EW: Wedgetail in the Joint EW space | ADM May 2012

Australia’s Wedgetail Airborne Early Warning and Control capability has now been in operational service for two years and though it is still a work in progress, it is now providing the ADF with an insight into its ability to operate as an important part of the future networked battlespace.

Much has been written about Network-Centric Warfare (NCW) and how individual capabilities are ‘nodes’ in the federation of information-gathering sensors, but Wedgetail promises more. Beyond pure data- gathering it can collect data from multiple sources, including off-board sensors, and fuse it into a cohesive picture before dissemination to other assets. This data forwarding, the ability to ‘pipe’ a coherent picture via Link 16 to other airborne assets or via Link 11 to Navy’s warships is a manifestation of future multi-service Command and Control (C2) operations.

When combined with the Vigilare Air Defence Ground Environment and, in the years to come, the Navy’s Air Warfare Destroyer and amphibious warfare ships, Wedgetail will contribute a capability essential for all combined operations.

“Wedgetail AEW&C is the most complex ‘linked’ platform in the world today,” Air Vice Marshal Chris Deeble, head of the Wedgetail program for DMO, told ADM. “In the latter half of this decade I see it and the Air Warfare Destroyer being effectively joined at the hip. I can’t imagine a future operation without these two key platforms being fundamentally involved.”

This ability for networked assets to provide a level of information greater than the sum of the parts is one of the key tenets of NCW and the ADF is now close to realising this goal.

Capability

The primary sensor aboard the aircraft is Northrop’s L-band Multi-role Electronically Scanned Array (MESA) radar, which, by virtue of design, can maintain a 360° scan while ‘staring’ at a selected track simultaneously.

The performance of the radar has been the subject of remedial work over the last few years, to enable it to reach its full capability. The Commonwealth has engaged the services of Boeing, Northrop Grumman, the Defence Science & Technology Organisation (DSTO) and the Lincoln Laboratories of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and US Government to define a growth path but it is now operationally effective, ahead of a final software ‘drop’ in the first half of this year.

The BAE Systems Australia/Elta ALR-2001 Electronic Support Measures system has also proved troublesome but is now beginning to show its potential. Its ability to ‘suck’ electromagnetic energy from the atmosphere, process and classify it and then present it to the mission computing system for fusion into an integrated threat picture is an essential weapon in Wedgetail’s armoury.

The Joint Tactical Information Distribution System (JTIDS) can use either Link 11 or Link 16 and convert one to the other. For example, this enables a radar picture to be received from a Hornet or Super Hornet, fused with additional data such as that from the ESM system, and sent to the combat information centre of one of Navy’s ships via the Link 11 net.

“There are very few capabilities in the world that can do that,” AVM Deeble said. “The complexity is driven by the extent of the message set used in the aircraft. We use an extensive part of that message set and therefore have the ability to send more information to the various assets within the network. There’s a lot more we can do that other platforms can’t.”

Voice communications are still an important part of C2 operations and Wedgetail is able to communicate across the spectrum, in both secure and non-secure means. The radios cover High Frequency (HF), Very High Frequency (VHF) and Ultra High Frequency (UH F) as well as Satellite Communications (SATCOM).

 

ADF and coalition operations

One of the problems of NCW is bringing everyone on to the same page, so to speak. This can involve upgrading and/or replacing current equipment and is an expen sive and time-consuming process. The ADF is fortunate to have formulated Joint Project 2089 as its network roadmap for the future, it is considering what work is required to legacy assets but also looking to the future to maintain interoperability with coalition partners.

Wedgetail, though designed from the outset for interoperability now has more roles than it was originally conceived for back in the 1970s. Airborne Early Warning has evolved into Airborne Early Warning and Control, with a larger emphasis on the combined picture, rather than pure air threats.

Although not directly involved in JP2089, Wedgetail will understandably benefit for the increase in interoperability between ADF assets and those of coalition forces. Future phases of AIR 5077, the Wedgetail AEW&C program, will monitor developments in coalition systems and ensure interoperability into the future.

Air

With the introduction of Link 16-capable platforms such as Super Hornet, and KC-30A Multi-Role Tactical Transport and the upgrade of the ‘classic’ Hornet fleet, Air Combat Group is now realising the benefits a modern data transfer system brings to the battlespace. When combined with ground assets such as Vigilare and the Jindalee Over The Horizon Radar Network most of the NCW jigsaw pieces are in place.

“We still use voice comms for a lot of what we do,” explains AVM Deeble. “But our ability to use data has reduced the amount required to conduct the mission.

“Vigilare is developing in parallel with AEW&C and both being Boeing-designed systems they share a lot of common elements,” he adds. “The Vigilare environment will evolve over time to utilise the information better than it does now, with the original message set. Arguably there are also elements of Vigilare that we might want to take back into AEW&C.

“Looking at JORN and being able to also fuse that picture with the Vigilare ground environment, and more coherently with a mobile platform such as AEW&C or AWD and correlate all that information is amazing,” AVM Deeble said. “And if you look at the spectrum we will now cover in terms of a fused picture – Wedgetail in L-band, JORN HF radar and the Air Defence Ground Environment – you can now create a radar picture across a broad width of the electromagnetic spectrum, which gives you maximum opportunity to track targets, bearing in mind that the characteristics of that target may not be readily detectable.”

Wedgetail has participated in a number of air defence exercises since entering service, both at home and abroad. Most recently it deployed to Andersen Air Force Base on Guam for Exercise Cope North, where it operated with elements of the USAF and Japan Air Self Defence Force. Arguably its biggest test to date will come in June when it will deploy to Alaska AFB for a Red Flag exercise.

Sea

With the AWD and LHD to enter service in the next few years and the enhanced capabilities of the upgraded FFGs and ‘Anzac’ frigates already being realised, Navy will play a greater part in the formation of the fused threat picture.

“We’re already finding that many of the upgraded FFGs are turning left out of Sydney Heads to head up to Newcastle, rather than turning right for the Jervis Bay Training area,” asserts AVM Deeble. “The reason for that is they can now interact with AEW&C and get a much broader picture than they’ve been able to see before.”

AVM Deeble recounts a recent exercise where a Wedgetail off Williamtown was able to provide a radar track to an FFG operating off Sydney. Whilst this would not normally seem terribly noteworthy, he says the track was of an airliner departing Melbourne’s Tullamarine airport!

The two LHDs will come with a significant C2 capability of their own and will be Link 16 capable from the outset. During future amphibious operations interaction between ship and AEW&C will be a routine occurrence.

The Navy’s new MH-60R combat helicopters will also come standard with Link 16 and can therefore also participate in networked operations with Wedgetail when it enters operational service over the next couple of years.

Wedgetail has 10 operator’s stations and not all are routinely used for the air defence mission, so it has become routine to carry a Navy liaison officer as part of each crew, to occupy one of the spare stations and facilitate operations with surface assets.

Land

Data communications with land-based assets are a little more problematic and neither of Army’s two new battlefield helicopters are equipped with Link 16.

“Tiger uses the European Eurogrid datalink,” explains AVM Deeble to ADM. “But we will be able to tap into Army networks in a number of different ways: We have flexibility on the aircraft to add adjunct capability. Eurogrid will require an interface with their ground-based system to allow us to communicate and we are looking at ways to do that via laptop.”

A future phase of JP2089 will look at bestowing a Variable Message Format capability to Tiger, which will facilitate communications through existing VMF-capable platforms such as Super Hornet and (in the near future) Hornet.

During amphibious or land operations an Army liaison officer will also be carried to allow effective communication with Army units and platforms.

 

The future

Future phases of AIR 5077 will ensure Wedgetail’s capability keeps pace with change and aims to keep the system interoperable with Australia’s allies and partners.

In the more immediate future, there is the possibility of a UAV command and control capability being added – something successfully demonstrated by Boeing in 2009, when an Australian Wedgetail simultaneously controlled three ScanEagle air vehicles via plug in laptop during testing in the US.

With the Lockheed Martin F-35A due to join the RAAF in the next few years, further Wedgetail testing will be required to ensure full compatibility.

“We don’t believe need to do any work to ensure compatibility with JSF at the moment,” AVM Deeble said. “But we’ve already had discussions with the United States about getting a Wedgetail into the flight test program.”

Finally there is the spectre of increased threats: “Capability is really going to be driven by future threats. As threats change we may have to change the capability of our sensors,” concludes AVM Deeble. “Low observable or stealthy targets may require us to evolve our sensors and as the range of weapons increases we may have to push the detection range of the radar and ESM out.”