In the last decade of the 20th century, the armed forces (Armed Forces) of the United States have repeatedly successfully used sea-launched cruise missiles (SLCMs) in regional armed conflicts (in the Middle East, the Balkans, terms and with minimal losses in manpower.
Such circumstances served as a further stimulus for the development of technologies for the production of this type of weapon, including through the deployment of further R&D in this area.
In the United States, the development of promising missile weapons for operational-tactical purposes has been actively engaged in relatively recently. The research and development work on the creation of SLCMs, begun in 1972, was carried out with long delays, which was explained by the fact that the control systems of this type of weapon of that time were not perfect enough, the missiles deviated from a given course and did not achieve the required firing accuracy.
Since 1985, thanks to the concentration of significant financial resources, scientific potential and production capacity, the United States has taken a leading position in the West in the development of air and sea-based CDs.
Characterizing the arsenal of SLCMs produced and supplied to service by the American Armed Forces of that time, it should be noted that the absolute majority of them were made in the nuclear version, which was conditioned by the requirements of the US national military strategy in the conditions of the existence of a bipolar world. Only at the beginning of 1987, the military-industrial complex (MIC) of the United States was mostly reoriented to the production of conventional SLCMs, which was facilitated by the events that took place in the USSR in the late 1980s. The military-political leadership of the United States approved the implementation of several sea and air-based development programs for the CD at once, as well as the re-equipment of missiles armed with nuclear warheads into conventional ones.
In particular, the efforts of the US military-industrial complex were focused on increasing the rate of production of three basic variants of the sea-based KR type "Tomahok" Block II, which was assigned the BGM-109 index:
• BGM-109B - anti-ship (TASM - Tactical Anti-Ship Missile) - designed to arm surface ships;
• BGM-109S - for strikes against ground targets with a unitary warhead (BGM, TLAM-C);
• BGM-109D - for strikes against ground targets, equipped with a cluster warhead (warhead).
In turn, the BGM-109A (TLAM-N) SLCM, designed to strike at ground targets with a nuclear warhead, has not been deployed on ships since 1990 when the fleet forces at sea.
The compliance of conventional SLCMs with the US cost / effectiveness criterion was demonstrated during Operation Desert Storm in 1991 against Iraq.
It was the first large-scale military operation to use modern cruise missiles designed to strike at ground targets. The intensity of their use constantly increased as the real advantages of this type of weapon over others were revealed. Thus, during the first four days of Operation Desert Storm, cruise missiles accounted for only 16% of the attacks. However, after two months of the campaign, this figure was 55% of the total number of all air strikes *.
* Of the total number of cruise missiles launched, about 80% fell on the sea-based CD.
From surface ships and submarines of the US Navy, deployed in positions in the Mediterranean and Red Seas, as well as in the Persian Gulf, 297 launches of Tomahok-class SLCM (TLAM-C / D) were carried out, of which 282 effectively hit the designated targets (6 CD failed after launch). Due to technical failures of the missiles, nine launches did not take place.
A new tactical technique for the use of KR, which was implemented during the operation, was their use to defeat power transmission networks. In particular, a certain number of SLCMs of the "Tomahok" type were equipped with a cluster warhead with a special composition to destroy power networks (coils with graphite thread, which caused short circuits of power transmission networks).
During the operation, the use of the CD eliminated the loss of both aircraft and pilots. In addition, due to the small reflective surface compared to aircraft and low altitudes of approach to the target, missile losses on the approaches to targets are sharply reduced. As a result, one of the main advantages realized by the command of the united group during an air offensive operation was the possibility of using cruise missiles as an advanced echelon necessary to suppress enemy air defenses. Thus, SLCMs secured the status of the main strike weapon used at the initial stage of an armed conflict.
Another clear advantage of using the Tomahok Block III SLCM, confirmed during Operation Desert Storm, is their all-weather capability. KR hit targets regardless of the presence of precipitation (rain, snow) and clouds, subject to strikes both day and night.
Thus, the advantages of cruise missiles, which were revealed during the entire air attack, over other means of destruction are obvious and significant. However, this type of weapon also has disadvantages. Among the main ones is the long term for preparing missiles for use, that is, preparing a flight mission. For example, in Operation Desert Storm, it took 80 hours to prepare for the combat use of the Tomahok SLCM due to the need to load digital maps of the terrain on the route to the target into the Tercom / Digismak system program (even if these images are available to the operators). Problems with the planning of SLCM flight missions arose, in addition, due to the peculiarities of the terrain in the area of the strike target: the terrain was too flat and flat (lack of characteristic landmarks) or too rugged to mask the object. Thus, it was required to introduce in the flight missions of SLCM the routes of approach to the target in such a terrain, the relief of which made it possible to effectively use the capabilities of the on-board missile control system. This led to the fact that several SLCM "Tomahok" approached the object along the same route, as a result of which the loss of missiles increased.
During Operation Desert Storm, the low effectiveness of this type of weapon was also revealed when striking moving targets - mobile launchers of ballistic missiles (none of them were destroyed by SLCMs), and suddenly detected targets.
The conclusions drawn by the specialists of the US Department of Defense following the results of the operation in Iraq forced the military-political leadership of the country to reconsider some approaches to the implementation of programs for the creation and development of promising cruise missiles. As a result, already in the 1993 financial year, the country's Ministry of Defense (MoD) launched a new program, the priority areas of which were improving the tactical and technical characteristics of existing missile systems of various bases and the development of a new generation of missiles on their basis.
In April of the same year, the US Navy received the first batches of SLCM "Tomahok" of a new modification (Block III) with receivers of the GPS satellite navigation system, which ensured approach to the target from any direction and required only one image of the terrain at the final section for the SLCM flight program trajectories. The use of such a navigation system made it possible to significantly reduce the time required for planning and preparing missiles for use, however, the guidance accuracy of SLCMs based on GPS data alone remained low. American specialists proposed to solve this problem by introducing differential GPS in the development of the subsequent modification of the rocket.
SLCM "Tomahok" Block III is equipped with a new warhead, the mass of which has decreased from 450 to 320 kg. In comparison with the warhead of the SLCM "Tomahok" Block II, it has a more durable body, which doubles the penetrating characteristics of the SLCM of the previous modification. In addition, the warhead of the SLCM is equipped with a fuse with a programmable time delay for detonation, and an increased supply of propellant made it possible to increase its flight range to 1,600 km. Finally, for the variant of SLCMs used from submarines, an improved launch accelerator was introduced, which made it possible to bring the firing range to the level of the ship variant
Programming the time of approach to the target allows you to attack it simultaneously with several missiles from different directions. And if earlier the flight task for the SLCM "Tomahok" was planned and introduced at bases in the United States, now a new system of this kind has been introduced in the fleet - the onboard planning system APS (Afloat Planning System), which reduces the time required to prepare missiles for combat use by 70%
The next modification of the SLCM "Tomahawk" - Block IV - was developed to solve strike tasks at the tactical level and, accordingly, is classified as the SLCM "Tactical Tomahawk" (Tactical Tomahawk). The new modification, intended for use from surface ships, airplanes, submarines with the aim of destroying both sea and land targets, is the most advanced missile launcher of this class in terms of its tactical and technical characteristics. Its guidance system has new capabilities for target identification and retargeting in flight through the introduction of communication / data transmission systems with aircraft and space surveillance / control facilities. The technical ability of the SLCM to patrol the area for 2 hours for additional reconnaissance and target selection was also ensured.
The preparation time for combat use has been reduced by 50% compared to Block 111 SLCM the number of deployed SLCMs by 40%
As in the case of Operation Desert Storm, where the US Armed Forces acquired the necessary experience in the combat use of sea and air-based cruise missiles in conventional equipment, the possibility of practical (combat) use of SLCMs of the latest modifications was realized by them during the peacekeeping operation in Iraq in December 1998 (Operation Desert Fox), as well as during massive air strikes against Yugoslavia in March – April 1999 (“Resolute Force”).
So, at the end of 1998, as part of Operation Desert Fox, the US Armed Forces actively used the Tomahok SLCM (Block III), as well as the modernized CALCM type ALCM (Block IA). At the same time, due to the fact that cruise missiles of new modifications had much higher performance characteristics, it was possible to minimize most of the significant shortcomings that emerged during the combat use of the CD in Operation Desert Storm.
In particular, thanks to the improvement of the navigation systems of the Kyrgyz Republic, as well as the presence of a unified system for planning flight programs, it was possible to reduce the time indicator of missile preparation for use to an average of 25 hours. for almost 12 days. As a result, the Kyrgyz Republic in Operation Desert Fox accounted for about 72% of all air strikes.
In total, during the entire operation, the contingent of the American armed forces used more than 370 cruise missiles of various basing, of which only 13, for technical reasons, did not hit their designated targets.
However, as foreign military experts noted, in essence, the Iraqi Armed Forces did not have a full-fledged air defense / missile defense system, and therefore the combined group was able to ensure the delivery of active massed air strikes, and cruise missiles, in turn, did not face real opposition from the enemy. Accordingly, an objective assessment of the effectiveness of the combat use of SLCMs of new modifications can be given rather conditionally. Much more convincing in this sense is the experience of the combat use of these missiles in an operation against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, whose armed forces used non-standard tactics of using their own air defense system, in connection with which the use of cruise missiles had its own peculiarities.
On March 24, 1999, in accordance with the decision taken by the leadership of the Alliance, the NATO Joint Armed Forces launched an air offensive operation (UPO) against the FRY "Resolute Force". The operation was supposed to be carried out in three stages:
- within the first stage, it was planned to suppress the air defense system of Yugoslavia and disable the most important military facilities located in Kosovo;
- within the framework of the second stage, it was planned to continue the destruction of objects throughout the territory of the FRY, and the main efforts were planned to be concentrated on the destruction of troops, military equipment and other military objects, up to the tactical level;
- during the third stage, it was planned to inflict massive air strikes on the main state and military-industrial facilities of the FRY in order to reduce the military-economic potential of the country and suppress the resistance of the Serbs. To participate in the operation, a
a powerful group of NATO air and naval forces, numbering at the first stage about 550 combat aircraft and 49 warships (including three aircraft carriers).
To carry out the tasks outlined in the first phase of the operation, the NATO Joint Armed Forces, within the first 2 days, inflicted two massive air-missile strikes (MARU), each lasting more than 3 hours. the tactical structure of forces included three echelons: a cruise missile echelon, an air defense breakthrough, and a shock echelon.
When delivering air-missile strikes, a special place was assigned to sea-based cruise missiles, which were part of all three echelons. This was due to the fact that the presence of NATO OVMS ships in the operational area allowed them, due to the high performance characteristics of the Kyrgyz Republic, at almost any time to deliver massive missile strikes at military and industrial facilities of the FRY and, if necessary, block the Otranto Strait, which connects the Adriatic and Ionian Seas. US Navy ships - carriers of SLCMs, located in the conflict zone, periodically replenished cruise missile ammunition from warehouses on the southeastern coast of Italy.
In turn, the ALCM strikes were an integral part of only the first echelon of the MARU, due to the fact that the number of carrier aircraft of the KR was limited, and their use was hampered by the opposition of the enemy's air defense.
In particular, preparing for a long-term armed confrontation with NATO, the command of the Yugoslavian Armed Forces decided to use the tactics of maximizing the preservation of air defense forces and assets. The minimal use of active and passive air defense systems, especially in the early days of the operation, came as a complete surprise to the NATO command. The radar stations for detecting air targets were turned off, which practically did not allow the alliance aviation to use anti-radar HARM missiles.
The Armed Forces of the FRY were mainly used by the mobile air defense systems "Kub" and "Strela". Their target designation radars were switched on for a short period of time, necessary to capture a target and launch a rocket, after which the air defense systems quickly changed their positions. Masked false positions, which NATO aircraft attacked, were also effectively used.
As a result, in the course of two air-missile strikes, the NATO Allied Forces used over 220 cruise missiles of various basing (more than 30% of all used in the operation), of which the targeted targets hit up to 65% of the missile launchers (according to preliminary estimates, this figure should have been 80%). Ten missiles were shot down and six missed.
At the same time, according to Western experts, although this indicator of the effectiveness of the use of the CD was not high enough, the achievement of the set goals of the first stage of the air offensive operation became possible mainly due to the use of precisely guided missile weapons. That is, the use of cruise missiles, and in particular SLCMs of the Tomahok (Block III) type, made it possible, despite the non-standard tactics of using air defense forces and means of the Yugoslavian Armed Forces, to ensure the defeat of strategically important enemy targets and gain air superiority.
So, during the first phase of the operation, the main airfields of the Yugoslav Air Force combat aviation were disabled, in connection with which the FRY Air Force aircraft were used rather limitedly. A lot of damage was done to stationary air defense facilities (command post of the Air Force and Air Defense) and stationary radar. As a result, as well as as a result of the active use of electronic warfare assets by the alliance, the centralized control of air defense forces and assets was practically disrupted. Air defense units and subunits acted in a decentralized manner in their areas of responsibility. By equipping the CD with high-precision inertial navigation and guidance systems, they were actively used to destroy important state-administrative and industrial facilities, which included military-industrial complex enterprises and large enterprises of the civilian sector, control and communication system facilities, oil refineries and oil storage facilities, television and radio relay masts, bridges. The average number of strikes against targets ranged from one to four to six CR (repeated strikes), depending on the size of the object, its protection, hitting accuracy, etc.
In total, during the first phase of the air offensive operation, the Kyrgyz Republic hit 72 targets, including 52 military and 20 industrial civilian.
As a result of the completion of the first stage of the operation, the alliance command, faced with a non-standard situation in solving the tasks of the air defense system (the use of "partisan" tactics by the forces and means of the air defense of Yugoslavia), abandoned the tactics of massive use of forces and means and switched to systematic combat operations with selective and group strikes on newly identified or previously unaffected objects. That is, at the subsequent stages of the operation, implementing such "harassing tactics", the NATO Joint Armed Forces shifted their main efforts from the destruction of the Yugoslav air defense system to the destruction of other military facilities, as well as civilian infrastructure facilities that directly ensure the combat capability and maneuverability of the FRY troops. Under these conditions, the main method of using air attack weapons was a flexible combination of continuous reconnaissance of Yugoslavian targets with the subsequent delivery of group and single air-missile strikes, with the advantage given to sea-based cruise missiles.
To this end, the composition of the NATO Naval Forces was increased to 57 ships of various classes, including four aircraft carriers. As a consequence of the most sophisticated guided winged weapons in the US Armed Forces, the most significant detachment of forces allocated by the United States to participate in the operation. Thus, the NATO naval grouping consisted of 31% of US Navy warships, of which 88% of the Tomahok-class SLCM carriers. The air group consisted of American strategic and tactical aircraft of the Air Force and Navy aircraft carrier aviation, and their total number reached 53% the entire aviation component of the NATO Allied Forces.
In the course of systematic combat operations, the KR were effectively used, mainly at night, to defeat reconnoitered and newly identified targets. The strikes were carried out on more than 130 targets, of which 52 (40%) were civilian targets. First of all, the objects of industry and infrastructure were affected: warehouses of fuels and lubricants, repair enterprises, oil refineries, bridges. In addition, in the interests of destabilizing the internal political situation, creating chaos and panic in the country, cruise missiles were targeted at civilian targets: pharmaceutical and chemical enterprises, power plants, television and radio broadcasting centers, schools and hospitals.
In total, about 700 sea- and air-launched cruise missiles were used during the operation against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. At the same time, about 70% of SD were used to destroy stationary objects with a high degree of security and a strong air defense system, and 30%
- for state-administrative and industrial facilities of dual use. In turn, about 40 cruise missiles, according to the results of the entire operation, were shot down by enemy anti-aircraft air defense systems and 17 were diverted from the target (strikes against false targets).
Regarding the assessment of the effectiveness of the combat use of the CD in Operation Decisive Force, Western experts also note that when the alliance command is assigned up to 40 targets, and from the second phase of the operation - up to 50 targets per day, the entire NATO OVMS and OVSF grouping (cruise missile carriers) struck an average of about 30 objects. The main reasons for this insufficiently effective use of CD were as follows:
- difficult meteorological conditions that impeded the full use of ALCM carrier aircraft;
- the small number of aircraft grouping - carriers of ALCM;
- relatively effective use of the Yugoslavian Armed Forces of anti-aircraft air defense systems;
- a complex physical and geographical landscape of the enemy's territory, which provided the FRY Armed Forces with the ability to create masked false targets and destroy the CD on bypass routes.
Thus, the use of cruise missiles of new modifications of the US Armed Forces in the Balkans provided not only a clear advantage of the NATO Joint Armed Forces over its adversary, which made it possible to completely gain air superiority in the shortest possible time, but also once again confirmed the need for further development of the CD, taking into account the peculiarities of their combat use. which were revealed during the air defense, and in particular the ability to hit moving objects in the presence of a strong air defense / missile defense system. In addition, a significant revision of the systems for planning flight programs of cruise missiles is required in order to increase their resistance to the effects of electronic warfare and the ability to provide independent, automatic search and target selection. This need is also confirmed by the fact that it is much more practical to use high technologies of programming systems and only to correct (help) the CD during the conduct of hostilities than to constantly conduct topographic surveys and adjust the terrain of almost the entire inhabited territory of the earth in order to ensure the laying of data into the onboard systems. cruise missiles. Ultimately, even the already created database of the terrain will have to be constantly corrected in connection with the influence of natural and climatic conditions and the activities of the person himself *.
* Already now, the imperial ambitions of the United States are forcing them to accumulate and store a huge database of terrain and objects in each country, while more frequent natural disasters, warming of the Earth's climate, changing the appearance of the coasts, the location of pack ice, the descent of glaciers, the formation and disappearance of lakes and rivers require constant mapping adjustments.
Such conclusions forced the military-political leadership of the United States to concentrate the efforts of the military research and production potential on the development of new software that will allow the on-board systems of the CD to provide independent flight adjustment and target selection, as well as the possibility of the most accurate use in urban conditions (reducing the CEP of missiles to a minimum values). The main requirements also indicated the need to expand the types of carriers from which the missile launchers could be launched, and to increase their damaging characteristics.
In the development of the implementation of all these requirements, already in 1999, the Raytheon Corporation received a large order from the US Department of Defense, which provided for the implementation of the program for improving the performance characteristics of the Tomahok SLCM over the next three years, and starting from the financial year 2004, the serial production of the new Tactical Tomahok KR . The total order of the Navy will be 1,343 units.
A fundamentally new difference in the configuration of the Tactical Tomahok SLCM will be the presence of a more advanced control system as part of its onboard systems, which will provide precision all-weather navigation / missile guidance.
Also, work is underway to expand the types of carriers capable of using a rocket of this modification. In particular, it is proposed, in addition to the existing VLS (Vertical Launch System) system, which provides vertical launch of the rocket from surface ships and nuclear submarines, to develop an SLCM launch system from submarine torpedo tubes (TTL launch system - Torpedo Tube Launching). At the same time, as in the case of the Tomahok Block III SLCM, in terms of their tactical and technical characteristics, the Tactical Tomahok missile in the ICBM version will not be inferior to this modification in the ship version.
In each of the armed conflicts of the last decade, where the US Armed Forces took part, certain tasks were set for the Kyrgyz Republic. Moreover, during the entire period under consideration, as the combat experience of their use and the improvement of the performance characteristics of winged weapons was accumulated, these tasks were concretized and refined. So, if in Operation Desert Storm, cruise missiles in conventional equipment, in fact, had to "gain authority" and consolidate the status of the main strike weapon of the forward echelon, then in the VNO "Resolute Force", in addition to performing this function as the main it was necessary to solve specific tasks for high-precision destruction of objects in urban development and newly identified (additional explored) objects. In turn, the successful solution of these tasks predetermined the large-scale use of this type of weapon in the anti-terrorist operation in Afghanistan, where more than 600 sea and air-based missile defense systems have already been used.
Thus, the experience of the combat use of cruise missiles, which allowed the American military leadership to identify and form the main paths of their development, shows that at present this type of weapon has occupied a very definite (important) niche: the CD anticipate the actions of all other forces, their strikes are powerful and cover the entire territory of the enemy. In the future (presumably by the end of 2015), taking into account the current pace of modernization and improvement of cruise missiles, but according to the estimates of the military experts of the US Defense Ministry, the range of tasks that these CDs should solve will expand even more, and provided that an effective information war has been conducted beforehand, up to 50% of all strikes in a given armed conflict will be delivered by cruise missiles.
Thus, in the future, when an armed conflict of any intensity and any scale is unleashed, the main means of achieving the set military goals will be the comprehensive use of different-based CDs.
