Prospects for the Development of the Russian Aerospace Forces. Electronic Warfare Aircraft
Since the appearance of the world's first fully-fledged aircraft EW, and it happened in 1951, quite a lot of time passed. The first plane was the Douglas A-1 Skyraider, which was named AD-1Q Skyraider. Then there were modifications with other letters, the main thing is not in the letters, but in the essence.
The carrier-based attack aircraft, which served for quite a long time and was retired when jets were in full swing in the skies, turned out to be a very valuable thing. Its fuselage could easily accommodate four people: a pilot, a navigator and two operators. It was, as they say, cramped, but not offended.
The aircraft was used in a variety of ways, in general the A-1 Skyraider changed many roles in its service, including being a radar reconnaissance aircraft and a jammer, everything depended on what equipment was suspended under the wings. The guns (4 x 20 mm) with ammunition were removed, and by weight it is almost one and a half tons, so there was something to place in their place.
So began story aviation Electronic warfare. And it continues to this day, but, alas, Russia is not at the forefront today. However, let's leave history for now and move forward 70 years to look at the current situation. Who is putting pressure on whom and with what, so to speak.
Today we will consider only electronic warfare aircraft; we will talk about their counterparts in electronic intelligence separately.
So, the Russian Aerospace Forces have specialized EW aircraft. Three of them. This is the well-known and very well praised by the press at the time Il-22PP. Created on the basis of the Il-18, or more precisely, re-equipped from Il-18s taken from storage.
What made both customers and contractors do this: install a set of modern equipment on an aircraft that is approaching 35 years old? It's simple: none of the existing modern aircraft met the requirements for flight characteristics, primarily for flight duration. And this is the main reason why old Il-18s were pulled out of storage, patched up and repaired, and thus the Il-22PP was obtained.
Even if the Porubshchik electronic warfare system is simply wonderful, the platform it is installed on does not inspire confidence. "Beauty and the beast" as it is. But, alas, there is simply no other platform. So for now everything looks like this. The Il-22PP has passed all the tests, has been accepted into service, but all our aircraft manufacturers have been capable of is three aircraft in 10 years.
But experts say that even a completely repaired Il-18, which is Il-22, will not serve for more than ten years. That is, the operation of these aircraft is already in doubt today.
So it can be considered that the Il-22PP exists on paper, although the aircraft actually passed all types of tests and, perhaps, was even used in combat, although there is no information about this.
Potential targets for the "Porubshchik" included airborne early warning and control (AWACS) aircraft, radio-technical equipment of the complexes Defense Patriot type and military control channels drones. The impact of such an electronic warfare system on the network-centric control systems of modern armies, which are acutely dependent on the stability of a large number of communication channels, is difficult to overestimate.
And here the question of the possibility of application arises.
Let's imagine a theoretical scheme for using the Il-22PP in combat conditions. It won't be able to cover a group of its own aircraft, for example, the Su-34. It's too slow. "Hang" at some distance from the operating area? Who will allow it? It's enough to recall the tragedy of the Bryansk experiment, when the EW helicopters were supposed to provide support to the aircraft. And how did it all end? First, the Ukrainians shot down the helicopters, and then the aircraft.
In general, the practice of “hovering” over (or near) the battlefield to cover one’s own units, according to Alexander Pokryshkin (who knew something about air combat tactics), was already vicious in 1942. And it is absolutely vicious today, because it turns an airplane worth tens or hundreds of millions of dollars into a good target. Today, anti-aircraft systems send their missiles at 200+ km, therefore such an unjustified “party” of the electronic warfare aircraft will end very quickly.
Today the whole problem is that a beam of modulated radio waves, called interference, and a missile fly at approximately the same distance. Well, who is who there is a question.
Let's see what's going on with... yes, with the Americans?
And they have very interesting events developing there. Everyone knows that the army and fleet They make everything up themselves. So, in the army they have an electronic warfare aircraft. In terms of size and weight, it is approximately in the same weight category as our Il-22.
EC-130H Compass Call
Yes, the aircraft is from the same era as the Il-18, they were produced almost in the same years, and their flight characteristics are approximately the same, which is not surprising. And of the 14 aircraft produced, 4 (four) aircraft remain in service with the US Air Force. And even those are on their last legs after participating in operations with Iraq.
And here it is interesting, what are the Americans going to give their Air Force in terms of a support/EW aircraft? Maybe based on the Boeing 737? 747?
You guessed wrong. The Gulfstream G550 business jet won the competition. On November 14, 2023, the US Air Force command made this decision and assigned the new Compass Call platform the designation EA-37B.
Meanwhile, the Gulfstream G550 is three and a half times lighter than the Hercules, more than two times smaller, and so on.
And what do we have in naval aviation? Well, everything is well known there, we have the Boeing EA-18G Growler. Well known and has proven itself excellent in less than 20 years of service.
What is so strong about this aircraft, which can be considered the best electronic warfare aircraft in the world today? Because it is so well integrated into the structure of a carrier-based aviation squadron. It is practically the same F/A-18 as those that take off with bombs and missiles, it just has a completely different load. But: it flies at the same (and even slightly higher) speed as the standard fighter-attack aircraft such as the "Hornet", climbs to the same altitude and its range is absolutely the same.
That is, the EA-18G Growler is a fully-fledged carrier-based squadron support aircraft, which is capable of flying nearby/slightly to the side and, with its actions, eliminating problems along the path of this squadron.
And he has a full set for this:
- ALQ-99 jamming system in suspended containers with individual power supply. The system, of course, to put it mildly, is not new, not without its shortcomings, but time-tested and modernized as far as possible;
- ALQ-218(V)2 electronic warfare system. This is a serious thing, it is a passive system for detecting everything that moves in the air. The detected radiation is processed, determined, and either a generated personal interference or an AGM-88 HARM anti-radar missile flies to its address;
- an electronic warfare station for suppressing the LR-700 radar. This is if you don’t want to waste a missile;
- AN/ALE-50 or AN/ALE-55 towed optical fiber jamming station;
And, of course, a wide range of traps, decoys and other useful things.
Overall, a very good set. And in operations in Libya and Iraq, Growler showed that even if it is not suitable against the S-300, then the Crotale and Osa are nothing to it.
We will put aside the old Il-18, we will not even consider the Il-76 as a candidate, because the sad experience of the A-50 has already shown that such an aircraft is useless in a modern theater of military operations, primarily because of its size, speed and maneuverability. And the fact that it can hang for 8-10 hours is of no use to anyone today.
Unfortunately, we not only do not have any carriers like the Gulf Stream, but we also do not expect any in the foreseeable future. Of course, there is an option - to try to buy something like the Embraer ERJ 145 from our BRICS "friends", the Brazilians, on the basis of which they created their own AWACS aircraft Embraer R-99 (EMB-145 AEW&C).
The plane would be quite suitable, by all parameters. The only question is whether the American "partners" will strangle such a deal, and there are certain difficulties: here you have to practically reconfigure the entire plane, and for this you need to know it. That is, you have to buy a license for production, and this is expensive.
To demand that our aviation industry quickly-immediately-urgently get something up and running that could become a platform for an electronic warfare aircraft... Well, that's not much of an experiment.
Therefore, let's not shake the air with demands to cut such an aircraft in the shortest possible time, it's unrealistic. And let's start from reality, that is, let's take and adapt what we have. The way they adapted the Il-18, only let's not take a museum one.
And since we don’t have any aircraft like the Il-18 now, and won’t have any in the next 15-20 years (God willing, we’ll push what we have into the sky, because all these “Superjets” and MS-21s clearly don’t want to fly import-substituting aircraft), it’s worth looking at the practice of American naval aviation.
We have two simply magnificent platforms on which it is quite possible to create an electronic warfare aircraft.
The first is, of course, the Su-30. It is a two-seater, which does not pose the issue of operator placement. Like all Sukhois, it has a simply amazing combat radius. Well, plus the fuel capacity of the Su-30 in internal tanks is about the same as the F/A-18 with THREE external fuel tanks. And only if you hang a fourth, the F/A-18 slightly surpasses this indicator.
But to just take away 4 out of 11 suspension units... This is an unaffordable luxury in our times. So here the American is significantly inferior.
And the Su-30 can carry up to 12 kg of various weapons at its 8 knots, but there is such a tricky thing as the RLE - the flight manual, so it says there that if it is really necessary, the 000th will carry 30 kg. But without aerobatics. In a calm mode. That is, there is a weight reserve.
As for the power surge, everything is fine here too: everyone has long since switched to independent power supply: each container with equipment has its own generator, which is rotated by an impeller from the oncoming air flow.
12 hardpoints – there’s plenty of room to run. 2 hardpoints for air-to-air missiles, just in case, 4 hardpoints for the Kh-58UShKE (a very good creation from the Tactical Missiles Corporation), and another 6 for whatever you want. Additional radar, jammers, whatever you want.
If we look at the EA-18 and keep in mind the Su-30, the question is debatable, of course, but it seems to me that the Su-30 will be used to create an electronic warfare aircraft that will surpass the American in many flight characteristics. In terms of combat, this is a question for the equipment manufacturers, but for some reason there is confidence that the KRET corporation as a whole and KNIRTI in particular will be able to make it so that everything flying and crawling will shy away from the Russian Growlers.
And there is also the Su-34. It is slightly larger in size, flies a little further and is also capable of performing the functions of an electronic warfare aircraft. But there is one point here that somewhat reduces the effectiveness of such a process. The Su-30 can easily replace the Su-35, but as a bomber, there is nothing to replace the Su-34.
So the Su-30 looks preferable. Here is the first component of the prospective development of the RF Aerospace Forces' EW aviation. The base, so to speak.
The second component is what to equip it with.
There is a very good and fairly new complex "Vitebsk", designed to protect aircraft and helicopters from anti-aircraft missiles with radar and thermal guidance heads. Considering that it is modular, that is, its parts have already been installed on various models of aircraft and helicopters, there should not be any big problems. The complex is effective.
If it were possible to solve the aerodynamic problems of the antennas of the Rychag complex, which helicopters are equipped with (precisely because at their speeds aerodynamics are not important), or to develop new emitters, this would be a good addition to the Vitebsk.
The L187A "Lever" implements almost all the innovative technical solutions achieved to date in the field of electronic warfare: broadband active multi-beam antenna arrays, digital devices for recording and reproducing signals, adaptive control systems based on multiprocessor computing facilities and programmable multi-channel switches. Despite the fact that the "Lever" base is frankly Soviet, it is radically improved due to the use of digital methods of signal processing and the replacement of the element base with a modern one.
An equally good option would be to bring the Himalaya electronic warfare system, which has been in the testing and refinement stage since 2014, up to standard.
"Himalayas" was developed for PAK FA, which has already become Su-57, but how ready the complex is is a question. There is no open data on the complex, so we will not invent anything extra, as well as immediately answer the question about the "Khibiny" complex.
The Khibiny complex is frankly outdated, criticism of it can be found in Telegram channels in quite decent quantities, in general, there are many complaints about it. It is logical, the complex was developed since the late 70s of the last century and was presented "in metal" in 1990. Since then, a lot has changed in the world, and although Khibiny has undergone many upgrades, the missiles that it is supposed to drive crazy have also become quite smarter.
In general, what should be included in the electronic warfare complex of such an aircraft?
1. Missile launch direction finder. An optical-electronic device that detects the launch of a missile by its thermal trace in infrared or ultraviolet radiation.
2. The equipment for detecting laser and radar radiation together with the analysis units are responsible for distinguishing the operation of the radar and the radar homing system, then various methods of combat follow: an anti-radar missile will be sent to the radar, and the generated interference or interference taken from the memory units will be sent to the homing head of the missile.
3. Laser station of optical-electronic suppression. This is precisely against missiles with laser homing heads. Yes, such missiles are now very rare, but the station does not take up much space. In addition, LSOEP can be quite successfully used against missiles with IKGNS.
4. Active radar jamming stations. With memory blocks where data on all sorts of signals and jamming generation matrices are stored. That is, modern technologies allow, within a fraction of a second after receiving a signal about an aircraft being irradiated, to determine not only the source of the signal and the direction to it, but also, by comparing it with the database, to extract the most effective jamming from it and send it to the jamming station for generation and emission in a given direction.
In general, there may be more than one such station; they can operate in different frequency ranges, in different directions, and so on.
5. Towed jamming station. The Americans actively use their jamming stations of this type, covering a group of aircraft when moving away from the target. The jamming station hides the aircraft from the enemy radar, preventing detection and guidance. However, it is worth noting that it is more effective to use missiles with thermal seekers in pursuit along the course.
6. Containers for ejecting thermal and electronic decoys. There is never much of this stuff, and although every normal aircraft is equipped with them, it is a question of quantity.
Overall, the image of an aircraft similar to the EA-18G is obtained, which is designed to conduct electronic reconnaissance, jamming enemy radars and communication systems, and destroying radars with anti-radar missiles. The onboard equipment of such an aircraft allows identifying and triangulating sources of electromagnetic radiation, and then working on them with jamming or missiles. Another very useful point will be the network-centricity of the aircraft, that is, interaction with other aircraft and issuing them target designations.
And, of course, modern satellite communication terminals to ensure interaction during active jamming. Incidentally, the Americans had very big problems in this regard with the EA-6 Prowler, the predecessor of the EA-18: as soon as the Prowlers turned on their electronic warfare systems, they simply ceased to exist for the rest of the world, because their suppression systems first of all cut off their communications.
And since, for the sake of economy, the EA-18 was equipped with low-frequency AN/ALQ-99 transmitters, developed for the Prowler aircraft (don’t laugh, but they use vacuum tube components, and the antennas are equipped with mechanical drives), the EA-18 automatically inherited the communication problems.
AN / ALQ-99
The Americans played beautifully, developing and installing the INCANS (Interference CANcellation System), which provides stable VHF communications for the Growler crew when the jamming equipment is turned on, and then added the MATT (Multi-mission Advanced Tactical Terminal) satellite communications system, which solves all problems with communications and information transfer.
Alternatives?
Oh, the Americans considered a whole bunch of alternative options (27 units), from re-equipping business jets ($25-30 million per unit) to B-52 ($82 million) via options with F-35 and F-22. The cheapest option was a modification of a high-altitude Global Hawk UAV with four kamikaze UAVs capable of destroying radars. Such an option with construction “from scratch” would cost “only” $20 million.
In fact, it is quite an option, because a UAV with 5-10 kg of explosives, fluttering into the mirror of any radar, is guaranteed to disable it.
In general, the Americans considered many options and decided to settle on re-equipping business jets for the ground forces and EA-18 for naval aviation with further modernization.
Everything is simpler for us: there are no strategic UAVs and none are expected, there are no business jets and none are expected, there are no transport or passenger aircraft that could be re-equipped either.
The Chinese have similar problems, so they didn't torture themselves and created the J-16D, a pretty good EW aircraft. Based on the Su-30MK2. Yes, they didn't put in everything they wanted the first time, they had to remove the OLS and the cannon, but in the free space they got everything the military asked for.
It's a good path, why shouldn't we follow it? After all, it's better to have electronic warfare aircraft in air units than not to have them. Three of these ancient Il-22PPs on the scale of the Russian Aerospace Forces - well, that's zero. The Americans alone have more than a hundred Growlers, plus the second-rate Prowlers sent into storage, also more than a hundred in number. And then it will be clear that an old Prowler is better than nothing. And it will become clear on your own skin, as it was with drones.
Ironically, history has come full circle: in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the two-seat Su-30M (based on the two-seat Su-30/Su-27PU air defense fighter) was planned for adoption by the Soviet Air Force as a dedicated electronic warfare and suppression of enemy air defense (SEAD) aircraft to replace the MiG-25BM.
New is a well-forgotten old.
In summary: with all the wealth of choice the Americans have, we have only one path: the Chinese one, that is, an aircraft based on the Su-30. The path itself is not bad, the Su-30 is a decent aircraft, and there is something to hang under its wings. The rest is exclusively under the jurisdiction of KRET. But it is unrealistic to imagine future conflicts today without such aircraft.
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