ASMD developments

The Anzac frigate ASMD project has been subjected to further scrutiny and analysis - in part because the threat environment it was originally designed for is intensifying.
Acknowledging the inadequacy of ships' defences against the more capable anti-ship missiles proliferating in the region, the Defence White Paper is blunt in its statement that the Anzac ships do not have adequate defences and have other significant deficiencies in their combat capabilities.

It goes on to say that they will be upgraded to provide a 'reasonable level' of anti-ship missile defence (ASMD) and other enhancements of their combat capabilities, including the fitting of Harpoon anti-ship missiles, and notes that the project is scheduled to start in 2001 with upgraded ships in service by 2007.

This project of course started years ago, initially as the Anzac ship warfighting improvement program (WIP) which aimed to provide the ill-equipped ships with an air warfare capability. But floundering beneath the twin burdens of cost ($1.5 billion and growing) and risk, this ambitious project was finally killed off in favour of a more modest ASMD capability.

The four companies involved in the WIP, ADI, BAES, SAAB and TDS, then formed an Integrated Project Team with the DMO's Directorate of Surface War Systems A, and were awarded a series of funded 'consolation' studies. Only one, led by SAAB but with contributions from other IPT members, appeared to have anything to do with the subject matter. Other studies covered the Kidd acquisition (ADI), air warfare destroyers (Tenix), and naval air warfare doctrine (BAES).

The ASMD study was tasked with developing a range of capability options for a particular threat (somewhat benign we understand) under a given dollar cap (less than $500 million). These were to be developed around an improved surveillance radar, a second channel of fire and Link-16. The narrow scope of the study resulted in a listing of equipment-specific 'core' and 'important' modifications, the former including upgrades to radar, fire control system and the combat management system. The latter included Link-16, IR Search & Track, 3D radar, VSRAD missile system (eg Mistral), and a softkill EA system.

The DSTO study
The report was received by the DCIC last August, in the run-up to the White Paper, but aside from informing the Defence Capability Plan, it went nowhere. At the time we understood that it was 'always envisaged' that a more comprehensive study of this to
Miffed perhaps that it hadn't been offered the opportunity to contribute to the earlier study, MOD is holding this one close to its chest - in the person of Dr Bernie Kachoyan (Head Surface & Air Warfare) - to the concern of some of the original industry participants, keen to assist with the study, including with modelling and algorithms of their proprietary systems.

But Kachoyan has extensive modelling and other resources to draw upon, including computer simulations, to assess the effectiveness of different sensor or weapon systems and of platforms in tactical scenarios. MOD was heavily involved in the WIP and had contributed significantly to decisions regarding surface combatant acquisition and upgrades, most recently for the FFG and ANZAC classes.

While we don't pretend to be privy to the terms of reference for the MOD study we do know that it is being developed within the context of a more complex and more intense threat environment. We understand that it involves confirming the performance of the core capabilities proposed in the previous study and prioritising the important changes, in a scenario that embraces:

* regional proliferation of highly capable anti-ship missiles, including cruise missiles

* a much more complex and demanding ECM/ECCM environment

* the more difficult geography of the littoral rather than the blue water battle space

This of course is a far cry from the benign environment that applied to the earlier activity and it would be surprising if MOD did not propose additional capabilities, necessary to defeat the threats of today rather than those of the '80s, beyond those proposed in the earlier study.

As we know ASMs showed their devastating capabilities during the Falklands and the Gulf confrontations when relatively simple Exocet missiles showed themselves capable of destroying - or disabling - naval vessels such as HMS Sheffield and the USS Stark. Today, precision guided ASMs, like ground to air and air to air missiles, are now highly developed and infinitely more capable than they were during those events and they present the most serious surface threat to warships.

Flight programmable profiles enable ASMs to manoeuvre laterally during the approach phase switching to sea-skimming or high diving (pop-up) during their terminal flight phase. In sea-skimming mode the missiles fly between three and five metres above the sea surface, making them difficult to detect against a background of radar and optical sea clutter. In the pop-up, high diving mode the missiles may sea-skim during the approach phase then, during the terminal phase, climb very abruptly to several hundred metres to dive at a very high angle, perhaps as high as 85o, onto the target, thus optimising the penetration of the thin upper deck of a ship. This manoeuvre also tends to distract the defensive assets of the ship from other sea-skimmers fired as part of a salvo.

Confronted with this sort of performance the development of an effective countermeasure system (ASMD) is both complex and expensive. Broadly speaking ASM countermeasures fall into three types: tactical, offensive, and defensive. Tactical countermeasures begin with knowing where the hostile ASM launch platform is and either turning it away or destroying it before it gets within attacking range.

Defensive countermeasures against ASMs include sensors and soft and hard kill weapons systems. The sensor capability is extremely limited on Anzac ships, particularly for detecting small, supersonic targets and, as reported elsewhere in this issue, news that one Anzac ship is to be equipped with an Australian 3D phased array radar (CEA-FAR) suggests Navy is not unaware of this shortcoming.

The primary soft kill weapon is Nulka, a repeater decoy which, in flight, detects RF homing radiation from a missile, amplifies them and then retransmits them at a higher power than the reflections from a ship. But Nulka is ineffective against missiles that use EO/IR passive homing techniques, although an IR homing missile decoy variant is likely to emerge.

The Super RBOC system launches radar chaff at the wavelength the missile is using to illuminate the ship and is also capable of launching a cloud of flares to seduce an IR homing missile. Neither of these systems are completely effective counters to intelligent missiles that use signature structure in the detection and homing process.

What will surely be evident to Dr Kachoyan, as he reviews ASMD capabilities within the heightened threat scenario presented to him, is that the 'core' capabilities proposed in the earlier study by industry (necessarily limited in its scope by the funding cap of less than $500 million) at best will only ameliorate the threat posed by ASMs and more protection will be required.

Aware of the limitations of the 'core' proposals, SAAB proposed upgrading its combat management system to Mk 3E enabling it to host their proprietary Multi Sensor Tracker software and thus track multiple supersonic targets (eg: salvo firings). It would do this not only by using sources such as the existing Anzac Target Indication Radar (TIR) but it could also be used to fuse TIR data with that from non-'core' sensors, such as IR Search & Track ('important'), 3D PA Radar (referred to earlier) and the ship's ESM system.

Navy sees IRS&T as being very desirable, contributing to a diversity of sensors which is particularly important in the more difficult terrain of a littoral environment.

DSTO has been a strong protagonist of extending the so-called soft kill capabilities described earlier to include an Electronic Attack (EA) jamming system with an ECCM threat programmable capability. While Naval diehards point to the limitations of EA - its effectiveness depends upon precise knowledge of hostile emission wavelengths - modern ES systems detect and hand on to the CMS/TDS intelligent jamming waveforms, bearing, range and other data, virtually instantaneously.

With a claimed detection probability of greater than 99 per cent in a heavy jamming environment, one ES system (C-Pearl) contains an active intercept file of more than 250 emitters and a threat library of over 5000 emitters. System outputs provide for direct connection to other EW assets as well as to the tactical data system.

C-PEARL is the first new EW system to be adopted by the RAN for surface ships for many years and logic would suggest that the system should be the preferred ES candidate for the ASMD upgrade for the Anzac-class frigates and for future capital ships. However, the Anzac's Sceptre ES system has recently been upgraded (to Thales-Defence Centaur specification) to provide a much-needed improvement in performance that may counter the candidacy of C-PEARL for this ship.

We have left to last reference to tactical countermeasures, which involve locating and destroying or deterring hostile ASM platforms. Locating the launch platform can be a difficult task for a single ship, but if part of a dispersed combat force - or even a small group of two more ships - the magnitude of the task is significantly reduced. The USN's Cooperative Engagement Capability, where ships interchange data by data links and interact in real-time with each other, is part of offensive and defensive countermeasures employed to defeat the ASM threat. Visiting Australia late last year CINCPAC, ADM Denis Blair, said adoption of CEC by the RAN would contribute significantly to interoperability between the USN and RAN fleets.

It is anticipated that Dr Kachoyan's findings will be considered by the DCIC, possibly by mid-year and that the ASMD project will again get underway. Depending to what extent the DSTO study has defined the capabilities considered vital for ASMD, it is anticipated that the DMO will then contract with industry for the implementation phase of this project.

It seems likely that rather than continuing with the somewhat unwieldy five member IPT arrangement, we may learn of an alliance between Tenix and SAAB, anointed and blessed by the DMO, as joint prime contractor for the ASMD upgrade, possibly with ADI and BAES in another subcontractor partnership arrangement.

Acknowledgment: Fred Haddock: 'ASMD- A Treatise for Beginners', Australian Defence Intelligencer, Vol 13 October 2000.

CeCOTS Console aboard ANZAC Demonstrator - SAAB Systems Pty Ltd has installed its CeCOTS Console prototype in the operations room of HMAS Anzac where it provides a situational awareness display for the captain.

The console was delivered in September last year and will remain aboard for at least 12 months. The purpose of the trial is to demonstrate new Human Machine Interface (HMI) principles and practices using the Windows environment, and to obtain operator feedback on the new HMI design.

The trial also provides an opportunity to evaluate the use of COTS hardware in a warship environment to determine its ability to withstand the normal warship environment of stress, vibration and shock. During the trial various new human interface concepts will be trialed as the ship engages in various operations in Australian and Asian waters.

The console is almost identical to the 9LVMk3E consoles being fitted to the Royal Swedish Navy's Visby-class 'stealth' corvettes, and uses the Windows NT operating system; however it has been modified to interface with HMAS Anzac's existing OS9-based 9LVMk3 combat system. The console has no 'effector' controls at present - the Captain cannot fire guns or launch missiles and decoys from this console.

SAAB has proposed replacing the Anzac-class frigates' existing consoles with the CeCOTS consoles as part of the ASMD; the Windows-based HMI of the CeCOTS console provides an enhanced display and simplifies operator access to some 1,400 function buttons on the console.

Adopting a COTS-based operating system will improve the combat system's supportability and upgradeability, according to SAAB - at present all OS9 software upgrades and additions need to be written by SAAB. The change will also restore system growth margins after the ASMD and USWUP upgrades.

By Tom Muir, Canberra