANL sur le site d'essai DGA de l'Ile du Levant. Le missile Sea Venom/ANL qualifié Réalisé le 17 novembre dernier, cet ultime tir de qualification du missile Sea Venom/ANL de MBDA avait pour but de valider les performances du missile en termes "de discrimination de cible en environnement naval dense et complexe". "Les essais précédents avaient permis de tester le domaine de séparation et de tir, le vol rasant à basse altitude, ainsi que les modes d'engagement du missile, tels que l'accrochage après tir (LOAL), l'accrochage avant tir (LOBL), l'opérateur dans la boucle ou encore la sélection du point d'impact", rappelle MBDA. Premiers essais sur hélicoptère Lynx Les premiers essais avaient commencé en 2017 sur un hélicoptère Lynx Mk 8 de la Royal Navy. Des essais d'embarquement et de largage du Sea Venom/ANL. Puis en avril 2018, avait suivi un tir depuis un hélicoptère Airbus Panther "avec vol du missile à très basse altitude et accrochage de la cible en milieu de course ». "La conduite de ce tir anti-navires a permis de mettre en lumière la capacité du missile à naviguer « au raz de l'eau (sea-skiming) et le bon fonctionnement de la liaison de données entre le missile et l'hélicoptère », avait alors précisé le Ministère des Armées. Puis, en fin d'année 2018, s'était déroulé un nouveau tir d'essai qui avait permis "de confirmer la capacité d'accrochage avant tir du Sea Venom-ANL, l'opérateur utilisant les images provenant de l'autodirecteur à infrarouge du missile pour désigner la cible avant le tir". L'essai s'est déroulé au centre d'essai de l'Ile du Levant depuis un hélicoptère d'essai Dauphin de la DGA. Premier tir de qualif. en février dernier Le premier tir de qualification du missile sur l'Ile du Levant au centre d'essais de missiles de la Direction générale de l'armement (DGA) a été effectué en février 2020. "Le missile a été tiré depuis un hélicoptère Dauphin de DGA Essais en vol progressant à une altitude proche de la hauteur minimale nécessaire au lancement du missile, ce dernier atteignant sa vitesse de croisière alors qu'il effectuait un vol rasant (sea-skimming). Pendant la dernière phase du vol, l'opérateur a utilisé les images provenant de l'autodirecteur à infrarouge –transmises par la liaison de données- du missile pour ajuster le point d'accrochage sur la cible. Le missile a ensuite suivi le point désigné jusqu'à atteindre la cible avec une précision extrême", indiquait alors MBDA. Le missile antinavire Sea Venom/ANL, qui équipera bientôt les hélicoptères Wildcat AW159 de la Royal Navy et H160M Guépard de la Marine Nationale, est un programme en coopération réalisé dans le cadre du traité de Lancaster House, conclu entre la France et le Royaume-Uni, il y a eu dix ans ce mois-ci. Le Sea Venom/ANL est également le premier programme à bénéficier pleinement des centres d'excellence franco-britanniques spécialisés dans les technologies des missiles, qui ont été mis en place par le traité de Lancaster House. https://www.air-cosmos.com/article/missile-mbda-sea-venom-les-tirs-de-qualif-sont-achevs-23912