The above scenario is one that could happen for real in as little as three years from now. Why? Well, combat aircraft are ultimately just a platform for the missiles and bombs that actually do the job. To illustrate my point, the Romanian Airforce was recently offered the F-16, F-18 and Mig-29, but instead they chose the Israelis' offer to upgrade the avionics, sensors and weapons. The F-22, its' best A\A weapon is the same AMRAAM that is found on a Harrier or a Humvee (new test program). Surprised? Don't be, just remember what your mom always told you: it's what's inside that counts most, and this applies very well to combat aircraft as well as relationships! So, you say, why then is everyone getting all wrapped up about the F-22? Well, people understand jets better than the weapons they carry, they have more sex appeal, and you can't go for a ride on even the best bomb (unless you're in a Shwarzeneger flick). The USAF is happy about the F-22 because it means the AMRAAMs and JDAMs onboard can be launched from the most beneficial position without getting the pilot killed.

With all this in mind, my articles will cover the new (after Dstorm) missiles, bombs and a few noteworthy aircraft upgrades that have not yet made an appearance in sims. Are you familiar with DRM, EFOG-M and GREEN FLAG? You will be! Projects like these will change air and land combat and our sims in ways you never imagined.

GBU LGB's

We should start out with the simplest of the new A\G weapons, but first we should discuss the limitations of the famous laser smart bombs, and why they might not be as effective in the next wars as in DS. We all know that the whole principal of it requires someone to :1) visually see the target 2) be close enough to shine a laser on the impact point 3) have your laser collimated to the reticule 4) be steady while you illuminate the target 5) illuminate no higher than 20,000ft (max alt of most laser systems) 6) acquire the illumination if you are only dropping 7) release the bomb less than 1 minute from target (batteries), sometimes in a steep dive 8) have a low threat area with no SAMs or heavy AAA and total air superiority

As you can see this is a tall order for a pilot facing less than ideal conditions. As for the benefits over iron bombs and current weapons: -you can stick the guidance on just about anything that will go bang-

It costs less than doing the same job with iron bombs - its incredibly accurate- its flexible towards new tactics. The GBU-28 was a 4700lb laser bomb (shown left) was developed in record time DURING the DS air war from mid-Jan to Feb 27 when it was dropped on bunkers at an airbase just north of Baghdad. It is 18 feet long, made from artillery barrels, uses 650lbs of Tritonal, and is five times more destructive than a GBU-27 2000lb . It was dropped by the F-111F and was later approved for the F-15E, and an updated JDAM version has been dropped from the B-2 Spirit. In tests it would go over 100ft deep after concrete slabs. If this program was done during peacetime, instead of >2months, it would have taken over two years to field the weapon.

As for the flexibility of LGB's, the commanders were distressed that the B-52 strikes on armor formations were not killing much armor, they suddenly started using LGB's to 'plink' tanks. This was cheaper than using Mavericks, and it's better to save the Mav's for the ground war CAS. Often, a flight coming from a strike mission would return with ordnance due to clouds over the target, then get redirected to kill tanks before returning (200 tanks per day). As for ground forces illuminating the targets for you, this is more problematic, since it is harder for the bomber to locate the target initially and the reflection is not as easily seen by the seeker.

So what is the future of the LGB? Well, the UK has started a program nicknamed the "terrorist" or "peace" bomb. This takes an inert LGB training device (steel tube with the fins and seeker bolted on) and ads a 7kg non-fragmented HE charge to the tail. This allows special forces the ability to kill terrs in a room next to where the hostages are kept, provide a big distraction (!) right in the middle of your city, with minimal damage. The same effect could be had using laser Hellfire's, provided you modified the warhead so the shaped charge is gone (or the blast would travel through three or four concrete walls).

JDAM

This is the Joint Direct Attack Munition, effectively a GPS\INS bomb for attacking fixed hard targets under any conditions. This is one of two primary A\G weapons for the F-22, (the other being LOCAAS). Once the plane is in range of the target he drops the bomb and turns away from the target area to avoid surface threats. The drop can be as far away as 15 miles (normally 5), hit less than 13 meters, and it comes in 500 and 2000lb sizes with a few 1000lb high energy versions for the F-22 (these do as much as a 2000lb).

It will cost about $18,000 for the guidance unit, with a lifetime warranty. This weapon can be dropped in clouded and bad weather with no performance loss and little effort from the pilot, being a fire-forget weapon. An improved version will hit closer than 3 meters. It is in production now, and will arm almost all jets which carry bombs now. Copies of this weapon are being developed in UK, CIS, China and France, who want to add a rocket to the tail for an increased standoff. The F-22 version may get an inflatable nose, in order to fit as much punch into the internal bays of the plane.

MMTD

This is the Miniaturized Munitions Technology Demonstrator. It is a specialized weapon, similar to the JDAM but optimized for internal bays of stealth planes. It will be 250lb, penetrate 6 feet of concrete and detonate 50lbs of explosives. The explosives are being developed right now to provide 5 times the power of current bombs. Between 6 to 8could be carried inside the F-22's bays. In order to penetrate well, the bomb must be traveling quite fast (1100fps) and have a good auto-pilot to retain energy. These weapons are being developed with the JSF and UCAV programs in mind.

The British toss-bombing tactics would seem to be an effective way to employ these weapons, from any altitude.

Part II will be posted on the weekend, covering:

• Wind Corrected Munitions Dispenser
• AGM 130: an updated GBU-15 bomb, using a 2000lb as the core, adding a rocket motor for standoff and low-alt.
• JSOW AGM 154: a glide bomb reminiscent of a cruise missile, but designed to be cheaper than iron bombs per target destroyed
• LOCAAS: Low Cost Anti Armor Munition uses a Ladar (laser) seeker, target recognition, and top-attack to engage the enemy.
• BRIMSTONE: 18 of these can be carried on a Harrier GR7 (AV-8b) and is a fire and forget weapon, unlike the RF Hellfire to be carried on the Longbow.
• STORMSHADOW/APACHE : The first true stealth air weapon in service outside the US.
• Tracor UCAV: a company that converts aircraft into sophisticated drones. WCMD

  Wind Corrected Munitions Dispenser is a smart-cluster-bomb, and it enables you to drop them accurately from high altitude, just like a JDAM. The F-22, B-1B and B-2 will carry this weapon, in order to safely attack armor and targets of opportunity. Instead of bomblets, it may eventually carry smart sub-munitions such as SKEET. The USAF has been experimenting with the use of clouds of carbon fiber strands that would short out radar's, and electrical grids, and may include this in the dispenser. The use of carbon fibers from Tomahawks put down a po.

  

  This is an updated GBU-15 bomb, using a 2000lb as the core, adding a rocket motor for standoff and low-alt. Launch. It has an imaging IR seeker and a data modem that sends its' view to the WSO. GPS\INS then gets it close to the target, and then the WSO searches for a target point via IR\data link, while the F-15E is flying home, and steers manually to the target, or put on automatic. If a mistake were made or civilians suddenly appeared, the WSO could prevent catastrophe even at the last second, because of the data-link. This is a feature that I believe will become very common in future weapons, as standoff distances increase, tolerance of collateral damage will shrink, and Bosnia style wars become more commonplace. The cylinder you see underneath the bomb casing is in fact the rocket motor, giving it a range of 15 to 40 mile, from the F-15E, F-111 and F-4, at night or in bad weather. It can be launched from as low as 200ft, avoiding air defenses. This weapon is in production and was deployed to service in '94, and 600 are expected to be boughtg/wep_7.jpg" alt="AGM 130">

  

  JSOW AGM-154

  The JSOW is a glide bomb reminiscent of a cruise missile, but designed to be cheaper than iron bombs per target destroyed. It will travel between 8 to 22 miles, dropped by: F-15E, F-16, F-117, F\A-18, F-111, AV-8B, B-1B, B-52, A-6E. There are three versions: the first is a cluster bomb (A) for the USMC\USN, the second carries smart sub-munitions like SKEET (B) for the USAF, and the last is a 5point targets. It will start operationally with the F\A 1ore advanced (B, C) versions will appear in 2001.

  The JSOW's computer uses two Intel 486 33mhz chips, to pilot the weapon along several waypoints , unless you get bounced and the weapon is released too early, in which case the cpu decides to override the waypoints and make a beeline for the impact point. The coordinates can be entered in flight , particularly useful for doing CAS missions at night\bad weather whiants to use it for. All versions use GPS\INS, but the C model adds a data-link and he AGM-130.

  

  One area of major concern to the users of weapons using GPS based guidance is its' potential vulnerability to jamming. Why buy a weapon for $400,000 if it cannot hit the targets? On that note, they have tested such systems thoroughly and woulndence on GPS if it were effective to jam it. Understand that milspec GPS are much more resistant to outside $200 special you bought to go hiking.

  

  As far as survivability is concerned, radar directed AAA will eventually be able to intercept such PGM's (check out the CWIS on navy ships), but by the time this is common, the terminal speed of the PGM's in use will be drastically increased. Recent research sugsing an advanced rocket or scramjet to achieve speeds of over Mach 6 could enable the weapon to destroy deeply buried targets as well reaction time.

  LOCAAS

  

  So far we have only dealt with weapons intended for structures and bunkers, but modern war often involves mechanized battalions. Unfortunately, in the past, destroying tanks and convoys had a positive effect overall, but was very dangerous for the pilot, as well as to friendly troops in close proximity. Modern SAMs an from getting close enough to visually ID the target, and therefore launch Mavericks at unfortunate friendly troops. Having been a ground pounder myself, this isught. One way of separating the friendly's was pioneered in DS was to add IR lamps on top of our vehicles, without being detected by enemy ground units.

  Still, this method of ID still has limitations: even from a standoff, Mavericks are still within SAM range, you can only carry a few on yre very expensive if all you want to destroy is a bunch of trucks! ( as much as $270,000 for the IR version) In DS, 5000 Mavericks were fired, at a cost of $537,000,000+! All the LGB's c, by comparison, for twice as many bombs dropped. The USAF started an ambitious program to develop a low cost and higher performance anti-armor weapon which has seen little press.

  The Low Cost Anti Armor Munition uses a Ladar (laser) seeker, target recognition, and top-attack to engage the enemy. It is very small: 50lb, 20 in., glider (10 to 40 miles) and powered (30 min. or 100 miles) versions will be made, and inexpensively at $23,000 to $30,000. The weapon is given the area, target type priority list, and type library before takeoff, however, simpler programming options in flight by the pilot allow for targets of opportunity and fluid battle situations thassion. The weapon searches the designated area for vehicles, compares the signatures against it's library, and selects the highest priority target to go for. It will discriminate between SAM, SCUD, types of MBT's,cks, and then detonate in the most advantageous way directly on top: long rod KE for MBT's, slug for IFV's and frag-slugs for soft targets.

  

  One indicats weapon is to the USAF is found in an early report to congress which proposes that the B-2 carry 192 of these to destroy entire formations in one pass, along with the F-22 carrying 24 LOCAAS internally with 2 AMRAAMs. The deployment of ann the US best, most expensive and stealthy platforms is in stark contrast to the Maverick on USAF F-16A and A-10's, especially since the "Hog" seems to be the least respected plane in the service by all but the pilots who fly them.

  It is expected that the powered version will be used to destroy SAM sites and loiter above them during ely reducing the dependency on many designated Weasel \HARM to cover the incoming bombers. This version may add components from the HARM itself, enabling it to detect the radar emissions, and switch to Ladar once the target turns off the radar and drive down the roARM, it costs $260,000 and 500 million worth (2000 missiles) were used in DS as well, which means further savings with Locaas for the USAF\ taxpayer. One wonders if future versions could detect man-portable SAM launchers (ie., strela\grail) and destroy them.

  Having the LOCAAS run as a lethal decoy would be a cost effective stratagem, and individual powered units could be fitted with detection equipment relaying the frequencies of radio\SAM\radar sites to jamming support A\C (like the Raven and Prowler) just prior to a strike. Another potential use of the airframe would be as an observer for BDA assessment of a critical strike, relaying video back by data link of the whole strike and the after effects 20minutes later. Although UAV's could do this, they may not always be practical because they would be already tasked to do new target searches, may not have the range required, be more expensive\less expendable for high threat areas, and require even more coordination during an already complex strike mission. BRIMSTONE

  The RAF has recently chosen this missile for its anti-armor weapon for CAS missions, and the airframe is the same as the Hellfire used on US ARMY Apaches. 18 of these can be carried on a Harrier GR7 (AV-8b), three to a pylon. It uses a millimeter wave seeker, inertial autopilot and target library to enable it to be launched indirectly, off-boresight, as well as direct fire. It is simply fed the coordinates and flies there on the deck, where it then searches for a tank.

  This is a fire and forget weapon, unlike the RF Hellfire to be carried on the Longbow. Existing Hellfire upgrades to Brimstone capability will be offered, and this could significantly increase the survivability of anti-tank helis, like the WAH-64 bought by the British Army. Transport helicopters like the UH-60L could become CAS support, carrying and launching Brimstones from 16km away without exposing themselves from cover, while Apaches, UAV's and jets give direct coordinates.

  STORMSHADOW\APACHE

  The Stormshadow could possibly be the first true stealth air weapon in service outside the US. It is a stealthy cruise missile developed for the UK , France and Germany. Three versions will be made, the first being a point target weapon for hard targets, using a kinetic energy warhead. This version will fly more than 220 km from the release point, update its GPS\INS using a TERCOM system similar to that of the ALCM, and use an imaging IR seeker in the terminal phase. Its unclear to me whether this means a data-link will be included.

  

  Apache is a runway\airfield attack weapon. The significance of these weapons is more one of similar copies being used by unfriendly countries, and trying to defend against a strike involving 12 or more such missiles, while long range AAMs are launched against us. Systems such as this one are expensive compared to most of the other weapons here, but this appears to be just a stop-gap for the UK to get some stealth strike capability.

  Tracor UCAV

  Tracor is not actually a weapon, but a company that converts aircraft into sophisticated drones. The UCAV is the Uninhabited Combat Air Vehicle, an advanced strike weapon which will fly to the target, destroy it and go home without any human control required (of course, humans will oversee the critical strike unfold and change tactics accordingly, from command posts which may be on a different continent entirely. UCAV's present all sorts of challenges for the engineers, and I will discuss this further some other time.

  Tracor converts F-4G\E\C to QF-4, which is a full scale aerial target. Two types are made: Limited- these are targets that would be used for testing advanced air weapons in the evaluation phase, where targets must be destroyed. During the test phase, missiles would not have warheads, and be programmed to "near-miss" the target, with onboard detecting the 'hit'. The Unlimited types have full EW weapons (such as radar emitters that fool a radar into thinking the target is at a different location) and new defensive systems so sensitive that the USAF installs this themselves.

  Defensive systems that make it on the F-22 would probably be tested in such a way against our own AMRAAM, RBS-70 (laser guided SAM) and Archers(IR, CIS), to view weaknesses in the systems. Tracor feels they will have the upper hand in winning the first UCAV contract (due to extensive past experience) which will likely involve converting the F-16A into "drone combat vehicles". The RAF is very interested in UCAV's for replacing Tornado strike planes.

  This article is by no means all inclusive, and is meant only to introduce you to the new weapons under development or that have not been publicized much. As you can gather, these weapons will change how airwars will be conducted, and as a result sims which represent current and future timelines must include some of these. Unfortunately, this has the potential of making some sims a push button affair, totally lopsided domination, with no skill or action (like furballs). This effect has already been seen in a few current sims from the representations of AMRAAMs being VERY effective (and F-22 vs Mig21\ M1A2 vs BMP1) and no serious challenge presents itself.

  I see two ways of correcting the situation: allow varying levels of capability to the weapons (like EF2000 and Hornet 3), giving the 'enemy' better weapons than they likely can afford to buy, penalize high cost weapons for low cost targets, and finally finite number of advanced weapons (which is a very "real-world" reality). The other thing we can do is simulate more historical situations, like F-4's in Vietnam or CF-104's in central Europe (cold war heats up).

  Any mistakes in the articles are entirely mine, except in the case of systems which do not have final configurations yet. Anyone wishing to contact me: Rick, Rick Kent