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Counter harm strategies

vizier

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You know the ground based static radars are used to detect and counter incoming airplanes but are very vulnurable to harms because the planes by using their altitude and speed launch those missiles from a range more than 100kms which is beyond reach of most medium range sam systems. There is active defense and sams having several hundred km range but there can be ways to cheaply come up with a 30-40km sam systems without active defense and having higher mobility with smaller missiles,radar packages. Also 5th gen. planes will make the job of these systems more difficult as they will be the priorly targeted without being detected from a range long enough.

The more the radar is open the more the risk of getting harmed so for early warning non-emitting electro-optical,iir systems can be used like the ones on 4,5gen. fighters. It does not need to track but to inform that there are targets within 30km radius but if it provides directional info that will be a bonus. iir can also warn against 5th gens which can't hide their jet engines and heating on wingtips.

You know short range a2a missiles are very effective with high maneuvrability and are immune to jamming especially the ones with iir seekers and high off boresight. After they get a lock on you can fire and forget them without constant illumination by radar and the new ones have considerable range which can put them into medium range category for example R 73 has aerodynamic range about 30km at high altitudes. As important as the mentioned properties these missiles weigh about 90-100kgs and can be carried everywhere easily unlike larger missiles that can be carried only by trucks.

What these missiles lack in a sam system is the altitude. As mentioned these missiles weigh about 100kg but this is just slightly larger than medium range missile payloads like for example Buk missile carries a 70kg payload to 20km altitude with 40-50km range but you only need to go straightly upwards as the 100kg a2a missile having enough altitude and initial speed can travel laterally about 30km with its own engine.
The a2a missile needs to be carried to high altitudes by a straightly upwards launched rocket and directed towards the detected targets briefly by the ground radar as it reaches 10-15km altitude. The missiles will continue their flights after they get a lock on and you can forget about them afterwards. The radar will open briefly just for a few seconds beginning when the booster rocket reaches high altitude and seperates the uncaged a2a missile until the lightweight a2a missiles are directed towards the targets getting a lock on. After that the radar can be carried to somewhere else with the missiles and the setup can be assembled again dealing with multiples of targets with lightweight missiles(only the simple boosters are heavy)with a very short time radar illumination. Just an idea.

What can be other options?
 
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Modern SAMs are capable of shooting down anti-radiation missiles (ARM) such as the American HARM. The MBDA Spada 2000 being inducted by the PAF can shoot down enemy missiles at a range of 20 km according to the MBDA website, each Spada 2000 battery has 24 or 48 Aspide 2000 missiles. The battery can also control 10 anti-aircraft guns, which could also be effective at shooting down ARMs that get past the Aspide 2000 missiles.

EO tracking is only ever used by very short range SAMs as far as I know, its no good for longer range systems.
 
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Imaging infrared+electro optical detectors can be seperated around in high quantities closer to frontlines away from the sam radars and since they are non emitters detecting them would be very difficult. Tracking can be done by radars after entry is detected by infrared focal plane array systems so as most of us don't possess S 300 type of 100km+ range systems our radars won't stay open and continiously be targeted beyond our sam reach by harms as they will be silent until some planes enter at high altitude. Cruise missile hunters scan lower altitudes and new generation systems having lower sidelobes won't be detected while doing that.


decoys are good options as well as active defenses as the given article mentions but current radar guided sams both semiactive and datalink guided variants require continious tracking making radars stay open throughout most of the missile flight time leaving them open to jamming and continious harm attacks.Also if radar closes down the harms have gps, guiding them rest of the way which can be used to filter out compared decoy signals that are far away from gps designation. But these can be effective as the decoys stay open throughout radar operation and if emitter locator systems can't seperate the radar and the decoys in that time period. I understand these measures for 200-300km ranged S 300 systems that overcomes those attack types with the system performance but for medium range less costly frontline highly mobile systems iir seekers would be a solution which were not available when semiactive hawk,Buk type of missiles were developed in 70s. The radar needs to open just briefly to direct the missile nose towards the targets at high altitudes somewhat like what hms does with missiles sensors in fighters and after that the missiles take control and home themselves. Both R 74 and aim 9X has about 35km range fire and forget capability and they don't weigh more than 100kgs.
 
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