As proven by Operation Desert Storm, an effective standoff EA campaign against both enemy radar sensors and communications infrastructure damages the enemy's ability to determine the location and intent of our joint forces and its ability to control offensive or defensive forces. The S&T in mission support will significantly enhance warfighter operations by proactively separating the enemy command element from its forces by disrupting information handling systems, C3 nodes/links, navigation systems, long-range integrated air defense systems, and other electronic aids that provide battlefield/situation assessment to enemy forces. This degradation of the enemy's C3/ Integrated Air Defense System (IADS) structure must be effectively accomplished without hindering those same elements of our own. Opportunities for transitioning the C2W and counter-IADS mission support technology efforts exist in current EA systems. Future systems designed for exploitation, countersurveillance communications, and radar tracking will afford a fertile environment for testing and application of this technology. Also included in this subarea is the pursuit of advanced distributed simulation technologies, which will reduce the time and cost required to develop the entire scope of EW system capabilities discussed in Sections 3.10-3.12, resulting in a faster transition to the warfighter's operational "arsenal" at an affordable acquisition cost. Simulation and modeling will also result in more EW advanced systems with increased capability, as proposed modifications and performance enhancements can be tested by the S&T and user communities for effectiveness prior to development and production.
3.12.2.1 Goals and Timeframes. Modern battlefield commanders require information as never before, not merely information on enemy numbers, location, movement, readiness, weapon capabilities, control structures, or awareness of friendly actions, but also on similar information on his/her own forces and those of allies. To provide this information to friendly forces and denying the same to the threat commander, EW systems technology thrusts in the mission support technology subarea address three elements: RF mission support, electronic protection (EP), and EW employment. EW technologies provided will increase the capabilities of EW systems to:
Major goals and associated timeframes are shown in Table X-13.
3.12.2.2 Major Technical Challenges. The principal challenge of the C2W role is the global spread of extremely affordable, portable, modern telecommunications technology. Extremely complex modulation formats, multiplexing schemes, and spread-spectrum coding pose severe hurdles to the ES system in its real-time abilities to identify, detect, and intercept. Given that challenge, the EA portion of the system must accomplish "surgical" attacks on enemy C2 and navigation aids with minimal collateral/fratricidal damage due to the commonality of frequencies/systems used by both forces and nonaligned third parties. In the HF communications region, resurging interest in this "comms" method imposes severe hardware challenges on ECM and ESM subsystems (by virtue of the multi-meter wavelengths involved) and affordable integration thereof on a broad class of existing, operational warfighter platforms (small, mobile ground vehicles; airborne; and shipborne)--e.g., efficient broadband amplifiers and antennas, over-the-horizon detection schemes. The third C2W challenge is the capability to correlate and combine all force sensors (active and passive) data to provide a complete tactical picture. For RF mission support, the challenges are threefold: creating an architecture for an affordable, next-generation support/SOJ capability; demonstrating low-cost, effective electronic enhancements to the SEAD mission; and providing capabilities to direct/protect the flow and handling of friendly information systems.
3.12.2.3 Related Federal and Private Sector Efforts. Although EW is primarily used by DoD organizations, there are commercial activities pursuing directly related technologies. DoD EW technology efforts are complemented by industry initiatives, particularly in the area of advanced communications. EA techniques against modern threat C3 systems are also being applied in an EP fashion to efforts protecting our own military and commercial communications and computer networks through the development of common tool sets for information protection. DoD, law enforcement, customs, and other federal organizations have been partners with the commercial sector and academia in the development of technology for countering criminal and terrorist activities. Industry is involved in data fusion applications running the gamut from strategic intelligence production and tactical situation awareness development to automated production, preventive maintenance, and autonomous robot applications. Spinoffs from DoD work in data fusion include factory automation, advanced safety systems, multisensor diagnostic systems, and earth resource management. Also, DoD visualization/simulation technology is able to leverage off of dramatic advances from the computer graphics industry.
| Application/Mission | Short Term (1-2 Years) | Mid Term (3-5 Years) | Long Term (6+ Years) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Exploitation and jamming of mobile and digital C3 systems | Demo 10x increase in number of HF signals that can be simultaneously countered, through opti-mized techniques and increased wideband power generation. | Demo techniques of countering current digital communications to intro-duce significant delay in the threat commanders' decision cycle from his/her information databases. | Demo techniques for countering future reconfig-urable, multimedia, computer-intensive mobile networks. |
| Robust, all-aspect antiship missile CM (ASCM) simulation capability | Add a cloud cover model to the IR predictive code for the cruise missiles EW simulation. | Provide an RF/IR digital model representative of the multispectral environment. | |
| Extension of target collection range, attack and mobility of IEW Common Sensor (IEWCS) | Demo 40% collection range exercise through UAV test. | Demo a 90% increase in precision location capability for targets outside range of IEWCS and selective jam-ming attacks in UAV flight test; integrate and demo with airborne IEWCS platforms. | Demo target collection and location at over 75% extended ranges on planned mobile digital communications using UAV tethered to IEWCS. |
| Develop capability to surgically counter C2W systems with minimal fratricide | Test communication/ navigation CM capabilities against ground and airborne platforms. | Demo airborne CM against future navigation systems. | Demo precision attack techniques as CM against global high-capacity communication/navigation systems. |
| Airborne multiple sensor fusion | Complete the multi-INT sensor correlation with moving target indicator. | Demo advanced airborne planning algorithms and effectiveness tools for multisensor tasking and reporting using dB-to-dB interfaces. | Integrate SIGINT/MTI sensor cross-cueing and situation displays into IEWCS and All-Source Analysis System (ASAS). |
| Next-generation RF support jammer | Develop and demo integrated MPM phased-array architectures. | Develop and demo broad-band, polarization-agile transmit/receive architecture with 3-5-deg beam control | Demo tactical platform (include UAVs and pods) integration into a wideband configuration. |
| C2W visualization/ simulation technology | Live intel data coupled with visualization/simulation technology. Perform predictive analysis on efforts of EA to C2 networks. |
Couple visualization/ simulation technology with test assets. | Advanced display tech-nology to on-the-fly display 3D view of EOB. |
| Force-on-force simulation technology | Increase fidelity of sensor model emulations. | Develop tri-service interoperability. | Embed into operational systems. |
| Counter ECM false targets and false images in SARs | Dev and demo neural network processor to counter ECM signals. | Conduct flight test in air-craft, JSTARS. | Integrate processor to counter false SAR signals into tactical fighter such as the F-22, F/A18-E/F, and JSF. |
3.12.3 S&T Investment Strategy
In executing the mission support subarea, focus is maintained on specific technology demonstrations, which synergistically integrate advanced antenna/aperture, processor, receiver, and transmitter technologies, yet also foster technology developments in these same areas that are focused on the component/functional level. National investments among various technology demonstration and technology developments efforts are allocated in accordance with their potential payoff to warfighting needs, affordability, and relative contribution to achieving mission support goals.
3.12.3.1 Technology Demonstrations. In accordance with the TARA recommendations in April 1996, the second most important area in EW S&T is C2W. Hence, the demonstrations in mission support depict this posture and provide incremental achievement to reach WE.23.08. Objectives include significant tactical battlefield fusion visualization and decision aids, CM to advanced forms of navigation aids, EA against modern information networks/communications, and development of advanced C2W receiver and transmitter architectures/components. The other major EW demonstration is embodied on the joint warfighter side by DTO H.04 and is geared to assist lethal SEAD. Other mission support demonstrations will be conducted in accordance with this subarea's investment strategy.
3.12.3.2 Technology Development. The service efforts in the mission support subarea are divided into three classes.
EW mission support technology will develop the technology to attack the enemy C2, IADS, and information distribution networks. Detection, degradation, deception, and destruction are all part of the total requirement. A development goal is to provide the capability to surgically counter both communication and navigation systems by disrupting C3 nodes and links without negatively impacting friendly use during war, and most particularly, operations other than war to avoid disruption of communication facilities of other nations and international humanitarian organizations. An additional goal is to develop the enabling technologies required to field the next-generation integrated RF support jammer concept to electronically counter search, surveillance, targeting, and other advanced radars. This enabling technology includes multibeam, dual-polarized, real-time, phased-array antennas/apertures; microwave power module transmitters; reactive coherent techniques generator using DRFMs and programmable tapped delay lines; integrated threat warning; multiplatform coordination; improved antenna isolation; and improved surgical jamming to prevent fratricide.
EP (ECCM) technology will provide protection against threat EA enhancements. This portion of the EW S&T program develops necessary technology to perform vulnerability assessments to ensure that U.S. weapons, C3, and C3I systems have adequate and cost-effective hardening. This technology is at a basic S&T level, which is quickly transferred/transitioned to system developers for rapid insertion of protection techniques/upgrades to operational systems. Radar mission effectiveness will be demonstrated for advanced fire control radars, such as in the F-22, F/A-18E/F, and JSF, based on electronic protection (EP) technologies. Radar mission effectiveness will also be demonstrated for ground-based fire control radars.
EW simulation will support detailed engineering analyses of both specific EW equipment and technologies and computer-intensive higher order simulations. This is necessary to analyze all levels from one-on-one to force-on-force scenarios. Simulation visualization technologies are also needed to allow immediate, man-in-the-loop evaluation and interaction with EW scenarios. Developed technologies will provide joint service interoperability between constructive, virtual, and live assets, which will result in a more realistic environment to perform operational analysis and training.
3.12.3.3 Basic Research. Basic research efforts are underway that support this mission support subarea. Signal processing research in modulation characterization, fast adaptive super-resolution beamforming, noise reduction, adaptive direction-finding algorithms, and antenna size reduction using high-temperature superconducting (HTS) components directly apply to ES and EA against modern communication, RF emitter, and information systems. Basic research efforts in data fusion emphasize the theoretical underpinnings of information combination and investigate promising new approaches and concepts in providing timely tactical battlefield intelligence fusion and situation assessment needed for effective EA. Investigations are being conducted in the development and evaluation of new paradigms for machine-based reasoning, advanced database management system design, optimal constraint-based resource management, and new-evidence combination methodologies.
