The development of airborne weapons poses very serious challenges for air defense. Modern air defense systems are faced with the task of increasing the maximum and decreasing the minimum range of destruction and similar requirements for the speed of targets hit.
Alexander Khramchikhin, deputy director of the Institute of Political and Military Analysis, is talking about this.
On the one hand, the problem of countering hypersonic targets is becoming more and more urgent, on the other hand, the defeat of small, stealthy and low-speed UAVs (including mini- and even micro-UAVs), as well as cruise missiles.
The second of the problems listed above makes the need to create new reconnaissance equipment even more urgent, which has become extremely urgent for a long time in the context of the rapid development of electronic warfare equipment and stealth technology. An additional problem is the fight against high-precision weapons (UR, UAB), which requires a significant increase in the ammunition load of the air defense missile system.
UAV X-47B is created using technologies to ensure stealth in the radar spectrum
The mainstream in the development of SVKN is the mass creation of drones of various types (see the article "UAVs from MQ-9" Reaper "to WJ-600 mark a new era").
US Navy orders 361 Tomahawk Block IV cruise missiles from Raytheon with a total value of $ 337.84 million
The second mainstream is the rapid development of long-range cruise missiles (see the article "Tomahawk" and its successors ").
Finally, as mentioned above, precision-guided munitions, which are, in fact, short-range cruise missiles, are becoming an increasingly serious problem (however, this "short" range is becoming larger and larger, reaching already up to hundreds of kilometers). Here, the United States has succeeded most of all, having created many types of such ammunition (GBU-27, AGM-154 JSOW, AGM-137 TSSAM, AGM-158 JASSM and many others).
The laser-guided bomb GBU-27 F-117A can carry out bombing from level flight, pitching, diving, pitching after exiting a dive, as well as dropping loads from a low altitude
And, of course, the traditional manned aircraft (see the article "Manned combat aircraft - the limit of development?" air defense life.
Fighter of the fifth generation T-50 PAK FA. At an altitude of 20 thousand meters, it develops a supersonic speed of up to 2600 km / h without the use of afterburner
An increase in the flight range of high-precision weapons more and more often removes aircraft from the air defense zone, leaving the latter the thankless, or, more precisely, completely hopeless task of fighting ammunition, and not their carriers.
In such a situation, the effectiveness of ammunition may, in fact, turn out to be 100%: either the ammunition will hit the target, or it will divert one or even several missiles to itself, thereby contributing to the depletion of air defense.
The Vietnam War remained the only one in which ground-based air defense with the help of Russian S-75 missile systems fought with US aviation, at least on an equal footing
Improving the air defense missile system can lead to a serious crisis of ground air defense, which is demonstrated by recent wars. The Vietnam War remained the only one in which ground air defense fought with aviation, at least on equal terms.
After her, aviation invariably defeated air defense, and often completely suppressed it. Aviation has more room for maneuver, since, as an attacking side, it always has the initiative in the fight against air defense. In addition, space is potentially at the disposal of aviation.
On the other hand, ground air defense is much less dependent on meteorological conditions than aviation. Ground-based air defense has wider energy capabilities due to much smaller weight and dimensional restrictions on missiles and their launchers and the availability in some cases of energy consumption from external sources; it may have at its disposal a significant ammunition load of missiles and / or shells.
Air defense also has the advantage that the overload for missiles is several times greater than for manned aircraft. However, the share of unmanned SVKNs, which also have much fewer restrictions on overload, is getting higher.
As mentioned at the beginning of the article, modern and promising air defense systems and air defense systems are facing more and more contradictory requirements: one must be able to simultaneously deal with hypersonic orbiters and micro-UAVs that have the size of insects and the same speed as theirs. Apparently, it will be much easier to solve the first problem.
The S-300 anti-aircraft missile systems are capable of striking cruise and ballistic missiles, elements of high-precision enemy weapons, any aircraft and helicopters
Actually, back in the late 80s, many promising air defense systems (for example, the S-300) were designed to defeat hypersonic targets that did not yet exist. Fighting such targets will require "only" a further increase in the range and speed of the missile defense system, which will erode the border between air defense and missile defense.
"At the same time," such missiles, due to their long flight range, will be able to fight against aircraft carrying high-precision weapons, as well as against VKP, AWACS and electronic warfare aircraft. By the way, it is likely that the Americans are moving in this direction, creating their own missile defense system, increasing the speed and range of the "Standard" missile defense system.
Anti-aircraft guided missile "Standard-2MR" (RIM-66B) at the US Navy test site
Russia is fixated on "weakening our strategic nuclear potential," while in the United States, most likely, they think much deeper, broader and further. Least of all they are interested in our ICBMs, since they have not gone crazy and are not going to wage a global nuclear war with us.
They create means of dealing with promising SVKNs of a very different class and range of speeds and altitudes, and whose specific SVKNs will be is another matter. Hypersonic missiles will become a real problem if their size and range are reduced.
The air defense will not even have time to react to such missiles (they were discussed in more detail in the article "Increasing the effectiveness of aviation ammunition or hammering nails with microscopes?") Air defense will not even have time to react, let alone shoot them down.
The fight against long-range cruise missiles is a difficult question, but, again, solvable. The same S-300 was created, in particular, to solve it. As you know, the most difficult thing with regard to cruise missiles is not to destroy, but to detect.
Apparently, in this regard, radars of the decimeter and meter ranges will be further developed, while the air defense missile systems and air defense systems will directly interface with various external reconnaissance means.
However, if the speed of cruise missiles grows (i.e., while remaining stealthy and low-flying, they become super- and then hypersonic), it will be extremely difficult to deal with them, especially when they are used massively.
It will be even more difficult to deal with the massive use of small-sized high-precision ammunition, if it is not possible to achieve the destruction of their carriers before reaching the line of missile launch and UAB release. As mentioned above, the effectiveness of such ammunition can become 100%, since they either destroy targets or deplete air defense.
Finally, small drones are becoming the biggest challenge. During the August 2008 war, an Israeli-made Georgian UAV hung with impunity over the positions of the Russian paratroopers.
The GOS SAM MANPADS "Igla" could not capture it because of the too low level of thermal radiation, the paratroopers did not have a "large" air defense system, however, he could hardly have shot down the drone because of its too small EPR. And the burst from the BMP-2 cannon failed to get it, since the UAV was flying high enough.
Fortunately, he was not a shock one, but an intelligence agent, while the data he passed on to the "timid Georgians" did not help. If we had a more adequate adversary, the consequences would have been tragic. The massive use of mini- and micro-UAVs will create tremendous air defense problems.
It is completely unclear how to at least detect them, all the more so - to destroy them (not to beat them with a fly swatter). Apparently, the fight against small targets at short ranges (regardless of the speed of targets, i.e., both with UAVs and with precision ammunition) will be assigned to the ZSU and ZRPK, which will use both radar and optoelectronic reconnaissance means.
Moreover, artillery can fight against ground targets, providing, in particular, anti-sabotage protection of "large" air defense systems. In addition, only with the help of artillery it is possible to cope with the problem of the depletion of air defense ammunition in the event of the massive use of missiles and UABs.
Like no other type of aircraft, air defense needs lasers that will solve most of these problems. Shooting from guns at mini- and micro-UAVs, or the creation of mini- and micro-SAMs against them is hardly real.
The laser is quite capable of solving this problem. It is also ideal as an anti-precision weapon. Considering that for land-based and naval air defense the restrictions on dimensions and power consumption are much less than for aviation, it is quite realistic to create a short-range air defense combat laser.
If you focus specifically on the short range of destruction, it is much easier to solve the main problems of laser weapons: beam dispersion and power loss. At medium and long ranges, there is no alternative to missiles and is not foreseen.
Upgraded SPN-30 jamming station. Designed for electronic suppression (REP) in the extended operating frequency range of existing, including modernized airborne radars to protect ground and air objects
In addition, the most important air defense tool will be electronic warfare, which should ensure the suppression of electronics on the enemy's SVKN and the disconnection of communication with the UAV (and, ideally, even interception of control over an enemy drone). Iran has already demonstrated the effectiveness of electronic warfare by capturing the American stealth UAV RQ-170 Sentinel.
Thus, the promising air defense missile defense is likely to become a combination of artillery, lasers and electronic warfare equipment at short and, in part, at medium range, with anti-aircraft missiles at medium, long and ultra-long ranges.
