Raytheon’s Standard Missile Naval Defense Family (SM-1 to SM-6)

SM-2 Launch, DDG-77
(click to view larger)

Variants of the SM-2 Standard missile are the USA’s primary fleet defense anti-air weapon, and serve with 13 navies worldwide. The most common variant is the RIM-66K-L/ SM-2 Standard Block IIIB, which entered service in 1998. The Standard family extends far beyond the SM-2 missile, however; several nations still use the SM-1, the SM-3 is rising to international prominence as a missile defense weapon, and the SM-6 program is on track to supplement the SM-2. These missiles are designed to be paired with the AEGIS radar and combat system, but can be employed independently by ships with older or newer radar systems.

This article covers each variant in the Standard missile family, plus several years worth of American and Foreign Military Sales requests and contracts and key events; and offers the budgetary, technical, and geopolitical background that can help put all that in context.

Peru Moves to Maintain, Modernize its Fighter Fleet

USAF F-16s, FAP MiG-29S
and Mirage 2000DP

Peru’s 12 Mirage 2000C/B and 18 MiG-29S fighters form the backbone of its current multi-role fighter fleet, alongside old SU-22 strike fighters and specialized SU-25 close air support jets. The Mirages were bought from France in 1985, while the MiG-29s arrived via a disastrous 1995 deal with Belarus. Fortunately, Peru patched things up with Russia, and RAC MiG agreed to provide service and support. In 2008, a contract began modernize that MiG fleet to the MiG-29SMT standard. In 2009, Dassault began working with Peru on a comprehensive inspection of the Mirage fleet, coupled with some electronics modernization.

These purchases have been expensive, and a number of observers have questioned their usefulness against more pressing security concerns, like Peru’s fanatical Marxist Sendero Luminoso (“Shining Path”) guerrillas. On the other hand, the FAP still remembers the 1995 Canepa War with Ecuador, and its Russian fighters are stationed very close to that border at Chiclayo and Talara. Its Mirage 2000Ps sit at La Joya near Bolivia and Chile; the 3 countries have a minor 3-way maritime borders dispute, and residual tensions with Chile have been a long-running theme in Peru. This article covers Peru’s ongoing efforts to maintain and improve its core fighter fleet.

Huey’s Departure: Thailand’s New Helicopters

US UH-60s during
COBRA GOLD 1997

Thailand’s extensive territories, unrest on its borders, and placement in a zone prone to natural disasters all make helicopters a critical aspect of its military capabilities. About 50 Vietnam-era UH-1H Hueys and similar Bell 212/412s twin-Hueys form the bulk of its force, and a small detachment of S-92 Superhawks serve as transports for the Royal Family, but Thailand needs new helicopters. Unfortunately, newer machines must be bought via Thailand’s limited defense budget and much smaller aid grants, instead of arriving as part of a flood of war-related aid.

Thailand began its efforts by buying a handful of H-60 family helicopters, but rather than standardize, they’re buying a widening variety of helicopters in very small lots. This article chronicles the timeline of Thai requests, buys, and deliveries since 2003.

Victoria Class Submarine Fleet Creating Canadian Controversies

HMCS Victoria

Canada’s aging fleet of Oberon class submarines had become simply too old to put in the water. In July 2000, their de facto retirement became official. The question was: what, if anything, would replace them? With long coastlines, and a significant portion of its iced-in northern seas used as running grounds for foreign submarines, Canada’s military believed that giving up its submarine capability was not a viable option for a country that wished to maintain its sovereignty.

Unfortunately, the country’s purchase of 4 second-hand diesel-electric Upholder Class submarines from Britain ran into controversy almost from its inception. In early 2008, controversy flared again as the submarines’ C$ 1.5 billion Victoria Class In-Service Support Contract (VISSC) became an issue. Subsequent revelations concerning spiraling costs, boats in poor condition, and few to no actual submarines in service have kept the fleet controversial to the present day.

Import or Die: Taiwan’s (Un?)Stalled Force Modernization

Latest updates[?]: 1st PATRIOT PAC-3 battery confirmed deployed, ahead of expected date.

Despite China’s ominous military buildup across the strait, key weapons sales of P-3 maritime patrol aircraft, Patriot PAC-3 missiles, and diesel-electric submarines to Taiwan had been sabotaged by Taiwanese politics for years – in some cases, since 1997. The KMT party’s flip-flops and determined stalling tactics eventually created a crisis in US-Taiwan relations, which finally soured to the point that the USA refused a Taiwanese request for F-16C/D aircraft.

That seems to have brought things to a head. Most of the budget and political issues were eventually sorted out, and after a long delay, some major elements of Taiwan’s requested modernization program appear to be moving forward: P-3 maritime patrol aircraft, UH-60M helicopters, Patriot missile upgrades; and requests for AH-64D attack helicopters, E-2 Hawkeye AWACS planes, minehunting ships, and missiles for defense against aircraft, ships, and tanks. These are must-have capabilities when facing a Chinese government that has vowed to take the country by force, and which is building an extensive submarine fleet, a large array of ballistic missiles, an upgraded fighter fleet, and a number of amphibious-capable divisions. Chinese pressure continues to stall some of Taiwan’s most important upgrades, including diesel-electric submarines, and new American fighter jets. Meanwhile, other purchases from abroad continue.

AN/TPY-2: America’s Portable Missile Defense Radar

AN/TPY-2

The THAAD Ground-Based Radar (GBR), now known as the AN/TPY-2, is an X-Band, phased array, solid-state, long-range air defense radar. It was developed and built by Raytheon at its Andover, MA Integrated Air Defense Facility, as the main radar for the US Army’s THAAD late midcourse ballistic missile defense system.

For THAAD, targeting information from the TPY-2 is uploaded to the missile immediately before launch, and continuously updated in flight via datalinks. The TPY-2 is always deployed with THAAD, but it can also be used independently as part of any ABM (anti ballistic missile) infrastructure. That flexibility, and ease of deployment, is carving out an expanding role for the TPY-2/ “FBX” that reaches beyond THAAD. If a recent NRC report is adopted, that role will expand again to include national-scale ballistic missile defense. Hence this separate article to cover its ongoing development.

France’s Rafale Fighters: Au Courant In Time?

Dassault Rafale
(click for cutaway view)

Will Dassault’s fighter become a fashionably late fighter platform that builds on its parent company’s past successes – or just “the late Rafale”? It all began as a 1985 break-away from the multinational consortium that went on to create EADS’ Eurofighter. The French needed a lighter aircraft that was suitable for carrier use, and were reportedly unwilling to cede design authority over the project. As is so often true of French defense procurement policy, the choice came down to one of paying additional costs for full independence and exact needs, or losing key industrial capabilities by partnering or buying abroad. France has generally opted for expensive but independent defense choices, and the Rafale was no exception.

Those costs, and associated delays triggered by the end of the Cold War and reduced funding, proved to be very costly indeed. Unlike previous French fighters, which relied on exports to lower their costs and keep production lines humming, the Rafale has yet to secure a single export contract – in part because initial versions were hampered by impaired capabilities in key roles. The Rafale may, at last, be ready to be what its vendors say: a true omnirole aircraft, ready for prime time on the global export stage. The question is whether that will come in time. Rivals like EADS’ Eurofighter, Russia’s Su-27/30 family, and the American “teen series” of F-15/16/18 variants are all well established. Meanwhile, Saab’s versatile and cheaper JAS-39 Gripen remains a stubborn foe in key export competitions, and the multinational F-35 juggernaut is bearing down on it.

Missile Defense: Next Steps for the USA’s GMD

GMD launch, 2001

The USA’s Ground-Based Midcourse Defense (GMD) program uses land-based missiles to intercept incoming ballistic missiles in the middle of their flight, outside the atmosphere. The missiles are currently based at 2 sites in the USA: 4 at Vandenberg AFB in California, and 20 (eventually 26) at Fort Greely in Alaska.

The well-known Patriot missiles provide what’s known as terminal-phase defense options, while longer-reach options like the land-based THAAD perform terminal or descent-phase interceptions. Even so, their sensors and flight ranges are best suited to defense against shorter range missiles launched from in-theater.

In contrast, GMD is designed to defend against intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). It depends on tracking that begins in the boost phase, in order to allow true mid-course interception attempts in space, before descent or terminal phase options like THAAD and then Patriot would be tried. In order to accomplish that task, GMD missiles must use data feeds from an assortment of long-range sensors, including satellites like SBIRS and DSP, some SPSS/BMEWS huge early-warning radars, and even the naval SBX radar.

LAS in, LAS out: Counter-Insurgency Planes for the USA and its Allies

Winner

The USA needs a plane that can provide effective precision close air support and JTAC training, and costs about $1,000 per flight hour to operate – instead of the $15,000+ they’re paying now to use advanced jet fighters at 10% of their capabilities. Countries on the front lines of the war’s battles needed a plane that small or new air forces can field within a reasonable time, and use effectively. If these 2 needs are filled by the same aircraft, everything becomes easier for US allies and commanders. One would think that this would have been obvious around October 2001, but it took until 2008 for this understanding to even gain momentum within the Pentagon. A series of intra-service, political, and legal fights have ensured that these capabilities won’t arrive before 2015 at the earliest, and won’t arrive for the USAF at all.

The USA has now issued 2 contracts related to this need. The first was killed by a lawsuit that the USAF didn’t think they could defend successfully. Now, in February 2013, they have a contract that they hope will stick. The 3 big questions are simple. Will the past be prologue for the new award? Will there be an Afghan government to begin taking delivery of their 20 planes much beyond 2014? And will another allied government soon need to use this umbrella contract for its own war?

Bird Dogs for the Iraqi Air Force

Cessna 208B:
note ISR turret

Iraq’s air force has been very slow in getting to its feet. A handful of Seeker light observation aircraft with their distinctive bubble-shaped fronts, a few Comp Air light propeller aircraft, a couple of old, refurbished C-130E transports, and a slowly growing fleet of helicopters. A few Hawker Beechcraft King Air 350s have been ordered for transport and surveillance duties, and an RFP for armed counterinsurgency aircraft has only given Iraq a set of unarmed T-6B trainers. Even subsequent orders for F-16C/D fighters and L-159 advanced trainer and attack jets leave the Iraqi air force a long way from being able to secure Iraq’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. While it continues to grow< , the IqAF's primary duties remain troop/medical transport, light supply duties, and surveillance of roads and infrastructure.

That kind of surveillance doesn't require high tech, high-end aircraft. The USAF was using F-16 and F/A-18 aircraft at $15,000 per flight hour, plus recapitalization amortization. Iraq's solution takes a page from the US military's own past, and offers a significant contrast to the American approach.