Aequatio
12-02-2006, 09:29
Project: Clear Sight/Straight Shot, Stealth Defeating Detection and Weapon System
With speed and stealth being an aircraft's greatest assets, it is only natural that their combination would be the next stage of evolution for heavy strike aircraft, especially for those that are deployed for strategic bombing raids into nations with extensive, conventional anti-aircraft defence systems. Thus, with the increase in use of high-speed stealth strike aircraft by nations around the world, Aequatian Military Industries (in cooperation with Arrio Heavy Manufacturing Corporation) have begun development in a combined detection and weapon system which would be aimed at defeating high-speed stealth systems which until this point have been viewed by many as invincible or would normally require a great expendature of a military's resources to defeat.
Project: Clear Sight - Detection System: Bi/Multi-Static RADAR System
The detection systems would include the utilization of a bistatic RADAR system that would, ironically, use a stealth aircraft's own technologies against it. Stealth aircraft, like the American F-117 or F-22, are specifically designed to have a low radar cross section to monostatic, or conventional, radars. They are not stealthy to some bistatic configurations.
Conventional monostatic radar places the transmitter and receiver in the same location, making it simple to locate a plane when spotted. Bistatic, or multi-static radar, would position the receiver at a different position from the transmitter. This makes it more difficult to compute the location of the aircraft. However, since stealth aircraft do reflect some radar, but away from the transmitter, bistatic radar could receive the reflection and detect the stealth aircraft.
However, since stealth aircraft do reflect some radar, but away from the transmitter, bi-static radar could conceivably receive the reflection and detect the stealth aircraft. The problem then becomes one of scale and coordination. The stealth aircraft will be visible only if ideal alignment exists so that the transmitter bounces a signal off the stealth aircraft to the receiver. Stealth aircraft, however, are vulnerable from a very small subset of possible combinations of angles.
The Roke Manor system solves that problem with computing power and some creative thinking. Building a radar every few miles to solve the first problem is prohibitively expensive. However, radar is simply an application of radio, and in today’s wireless age, radio waves surround us. In particular, in industrialized nations, cell phone towers can be found every few miles, sometimes every hundred feet. Telephone companies also know exactly where the towers are located, and have telephone lines hooked up to them, facilitating communication. In effect, the Roke Manor researchers have envisioned the use of cell phone towers as a extremely dense network of radar transmitters and receivers, interconnected via communications links. The sheer number of cell phone towers makes detection much easier than with solitary radar sites.
Having gotten around the stealth aircraft’s redirection capabilities, the system then puts together all the data from the cell phone towers. Modern computational power and advanced signal processing techniques have made it possible to sort through all the signals and form a coherent radar picture. Ironically, the further development of the same computing technology that originally made stealth possible has now made it possible to detect stealth aircraft.
Implications
Given a cell phone network, massively parallel computers, and the Roke Manor software, how much can one determine about a plane? Quite a bit, as it turns out.
“If you can get a radar return, you can get all kinds of information from the return signal if you can process it sufficiently,” Hansman said. “For example, if you an look at the Doppler shift of the returned signal, you can get aircraft velocity. If you are sensitive enough, you can see frequency effects, such as engine rotation or structural vibration. If you have several receivers or different imaging angles, you can begin to reconstruct an image of the target.”
These data further reduce the effectiveness of stealth technology. While stealth has always returned a small signal, even to monostatic radars, that signal is so small that it is usually filtered out either by the radar scope or by the operator. However, with velocity and shape information, as well as software specifically designed to detect the inconsistencies that give away a stealth airplane, it becomes considerably easier to separate planes from birds in the sky.
Project Straight Shot - Weapon System: High-Speed Air-to-Air/Surface-to-Air Missile System (HSAAM/HSSAM)
While the detection system is more than enough to defeat the stealth aspects of aircraft, these is still the problem of eliminating the aircraft once it is a threat to your nation. With most stealth aircraft being subsonic such as the F-117A Nighthawk, newer-generation strike fighter aircraft such as the F-22 and F-35 Joint Strike Fighter as well as other worldly aircraft such as the TAF-622 "Sparrow" of Tyrandis, the F-90 Guardian Angel and NP-5 Black Eagle of DMG and Lu-45 Hawk Air Superiority Aircraft of The Macabees to name a few can still be engaged with standard surface-to-air missile systems as long as they are incorporated into the detection system.
However, with the advent of hypersonic bombers and unmanned combat strike vehicles, conventional air defence systems are incapable of engaging such aircraft. So, the second aim of the project's development is focused on creating a missile that can be both air- and surface-launched and is capable of speeds greater than Mach 12 in order to defeat all present and projected hypersonic aircraft. The missile would more than likely be incorporated with a solid-fuel rocket engine for acceleration up to at a minimum of Mach 8 for initial launch and a supersonic combustion ramjet (scramjet) propulsion unit with additional oxidiser input that could potentially propel the weapon in excess of Mach 12 and up to Mach 24 (orbital velocity). A scramjet requires supersonic airflow through the engine, thus, similar to a ramjet, scramjets have a minimum functional speed, which is likely to be at least Mach 5 for a pure scramjet, with higher Mach numbers 7-9 more likely. Thus scramjets require acceleration to hypersonic speed via other means. (In this case, a solid-fuel rocket engine!)
Implimentation
While the use of submunitions in other High-Velocity Missile (HVM) systems is commonplace, the HSAAM/HSSAM system would be used as a kinetic energy weapon with a time-delay fuse which would detonate a warhead once it penetrated the fuselage of the enemy aircraft. The system would not require a heavy warhead as minimal damage done to a stealth aircraft would damage it enough to force the aircraft to slow its speed to prevent more damage being done by the high speed and the damage would negate the vehicle's stealth capability, allowing it to be engaged by conventional surface-to-air systems. As the system would more than likely be used for nation defence purposes, initial HSSAM weapon mounts would be stationary or towed (with potential for a fully mobile system for theatre missile defence on the battlefield) and HSAAM systems to be mounted on interceptor aircraft.
OOC: This whole concept was born out of my anger towards the use of high-speed aircraft being used and a particularly bad arguement that broke out in this thread (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=467058). I figure if I develop something that can take out any present and projected high-speed aircraft now, I'll be able to silence anyone that tries to use one in an roleplay and have them declare that there is no way I can stop them. As well, the detection system allows a nation to defend itself against the wide array of "stealth" aircraft that creep about this place even with current SAM systems.
With speed and stealth being an aircraft's greatest assets, it is only natural that their combination would be the next stage of evolution for heavy strike aircraft, especially for those that are deployed for strategic bombing raids into nations with extensive, conventional anti-aircraft defence systems. Thus, with the increase in use of high-speed stealth strike aircraft by nations around the world, Aequatian Military Industries (in cooperation with Arrio Heavy Manufacturing Corporation) have begun development in a combined detection and weapon system which would be aimed at defeating high-speed stealth systems which until this point have been viewed by many as invincible or would normally require a great expendature of a military's resources to defeat.
Project: Clear Sight - Detection System: Bi/Multi-Static RADAR System
The detection systems would include the utilization of a bistatic RADAR system that would, ironically, use a stealth aircraft's own technologies against it. Stealth aircraft, like the American F-117 or F-22, are specifically designed to have a low radar cross section to monostatic, or conventional, radars. They are not stealthy to some bistatic configurations.
Conventional monostatic radar places the transmitter and receiver in the same location, making it simple to locate a plane when spotted. Bistatic, or multi-static radar, would position the receiver at a different position from the transmitter. This makes it more difficult to compute the location of the aircraft. However, since stealth aircraft do reflect some radar, but away from the transmitter, bistatic radar could receive the reflection and detect the stealth aircraft.
However, since stealth aircraft do reflect some radar, but away from the transmitter, bi-static radar could conceivably receive the reflection and detect the stealth aircraft. The problem then becomes one of scale and coordination. The stealth aircraft will be visible only if ideal alignment exists so that the transmitter bounces a signal off the stealth aircraft to the receiver. Stealth aircraft, however, are vulnerable from a very small subset of possible combinations of angles.
The Roke Manor system solves that problem with computing power and some creative thinking. Building a radar every few miles to solve the first problem is prohibitively expensive. However, radar is simply an application of radio, and in today’s wireless age, radio waves surround us. In particular, in industrialized nations, cell phone towers can be found every few miles, sometimes every hundred feet. Telephone companies also know exactly where the towers are located, and have telephone lines hooked up to them, facilitating communication. In effect, the Roke Manor researchers have envisioned the use of cell phone towers as a extremely dense network of radar transmitters and receivers, interconnected via communications links. The sheer number of cell phone towers makes detection much easier than with solitary radar sites.
Having gotten around the stealth aircraft’s redirection capabilities, the system then puts together all the data from the cell phone towers. Modern computational power and advanced signal processing techniques have made it possible to sort through all the signals and form a coherent radar picture. Ironically, the further development of the same computing technology that originally made stealth possible has now made it possible to detect stealth aircraft.
Implications
Given a cell phone network, massively parallel computers, and the Roke Manor software, how much can one determine about a plane? Quite a bit, as it turns out.
“If you can get a radar return, you can get all kinds of information from the return signal if you can process it sufficiently,” Hansman said. “For example, if you an look at the Doppler shift of the returned signal, you can get aircraft velocity. If you are sensitive enough, you can see frequency effects, such as engine rotation or structural vibration. If you have several receivers or different imaging angles, you can begin to reconstruct an image of the target.”
These data further reduce the effectiveness of stealth technology. While stealth has always returned a small signal, even to monostatic radars, that signal is so small that it is usually filtered out either by the radar scope or by the operator. However, with velocity and shape information, as well as software specifically designed to detect the inconsistencies that give away a stealth airplane, it becomes considerably easier to separate planes from birds in the sky.
Project Straight Shot - Weapon System: High-Speed Air-to-Air/Surface-to-Air Missile System (HSAAM/HSSAM)
While the detection system is more than enough to defeat the stealth aspects of aircraft, these is still the problem of eliminating the aircraft once it is a threat to your nation. With most stealth aircraft being subsonic such as the F-117A Nighthawk, newer-generation strike fighter aircraft such as the F-22 and F-35 Joint Strike Fighter as well as other worldly aircraft such as the TAF-622 "Sparrow" of Tyrandis, the F-90 Guardian Angel and NP-5 Black Eagle of DMG and Lu-45 Hawk Air Superiority Aircraft of The Macabees to name a few can still be engaged with standard surface-to-air missile systems as long as they are incorporated into the detection system.
However, with the advent of hypersonic bombers and unmanned combat strike vehicles, conventional air defence systems are incapable of engaging such aircraft. So, the second aim of the project's development is focused on creating a missile that can be both air- and surface-launched and is capable of speeds greater than Mach 12 in order to defeat all present and projected hypersonic aircraft. The missile would more than likely be incorporated with a solid-fuel rocket engine for acceleration up to at a minimum of Mach 8 for initial launch and a supersonic combustion ramjet (scramjet) propulsion unit with additional oxidiser input that could potentially propel the weapon in excess of Mach 12 and up to Mach 24 (orbital velocity). A scramjet requires supersonic airflow through the engine, thus, similar to a ramjet, scramjets have a minimum functional speed, which is likely to be at least Mach 5 for a pure scramjet, with higher Mach numbers 7-9 more likely. Thus scramjets require acceleration to hypersonic speed via other means. (In this case, a solid-fuel rocket engine!)
Implimentation
While the use of submunitions in other High-Velocity Missile (HVM) systems is commonplace, the HSAAM/HSSAM system would be used as a kinetic energy weapon with a time-delay fuse which would detonate a warhead once it penetrated the fuselage of the enemy aircraft. The system would not require a heavy warhead as minimal damage done to a stealth aircraft would damage it enough to force the aircraft to slow its speed to prevent more damage being done by the high speed and the damage would negate the vehicle's stealth capability, allowing it to be engaged by conventional surface-to-air systems. As the system would more than likely be used for nation defence purposes, initial HSSAM weapon mounts would be stationary or towed (with potential for a fully mobile system for theatre missile defence on the battlefield) and HSAAM systems to be mounted on interceptor aircraft.
OOC: This whole concept was born out of my anger towards the use of high-speed aircraft being used and a particularly bad arguement that broke out in this thread (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=467058). I figure if I develop something that can take out any present and projected high-speed aircraft now, I'll be able to silence anyone that tries to use one in an roleplay and have them declare that there is no way I can stop them. As well, the detection system allows a nation to defend itself against the wide array of "stealth" aircraft that creep about this place even with current SAM systems.