Diplomacy & Crisis News

Sebastien Roblin

Helicopters, Asia

The Z-19 lacks the Comanche’s most exclusive feature: the specially designed hull, sculpted and coated with expensive radar-absorbent materials to reduce its radar cross-section to 1/250th the usual size.

Here’s What You Need to Remember: It was reported in 2017 that an anonymous buyer had declared the intention to purchase at least five Z-19s. But in 2018 it emerged Pakistan rejected the Z-19 in favor of the Turkish T129 ATAK helicopter.

Developing a scout helicopter that balances agility, protection, stealth and firepower—all at an affordable price—is a tricky business. The Pentagon spent twenty-two years and $7 billion developing the hyper-advanced RAH-66 Comanche before throwing in the towel due to costs in 2004.

Less than a decade later, China debuted its own light scout/attack helicopter with stealth features dubbed the Z-19 “Black Whirlwind,” named after a hot-tempered berserker in the Chinese medieval bandit-epic The Water Margin known for wielding an axe in each hand in battle.

The Z-19 is descended from the popular French AS-365 Dauphin 2 medium helicopter, which China began license-building the twin-engine variant as the Z-9 and later evolved into armed variants. A distinctive feature of the Dauphin is that its tail rotor is fully contained within the tail in what’s known as a “fenestron.” 

Designer Wu Ximing of the Harbin Aviation Industrial Corporation used the armed Z-9W as the basis for a heavily evolved Z-19. This development path is reminiscent of the evolution from the UH-1 Huey first into a field-modified armed gunship, and then into the dedicated AH-1 Cobra attack helicopter.

Though a Z-19 prototype was lost in an accident in 2010, Wu’s new design was unveiled to the public just two years later and soon entered limited PLA service. 

The basic Z-19 weighs only 2.5-tons empty, and its two 848-horsepower WZ-8A turboshafts can drive it to speeds of 435 miles per hour and range up to 435 miles. Like the Cobra, the Z-19 has a narrow hull and a tandem two-seat cockpit for a pilot and gunner. Survivability features include light armor plating and bulletproof canopies, crash-resistant seats, self-sealing fuel tanks and three shock-absorbing landing gears.

To fulfill its scout role, the Z-19 has a sensor turret in its nose combining an electro-optical/infrared system, a laser-targeter/rangefinder, and day/night TV cameras which make it night- and all-weather- capable. Later, some Z-19s have been equipped with millimeter-wavelength electronically scanned array radar domes mounted on top of the four-bladed main rotor, much like the radar on the AH-64D Apache Longbow. A Z-19 so equipped can potentially duck behind terrain while its radar scans the area.

For armament, the Z-19 has two wing stubs each with two hardpoints. These can accommodate extra fuel tanks, heavy HJ-8 wire-guided anti-tank missiles (akin to the TOW), and rocket pods either carrying eighteen 57-millimeter, or seven 90-millimeter rockets for blasting personnel or light vehicle targets. Though lacking an integral cannon, the Z-19 can also carry .50 caliber or 23-millimeter gun pods. You can see a Z-19 with a mixed payload here.

Z-19s have also displayed quad racks for two lighter types of missiles. The fifty-eight-pound Blue Arrow-9 anti-tank missile is a smaller variant of the laser-guided HJ-10 (dubbed the Chinese Hellfire) with a range of six kilometers. The second is the Tian Yan-90, a short-range heat-seeking air-to-air missile designed to shoot down other helicopters and drones.

Intriguingly, the Z-19 seems to share a few stealth features in common with the Comanche. Its fenestron tail rotor is designed to dampen noise, and its engine exhausts are designed to channel heat in such a way to reduce infrared signature. This could help it survive as most short-range anti-aircraft weapons like the man-portable Stinger missile or even vehicle-mounted SA-9 or SA-13 systems rely on infrared guidance. The chopper also has its own self-defense electronic warfare suite and an infrared countermeasure system.

Of course, the Z-19 lacks the Comanche’s most exclusive feature: the specially designed hull, sculpted and coated with expensive radar-absorbent materials to reduce its radar cross-section to 1/250th the usual size. However, while radar-guided also pose a threat, the Comanche proved too expensive to fund, while the simpler Z-19 entered service, estimated to cost half the price of western peers.

But that’s not to say the Z-19 doesn’t have any shortcomings.

Under-Powered and Under-Armored?

In 2018, AVIC announced it was ready to commence mass production of an export model dubbed the Z-19E, aimed particularly its close ally Pakistan as well as Malaysia. The heavier E model (2.75 tons) has uprated 930-horsepower WZ-8C engines and can carry larger payloads, but its service ceiling is reportedly down to 12,000 feet from 20,000. It also comes with a new Apache-style helmet-mounted display.

The Z-19E doesn’t come with the rotor-mounted radar, but some sources claim the export model includes an integral 23-millimeter cannon—though such a weapon is not in evidence in any photos the author is aware of.

It’s also unclear whether any of the Z-19E’s upgrades are making their way back to the Z-19s in PLA service.

It was reported in 2017 that an anonymous buyer had declared the intention to purchase at least five Z-19s. But in 2018 it emerged Pakistan rejected the Z-19 in favor of the Turkish T129 ATAK helicopter.

According to Franz Stefan-Gady at The Diplomat “…one of the most likely reasons is gunship’s underpowered turboshaft engines, which have prevented the Z-10 and Z-19E from carrying their full weapons payload during tests.”

A military commentator on Sputnik News argued that the Z-19’s “narrow fuselage based on polymer materials, modern Kevlar armored panels defending against 12.7 mm bullets – these are suitable for a short incursion and a quick departure for home, but not for a serious military operation.”

One must bear in mind the state-owned media outlet’s job is to pan competitors and promote sales of Russia’s larger and more heavily armored helicopter gunships. However, the critics do have a point that a lightly armored helicopter could prove quite vulnerable even to relatively unsophisticated anti-aircraft weapons like heavy machine guns or rapid firing flak cannons. Reportedly, the PLA is experimenting with adding additional armor plates to the Z-19.

To be fair, the Z-19 isn’t intended to be used the way Russia’s tank-like Hind gunships is in Afghanistan, often called upon for close support to air-mobile troops assaulting fortified positions. The concept behind an armed scout helicopter like the Z-19 is to leverage its superior sensors to spy on enemy forces, and in a pinch, launch and hit-and-run attacks from relatively long distances. 

Whether the crew of even a hi-tech scout chopper can manage the risk level so neatly on a modern battlefield saturated with sensors and anti-aircraft weapons, however, is in question. The U.S. Army, for example, lost thirty-five OH-58s scout helicopter to accidents and enemy fire in Afghanistan and Iraq before retiring the type in 2017.

The scouting and light-attack role could also simply be undertaken by drones, which would be cheaper, stealthier and not put human crew at risk. But the U.S. Army’s renewed quest for a scout helicopter to replace the OH-58 shows that militaries continue to see the value in lighter armed scout helicopters to complement bruisers like the Apache and Z-10.

At last count, the PLA has 180 Z-19s in service, implying it’s deployed into nine to twelve aviation regiments. It’s been suggested (but never demonstrated) that the Z-19 could carry anti-ship missiles, and one could imagine a shipboard spinoff serving on China’s new Type 075 Landing Helicopter Docks in a similar role to the U.S. Marine’s Sea Cobra gunships.

Sébastien Roblin holds a master’s degree in conflict resolution from Georgetown University and served as a university instructor for the Peace Corps in China. He has also worked in education, editing, and refugee resettlement in France and the United States. He currently writes on security and military history for War Is Boring.

This article is being republished due to reader interest.

Image: Reuters

War Is Boring

Special Forces, Russia

Alpha Group is part spy network, part counterterrorism team, part general-purpose commando squad — and entirely terrifying.

Here's What You Need to Remember: Alpha Group survived the collapse of the Soviet Union and currently operates under the auspices of the FSB, the successor to the KGB. Yet its confrontation with Hezbollah during the hostage crisis in Lebanon remains one of its most widely discussed, and strikingly brutal, operations.

Russia and the Lebanese Islamic militia Hezbollah have become close allies in the civil war in Syria, with both of them supporting the regime of Syrian President Bashar Al Assad in the conflict.

Their relationship has not always been so friendly.

When members of Hezbollah kidnapped four Russian diplomats in 1985, killing one of them, Russia dispatched the KGB’s Alpha Group to deal with the situation.

Alpha Group is part spy network, part counterterrorism team, part general-purpose commando squad — and entirely terrifying.

It first gained notoriety for leading the assault on the presidential palace in Kabul during the initial phases of Russia’s invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. Throughout the 1980s and ’90s, its members participated in several high-publicity take-downs of terrorists, insurgents and kidnappers.

When the KGB and parts of the Soviet military attempted a coup in 1990, members of Alpha Group were given the job of securing the parliament in Moscow and neutralizing then-president Boris Yeltsin.

Alpha Group survived the collapse of the Soviet Union and currently operates under the auspices of the FSB, the successor to the KGB. Yet its confrontation with Hezbollah during the hostage crisis in Lebanon remains one of its most widely discussed, and strikingly brutal, operations.

The KGB created Alpha Group — or Spetsgruppa A —in 1974 in response to the Black September attacks at the Munich Olympics two years earlier.

Eight terrorists linked to the Palestinian Liberation Front had infiltrated the Olympic Village, killed two Israeli athletes and took several others hostage. West German police botched a rescue attempt at a NATO airport hours later. Nine more Israelis died there, along with five of the terrorists and a West German police officer.

Alpha Group formed in the fiasco’s aftermath. But the group quickly took on a broader role than mere counterterrorism.

When the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in 1979, Alpha Group and the KGB’s Zenith Group, another special forces unit, led a contingent of 700 troops in the assault on the Tajbeg Palace in Kabul, according to David Cox in his book Close Protection: The Politics of Guarding Russia’s Rulers.

The commandos entered the country under the auspices of protecting the Russian embassy. The assault on Tajbeg Palace on Dec. 27, 1979 was the first phase of the Soviet invasion. Afghan president Hafizullah Amin was hosting a party at the palace that evening. Numerous civilian guests and palace residents, including women and children, were present when the assault began.

A special forces officer who participated in the raid told the BBC in 2009 that the officers in charge ordered soldiers to kill everyone in the building.

“I was a Soviet soldier,” Rustam Tursunkulov recalled. “We were trained to accept orders without question. I was in the special forces — it’s the worst job.”

An Afghan named Najiba was inside the palace when the Soviets arrived. She was only 11 years old at the time. “The things I saw,” Najiba told the BBC. “My God — people on the floor. I saw a person … like a scene from a nightmare movie. Dead bodies. Lots.”

“Please try to understand that when there’s a battle going on, it’s hard to know there are children there,” Tursunkulov explained. “In any army there has to be someone who’ll do the harshest, most horrible tasks. Unfortunately, it’s not soldiers, but politicians who make wars.”

Amin’s 11-year-old son was killed in the attack on the palace, and Amin himself either died during the action or soon afterward — perhaps executed. According to Tursunkulov, the bodies of everyone killed in the palace were wrapped in carpets and buried nearby without ceremony.

Alpha Group continued to lead KGB efforts in domestic counterterrorism and counterintelligence through the 1980s. The unit targeted CIA agents and operatives and led the raid against the hijackers of Aeroflot Flight 6833 in Tbilisi, Georgia in 1983. They killed three of the hijackers and captured the rest, but lost five hostages.

It was the group’s involvement in a 1985 hostage crisis in Lebanon that earned the Alpha Group an international reputation as a vicious — but effective — counterterror unit.

On Sept. 20, 1985, the Islamic Liberation Organization, a part of Hezbollah, kidnapped four Russian diplomats in Beirut. A message from the terrorists “warned that the four Soviet captives would be executed, one by one, unless Moscow pressured pro-Syrian militiamen to cease shelling positions held by the pro-Iranian fundamentalist militia in Lebanon’s northern port city of Tripoli,” according to a contemporary report by Jack McKinney of Philadelphia’s Daily News.

Moscow initially attempted to open communication channels in hope of negotiating the release of hostages. But after the captors executed one of the Russians, Moscow sent in Alpha Group.

The remaining hostages were released within a few weeks, which came as a surprise to journalists, considering that many hostages taken in Lebanon were held for months or even years.

Brig. Gen. Ghazi Kanaan, who was the chief of intelligence for Syrian forces in Lebanon at time, was originally credited with orchestrating the Russians’ release. This account trickled out to journalists in other countries.

“Western journalists reported that the kidnappers were forced to free the hostages because a block-to-block search by pro-Syrian militiamen was closing in on them,” McKinney wrote.

However, according to Israeli sources cited in the Daily News, it was actually the KGB that negotiated the release. And in Hezbollah: The Global Footprint of Lebanon’s Party of God, Matthew Levitt clarifies that it wasn’t just your run-of-the-mill KGB operatives. It was Alpha Group.

“In one retelling,” Levitt writes, “the KGB kidnapped a relative of the hostage-taking organization’s chief, cut off the relative’s ear, and sent it to his family. In another, the Alpha unit abducted one of the kidnapper’s brothers, and sent two of his fingers home to his family in separate envelopes.

“Still another version has the Soviet operatives kidnapping a dozen Shi’a, one of whom was the relative of a Hezbollah leader. The relative was castrated and shot in the head, his testicles stuffed in his mouth, and his body shipped to Hezbollah with a letter promising a similar fate for the 11 other Shi’a captives if the three Soviet hostages were not released.”

While the details of the various “retellings” differ, the effect is much the same. Given the fact that the Alpha Group was dispatched to Beirut, and that the hostages were released so quickly when other countries, including the United States, had failed to facilitate such prompt responses from hostage-takers in Lebanon, it seems reasonable that it was Alpha Group rather than a Syrian search that prompted the quick release.

Russia has a longstanding policy of targeting family members of terrorists. The reports of Alpha Group’s alleged actions in Beirut are consistent with this tradition.

The Beirut saga is arguably the most sensational of Alpha Group’s operations. But the unit continued to play a prominent role in Soviet and Russian military, intelligence and counterterrorism efforts.

A Lithuanian detachment of the Alpha Group attempted to quell the secession movement there in January 1991, killing 14 civilians and injuring hundreds more when they seized the Vilnius television tower.

Later that same year, Alpha Group officers stormed the Russian parliament during a coup against Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev. They were directed to capture Russian Federation president Boris Yeltsin — or to kill him if it seemed he might escape.

Twenty Alpha Group officers refused the order, delaying the mission long enough for the coup to collapse.

More recently, the counterterrorism unit was involved in ending the hostage crisis at the Beslan school in North Ossetia in 2004. During the battle between the Alpha Group and dozens of terrorists, 330 people died, including 186 children.

The Alpha Group commandos were criticized for their reckless use of excessive force at Beslan, notes Glenn Peter Hastedt in Spies, Wiretaps and Secret Operations. Russian president Vladimir Putin defended his special operators, saying they had not planned on storming the school and did so only after reports that the terrorists had begun executing the children inside.

There have also been reports of Alpha Group fighting in the civil war in Ukraine.

This article by Darien Cavanaugh originally appeared at War is Boring in 2016.

Image: Reuters.

Kyle Mizokami

Special Forces, Americas

America's super soldiers.

Here's What to Remember: Every U.S. military branch has its own elite special operations unit.

Special operations forces have been at the forefront of U.S. combat operations in the last two decades. They are nearly at the forefront of risky combat missions—and suffer higher casualties as they are often deployed to remote locations and exposed to greater risks. 

A companion article details the special operations units of the U.S. Army and the distinction between various tiers of special operations units.

In this second part, we’ll dive into the special operations units of the U.S. Air Force, Marine Corps, and Navy, and look at recent challenges facing the special operations community.

The Marine Raider Regiment

 The Marine Corps historically resisted the creation of elite special operations units, instead designating some reconnaissance units as ‘Special Operations Capable’ with training for airborne and seaborne insertion. 

Today, these include four Force Reconnaissance Companies, primarily assigned to support Marine expeditionary forces, and three Divisional Reconnaissance Battalions which incorporate Deep Reconnaissance Platoon including specialized combat divers to perform beach and landing zone reconnaissance, and direct air and artillery strikes.

During World War II, however, the Marines briefly operated two unconventional Raider battalions involved in some spectacular island assaults, including an epic submarine-launched raid on a Japanese seaplane base. But the Marine brass disliked the concept and disbanded the units in 1944.

The Marines were finally compelled to form dedicated special forces battalions in 2003 by the Special Forces-loving Rumsfeld defense department. In 2015, Marine special forces battalions were then integrated into a new Raider Regiment based at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. 

The Raider Regiment counts three Raider battalions consisting of four companies. Each company has four fourteen-man teams called MSOTs. There’s also a Raider Support Group with three more battalions including specialist multi-purpose canine handlers, surveillance, and forward observers.

Raiders trainees undergo a three-stage screening, followed by a nine-month training program in skills ranging from demolitions, diving, foreign languages, close-quarters combat, and wilderness survival. Raiders have been involved in actions ranging from brutal urban warfare against ISIS in Mosul, Iraq and Marawi in the Philippines, to counter-terror actions in Mali.

Navy SEALs

The U.S. Navy’s Sea, Air, and Land (SEAL) teams have their origin in underwater demolitions teams assigned to scout out beaches and clear defensive obstacles ahead of amphibious landings in World War II ranging from Omaha Beach to the fortified island of Tarawa. 

The SEALS were officially formed in 1962 and were soon engaged in spy missions and riverine combat tasks in Vietnam, and participated in Operation Phoenix, a program to assassinate village leaders sympathetic to the Viet Cong.

Later SEAL ops include securing the governor-general of Grenada in his palace, infiltrating Iraqi-occupied Kuwait City, and taking back oil tankers seized by pirates. 

Just to begin training, SEAL candidates must demonstrate extraordinary physical endurance. The over year-long training program spans topics ranging from airborne and diving operations as well as marksmanship and demolitions.

But of those that pass the initial screening, only one out of three make it through the initial physical conditioning unit, the third week of which is known as ‘Hell Week,” in which trainees perform 20 hours of intense physical activity per day.

The basic SEAL unit is a sixteen-man SEAL platoon, which sub-divide into two squads. The Navy has roughly 3,000 Navy SEALS in eight SEAL teams, each consisting of six platoons and three eight-person special task support units.

Additionally, there are two sixteen-man SEAL Delivery Vehicle Teams equipped with specialized Mk.VIII Mod. 1 submersibles which can carry up to six SEALs for underwater insertion, and three teams operating small boats for littoral operations.

DEVGRU

The Naval Special Warfare Development Group (DEVGRU) is more popularly known by its former designation SEAL Team 6. Its operators are all experienced Navy SEALs who have undertaken an even more grueling training process with a 50 percent washout rate and occasional fatalities. 

Like the Army’s Delta Force, DEVGRU is a Tier 1 unit involved in counter-terrorism and preemptive assassination operations, famously including the killing of Osama Bin Laden in 2011. Unit members also specialize in hostage rescue and protect high-ranking individuals. 

DEVGRU is organized into four assault squadrons (Red, Gold, Blue and Silver); an over 100-strong sniper/advanced reconnaissance squadron (Black); a special boat squadron (Gray); and a training squadron (Green).

Air Force Special Operations

The Air Force has its own 15,000-person strong Special Operations Command, first formerly established in 1983. These involves a mix of aviation and commando-style units.

Special Ops air wings fly a wide range of unique aircraft which often work closely with special forces units of other branches.

Many of these fly variants of the venerable C-130 transport plane. For inserting and recovering commandos behind enemy lines there are MC-130 transport planes modified for low-altitude insertion and recovery and refueling helicopters, as well as CV-22 tilt-rotor aircraft.

To provide long-endurance precision air support, there are ponderous but deadly “Spooky” gunship transports bristling with howitzers, Gatling guns and missiles. And to impede enemy communications and remotely detonated mines, there are EC-130H aircraft with powerful jammers.

To map out just where hostiles are in the first place, AFSOCOM has a fleet of small U-28, C-145, and C-146 surveillance planes stuffed to the gills with hi-tech sensors used in low-profile spy flights across Africa and Southwest Asia alongside MQ-9 Reaper drone squadrons.

Special Tactics Squadrons

But there’s also a ground-pounding side to Air Force Special Ops in the form of Special Tactics Squadrons. These include specialists that are detached to support other special operations units.

Air Force Combat Controllers help assess landing zones and airfields in remote, and perform traffic control in these austere conditions. Two-man Tactical Air Control Parties focus on directing airstrikes in support of other ground forces. Pararescuemen, or PJs, assist in search-and-rescue missions behind enemy lines or difficult to access areas, as well as provide emergency medical care. 

There are even Special Operations Weathermen designed to assess weather conditions in the field that could impact the success of a mission.

Most STSs are grouped under the 24th Special Operations Wing, including the 24th STS, a Tier 1 unit that habitually embeds personnel with Delta Force and DEVGRU.

Challenges for U.S. Special Forces

Despite official secrecy, units like DEVGRU have been celebrated in press coverage and films like American Sniper, The Green Berets and Lone Survivor.

But as special forces undertake a large share of military efforts in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Mali and Syria, they are subject to being word down with near-continuous combat deployments abroad

Furthermore, despite the axiom that one “cannot mass produce special forces,” the ranks of U.S. operatives have more than doubled in size since 2001 in an effort to keep pace with demand.

These stresses may be contributing to an institutional crisis. In the last few years, there have been several exposés of breakdowns in discipline and systemic misconduct in special forces units, ranging from the murder of a Green Beret in Mali by Navy SEALs and Marine Raiders in North Africa to reports that SEAL teams were exhibiting high rates of drug and alcohol abuse, and mishandling or even mutilating with hatchets the remains of enemy combatants.

These scandals are leading to calls within the community to acknowledge the problem and reestablish standards and norms of conduct.

Another challenge lies in the shifting priorities of the Defense Department. While SOCOM will likely remain at the forefront of future counter-terrorism/insurgency operations in Africa and West Asia, the Pentagon is reorienting itself away from such missions towards preparing for possible ‘great power’ conflict with Russia and China.

Special Operations forces may thus develop new tactics on how their unique capabilities could counter Russia’s own unconventional warfare tactics in Eastern Europe, or be employed to surveil and raid militarized islets in the Pacific Ocean.

Kyle Mizokami is a defense and national-security writer based in San Francisco who has appeared in the Diplomat, Foreign Policy, War is Boring and the Daily Beast. In 2009 he cofounded the defense and security blog Japan Security Watch. You can follow him on Twitter: @KyleMizokami.

This article is being republished due to reader interest.

Image: Flickr.

Military and Aerospace Electronics

Missile Defense, Europe

Pretty fascinating.

Here's What You Need to Remember: The multinational live-fire Formidable Shield exercise last May off the coast of Scotland saw a French frigate knock down a supersonic target with an Aster 15 missile, while the Royal Canadian Navy tracked and hit another supersonic target with an Evolved Sea Sparrow missile.

WASHINGTON – Surface warships from several NATO allies tracked and knocked down ballistic missile targets from the sea for the first time sharing targeting information across a shared alliance network. Breaking Defense reports. Continue reading original article

The Military & Aerospace Electronics take:

26 Nov. 2019 -- The multinational live-fire Formidable Shield exercise last May off the coast of Scotland saw a French frigate knock down a supersonic target with an Aster 15 missile, while the Royal Canadian Navy tracked and hit another supersonic target with an Evolved Sea Sparrow missile. Both were firsts for the respective sea services.

The exercise, which simulated ballistic and cruise missile threats, was a key test for integrating NATO’s sea forces across one tactical network that can push information across a deployed task force -- something of incalculable importance in the confined spaces of Baltic Sea or North Atlantic if Russian missiles were launched from Kaliningrad or the Kola Peninsula.

While the French and Canadians hit their targets as NATO AWACS aircraft cleared airspace around the drill, Formidable Shield also marked the first key test of a NATO command and control structure, including the first at-sea deployment of Naples, Italy-based Commander Task Group 64, which runs the integrated air and missile defense mission for US Naval Forces Europe-Africa and the commander of 6th Fleet.

This article by John Keller originally appeared on Military & Aerospace Electronics in 2019. It is being reprinted due to reader interest. 

Image: Reuters 

Stephen Silver

Wi-Fi 6E,

Routers equipped with Wi-Fi 6E will allow consumers to surf the web even faster.

Just two years ago, the technology world saw the debut of routers equipped with Wi-Fi 6. Not long after, the Wi-Fi Alliance moved forward with Wi-Fi 6E, the next generation of Wi-Fi technology. This advancement was made possible by the FCC’s vote to allow 1,200 megahertz of spectrum for unlicensed use, something that Wi-FI 6E requires. Several Wi-Fi 6E products rolled out for the first time at the virtual Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in January 2021.

At CES 2022, which took place during the first week of January in a hybrid format, most major manufacturers debuted new Wi-Fi 6E routers.

“Despite several larger OEMs and Internet Service Providers pulling back from physically attending, the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) saw some interesting device launches for wireless routers by key industry leaders,” Counterpoint Research said in a blog post after the end of this year’s show.

One of the most notable new routers revealed at the event is the Archer AXE200 Omni by TP-Link, a CES 2022 Innovation Award winner. The router stands out for being the first of its kind with self-adjusting antennas.

TP-Link also displayed the Deco XE200, which is capable of providing Wi-Fi across 6,500 square feet. The company also announced the formation of Aginet, a new brand that will be marketed directly to Internet Service Providers (ISPs).

As for Netgear, the company rolled out the Nighthawk RAXE300 Triband Wi-Fi router, which offers up to eight Wi-Fi streams and speeds as fast as 7.8 Gbps.

ASUS announced the new ROG Rapture GT-AXE16000, a router that features speeds of up to 16,000 Mbps.

Linksys, meanwhile, announced the arrival of its own dual-band Wi-Fi 6 device, the Hydra Pro 6. The company touted that its 160 MHz channel offers a “true Wi-Fi 6 experience,” Counterpoint reported.

Per Counterpoint, the Wi-Fi market is expected to grow significantly this year, with routers featuring the latest technology likely to be adopted quickly.

“The major focus for OEMs this year will be to increase signal coverage and strength and offer faster Wi-Fi 6/6E devices at a range of price points,” Counterpoint said in its release. “OEMs and ISPs will work together to improve the Quality of Service (QoS), and as the fiber deployment increases across the globe, more demand will arise from xPON devices.”

Tom’s Guide released a ranking of the top routers from this year’s CES that included the TP-Link Archer AXE200 Omni, the Netgear Nighthawk RAXE300, the Linksys Hydra Pro 6, the TP-Link Archer AXE300, and TP-Link Deco XE200.

Stephen Silver, a technology writer for The National Interest, is a journalist, essayist and film critic, who is also a contributor to The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philly Voice, Philadelphia Weekly, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Living Life Fearless, Backstage magazine, Broad Street Review and Splice Today. The co-founder of the Philadelphia Film Critics Circle, Stephen lives in suburban Philadelphia with his wife and two sons. Follow him on Twitter at @StephenSilver.

Image: Reuters. 

Kris Osborn

Lasers, United States

Prototype laser weapons have been operational for many years now.

Here’s What You Need to Remember: The two military services are arming small tactical vehicles and some of their larger tactical trucks with precision-laser weapons to help find and incinerate enemy targets without needing to create explosive fragments.

Imagine that an advancing mechanized Army unit is closing with an enemy force on the outside border of an urban area when suddenly a small fleet of enemy drones emerge from behind tall buildings to attack with air-to-ground missiles. Approaching tanks and tactical vehicles in an armored column might suddenly be placed at risk if the drones were not previously detected by any air asset.

This is the type of scenario the Air Force and Army are preparing to confront. The two military services are arming small tactical vehicles and some of their larger tactical trucks with precision-laser weapons to help find and incinerate enemy targets without needing to create explosive fragments. Lasers would provide a more cost-effective long-term solution than current assets.  

Much of the innovation has been oriented toward engineering mobile sources of transportable electrical power sufficient to generate and sustain operational effectiveness. Gen. John Murray, the commander of Army Futures Command, says the Army is addressing these challenges and making rapid progress integrating mobile electrical power on combat vehicles.

“If you are putting it on a ship, I mean, you’ve got the room and you’ve got the power. If you are putting it in a fixed facility, you can build the room and the power,” Murray said earlier this year at an event for the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “The problem becomes how do you make these things mobile.”  

Prototype laser weapons have been operational for many years now. But emerging technology is changing the type of missions that these weapons can perform. The military services and defense industry companies have been working on software refinements, upgrades and enhancements to improve operational functionality. Part of this undertaking includes using new software to enhance the fire-control interface for the laser. This is something that could be used to increase precision, scale effects or increase power depending upon mission demands. A large truck-mounted laser could provide mobile air and missile defense for units on the move in combat. The high-energy laser could perhaps offer a protective envelope or blanket of defense over a particular operational area, allowing tactical and combat forces to maneuver at lower risk. This will require continued “power scaling” of laser systems and the exploration of newer kinds of mobile-power adaptations to ensure sufficient strength can be compressed into a small enough form factor to bring very substantial firepower to mobile systems such as Army tactical trucks.  

Kris Osborn serves as Defense Editor for the National Interest. He previously served at the Pentagon as a Highly Qualified Expert with the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army - Acquisition, Logistics & Technology. Osborn has also been an anchor and on-air military analyst for national TV networks.  

This article is being republished due to reader interest.

Image: U.S. Army, Flickr.

Peter Suciu

British Royal Navy, Europe

The ship is set to lead the NATO Response Force on a voyage to the Arctic. 

While HMS Queen Elizabeth may be the flagship of the Royal Navy, her sister ship HMS Prince of Wales has assumed command of the NATO Response Force from the French Marine Nationale as of January 1. HMS Prince of Wales will be the flagship of the alliance's maritime task force, which will take the vessel to Arctic, Baltic, and Mediterranean waters over the next year.

On Tuesday, the NATO flag was transferred to HMS Prince of Wales during an official ceremony on the 65,000-tonne aircraft carrier. The warship departed from Portsmouth on Wednesday morning to begin her 12-month journey as the command platform for Rear Admiral Mike Utley, the leader of the NATO task group. She will spend 200 days at sea while operating globally with NATO allies and other partner nations. It will be the first mission for HMS Prince of Wales since the £3.2 billion vessel entered service in late 2019.

Despite the early morning departure, many gathered at the best lookout points in Portsmouth to wave the warship off.

A Fresh Start

This new command for the warship comes just a year after the vessel experienced significant flooding that caused damage to her electrical cabling. Following repairs last spring, Prince of Wales began sea trials in April. In October 2021, the Royal Navy declared the aircraft carrier fully operational after she successfully took part in an international exercise off the Scottish coast. The vessel was joined by her sister vessel HMS Queen Elizabeth, which had recently completed her maiden deployment to the Far East.

The ship has proven to be more than ready to take on the flagship role of the NATO Response Force, a coalition that was formed to address major global incidents.

"We have got our orders loud and clear—we've got to be ready to respond and we will be," Prince of Wales' Captain Steve Higham told The News on Wednesday. "The great advantage for us is that we will be working with partners and allies from across the NATO alliance and that strength in depth is what gives us the real edge. This is the start of HMS Prince of Wales's fifty-year life. And to start right at the heart of NATO, as the NATO flagship, is really important."

The Queen Elizabeth­-class aircraft carrier currently carries both Lockheed Martin F-35B Lightning II stealth multirole fighters and Merlin helicopters for airborne early warning and anti-submarine warfare (ASW).

"NATO is the cornerstone of the UK defense and our commitment to the alliance is absolute, and it is a privilege to be the UK Maritime Component Commander moving into our vital role this year," said Rear Adm. Utley. "The Royal Navy is global, modern, ready and well-placed to support NATO in all its endeavors."

Peter Suciu is a Michigan-based writer who has contributed to more than four dozen magazines, newspapers and websites. He regularly writes about military small arms, and is the author of several books on military headgear including A Gallery of Military Headdress, which is available on Amazon.com.

Image: Reuters.

War Is Boring

World War II, Germany

One unlucky U-boat, the U-1206, sank during its maiden combat voyage after its captain used its high-tech toilet improperly.

Key Point: The toilet was extremely complicated. First, it directed human waste through a series of chambers to a pressurized airlock. The contraption then blasted it into the sea with compressed air, sort of like a poop torpedo.

By World War II standards, the German Type VIIC submarine was an advanced hunter of the seas. But one unlucky vessel of its class, the U-1206, sank during its maiden combat voyage after its captain used its high-tech toilet improperly.

Yes, this really happened, and was an unexpected and tragic consequence of a real naval engineering problem.

For years. crafty German engineers had been busy developing what they thought was the next generation in undersea plumbing. While Allied subs piped their sewage into onboard septic tanks, German U-boats saved precious weight and space by discharging waste directly into the sea.

But pulling off this latter operation posed unique challenges. The system only worked when the submarine floated near the surface, where the water pressure was low. One can only imagine the unpleasant work-arounds forced upon the crew when boats had to stay submerged for prolonged periods.

As the war — and Allied anti-submarine technology — progressed, submarines were increasingly dead meat in shallow water or on the surface. But by 1945, Germany’s toilet technology had matured.

Germany’s top minds had produced a newfangled “deepwater high-pressure toilet” which allowed them to flush while submerged deep below the waves.

Advanced as it was, the toilet was extremely complicated. First, it directed human waste through a series of chambers to a pressurized airlock. The contraption then blasted it into the sea with compressed air, sort of like a poop torpedo.

A specialist on each submarine received training on proper toilet operating procedures. There was an exact order of opening and closing valves to ensure the system flowed in the correct direction.

Now meet U-1206 and its proud 27-year-old captain, Karl-Adolf Schlitt. On April 14, 1945, Schlitt and his submarine were eight days into their first combat patrol of the war. The submarine lurked 200 feet beneath the surface of the North Sea when Schlitt decided that he could figure the toilet out himself.

But Schlitt was not properly trained as a toilet specialist. After calling an engineer to help, the engineer turned a wrong valve and accidentally unleashed a torrent of sewage and seawater back into the sub.

The situation escalated quickly. The unpleasant liquid filled the toilet compartment and began to stream down onto the submarine’s giant internal batteries — located directly beneath the bathroom — which reacted chemically and began producing chlorine gas.

As the poisonous gas filled the submarine, Schlitt frantically ordered the boat to the surface. The crew blew the ballast tanks and fired their torpedoes in an effort to improve the flooded vessel’s buoyancy.

Somehow, it got worse when the submarine reached the surface. “At this point in time British planes and patrols discovered us,” Schlitt wrote in his official account.

After taking damage from an air attack, the only option was to scuttle the sub and order the sailors overboard.

“The crew reached the Scottish coast in rubber dinghies,” Schlitt added. “In the attempt to negotiate the steep coast in heavy seas, three crewmembers tragically died. Several men were taken onboard a British sloop. The dead were Hans Berkhauer, Karl Koren and Emil Kupper.”

Schlitt survived the war and died in 2009. U-1206 rests on the bottom of the North Sea to this day.

This article by Elliot Carter originally appeared at War is Boring in 2015.

Image: Flickr. 

Stephen Silver

Omicron,

Fauci also recently had a contentious testimony on Capitol Hill. 

These days, it can often feel like everyone either has coronavirus or had it recently. That’s a result of the Omicron variant, which is rapidly spreading throughout the United States.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the chief White House medical advisor, said this week that he expects most people will ultimately be reached by Omicron. “Omicron, with its extraordinary, unprecedented degree of efficiency of transmissibility, will, ultimately, find just about everybody,” Dr. Fauci said in a recent “fireside chat” with the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Fauci was asked for his thoughts on the group of former Biden administration transition officers that recently suggested the government move past the “emergency” phase and into one of “living with the virus.”

Fauci added that while most people will be exposed to the virus during the Omicron phase, unvaccinated people will suffer the worst of it. Ultimately, Dr. Fauci said, the goal is to reach “control,” in which “getting the level of infection that causes severe disease low enough that we can incorporate this infection” is the ultimate endgame.

However, he added that while we’re not currently at the point where it’s safe to just “live with it,” we are heading in that direction.

It has been quite an eventful week for the longtime director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID). Per NBC News, Fauci recently had the latest in a series of Capitol Hill dustups with Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), a longtime critic.

During Fauci’s testimony before the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, Senator Paul criticized Fauci, who responded by blaming Paul for threats that have been directed towards Fauci’s family. This includes a heavily armed man who was arrested in Iowa in December after saying he was on his way to kill Dr. Fauci.

For a witness before Congress to accuse a senator of such things is extraordinarily rare, even in the most contentious of hearings.

During his testimony before the Senate, Fauci was also asked about a report from the controversial media outfit Project Veritas, which alleged that EcoHealth Alliance asked the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) in 2018 to fund gain of function research related to bat coronaviruses. NIAID, which is directed by Fauci, went ahead with the research. Fauci denied the report before Congress, per Real Clear Politics.

"What came out last night in Project Veritas was a grant that was submitted to DARPA, then it distorted it to say we funded the grant. We have never seen that grant and we have never funded that grant,” Fauci said.

Fauci was also criticized in some quarters, and praised in others, for appearing to call Sen. Roger Marshall (R-KS) a “moron” during the hearing.

Stephen Silver, a technology writer for The National Interest, is a journalist, essayist and film critic, who is also a contributor to The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philly Voice, Philadelphia Weekly, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Living Life Fearless, Backstage magazine, Broad Street Review and Splice Today. The co-founder of the Philadelphia Film Critics Circle, Stephen lives in suburban Philadelphia with his wife and two sons. Follow him on Twitter at @StephenSilver.

Image: Reuters.

David Axe

MH-53E Helicopter, United States

The three-engine MH-53E, 37 tons fully loaded, is one of the military’s most crash-prone aircraft.

Here's What You Need to Remember: The worst MH-53 crash occurred in 1988. Eight sailors died. Among other incidents, MH-53Es also crashed in 2000, twice in 2002, once in 2003 and again in 2005 and 2008.

On Jan. 8, 2014, a U.S. Navy MH-53E Sea Dragon minesweeping helicopter crashed off Virginia Beach. Of the five people aboard, four were rescued. Two died in the hospital. The Navy called off the search for the fifth crewman, pilot Sean Christopher Snyder.

The three-engine MH-53E, 37 tons fully loaded, is one of the military’s most crash-prone aircraft. The Navy bought 46 Sea Dragons from Sikorsky in the early 1980s. Fourteen of them have been destroyed, killing 32 people in total.

It’s not for no reason that the Navy is eager to retire the MH-53E. The fleet’s 2021 budget proposal asks Congress for permission to sideline the Sea Dragons starting in 2022. Smaller MH-60s could replace them, although some lawmakers have urged the Navy to acquire new CH-53Ks for the minesweeping role.

As of 2008, the MH-53E fleet had a crash rate of nearly six incidents per 100,000 flight hours. On average, the Navy loses one of its approximately 3,000 aircraft every 100,000 flight hours. Helicopters crash at a slightly higher rate of roughly two per 100,000 hours. Depending on what you’re comparing it to, the MH-53E crashes at a rate between three and six times normal.

The giant helicopter’s old, complex design is one reason. Leadership is another. The way the Sea Dragon is used is also a factor.

The worst crash occurred in 1988. Eight sailors died. Among other incidents, MH-53Es also crashed in 2000, twice in 2002, once in 2003 and again in 2005 and 2008. In 2012, two Sea Dragons were destroyed in accidents and another was damaged. A Navy investigation of Helicopter Mine Countermeasures Squadron 15 and the overall Sea Dragon force uncovered lax training procedures.

The sailing branch fired HM-15 commander Sara Santoski. “Initial findings from the assessment show that Cmdr. Santoski failed to strictly enforce appropriate operational, maintenance and safety standards and that she failed to ensure a proper command climate,” the Navy said in a statement.

But the MH-53E itself is partly to blame for its history of destruction. An upgraded version of Sikorsky’s classic S-65, the Sea Dragon is an analogue helicopter in a digital age. “When you pull the stick, you’re pulling actual metal wires on an engine,” a former sailor told Military.com on condition of anonymity.

“There’s not some electronic signal telling the engine to rev up or rev down, or telling the blades to angle up or angle down. It’s just a really old system and leads to a lot of mishaps.”

Moreover, the MH-53E spends most of its time at low altitude, towing a pickup truck-size mine-hunting sled—a sort of raft fitted with equipment for triggering sea mines. “If you can imagine fighting the winds over the ocean,” the sailor told Military.com. “It puts a lot of stress on the aircraft.”

The Navy for a long time stood by the Sea Dragon despite its high accident rate. “The MH-53E has been a workforce for the Navy for [many years],” Capt. Todd Flannery said in 2014. “I am confident and proud of the contributions the Sea Dragon has made and look forward to its continued service to the fleet.”

That “continued service” could end in just a couple of years.

David Axe served as the defense editor of The National Interest. He is the author of the graphic novels War Fix, War Is Boring and Machete Squad.

This article is being republished due to reader interest.

Image: U.S. Navy Flickr. 

Trevor Filseth

Lebanon Crisis, Middle East

Lebanon's government has done little to address the country's economic woes. 

Traffic delays mounted throughout Lebanon on Thursday as striking members of the country’s public transportation union blocked roads with their vehicles to protest the government’s ineffective response to the country’s deepening economic crisis.

Several other labor unions also participated in the strike, leading Lebanon’s remaining businesses to largely halt their operations throughout Thursday. Universities and schools throughout the country were also closed due to road closures, and protests took place on highways and city streets from 5 a.m. until the evening. The drivers’ main demand has been the restoration of fuel subsidies, which the government lifted earlier in the year in order to save money.

Lebanon’s banking sector, once the largest and most sophisticated in the Middle East, failed in 2019. The World Bank described the resulting collapse, in which the Lebanese pound fell from 1,500 per dollar to more than 30,000 per dollar, as one of the worst financial collapses in the world since 1850. Today, four out of five Lebanese citizens live in poverty, and the army’s food is being supplied by a foreign country. The country’s economy shrunk by an estimated 7 percent in 2021, a significant improvement from its loss of 20.2 percent in 2020, per the World Bank.

The devastation of the country’s economy has also been complemented by ongoing fallout from the enormous explosion that leveled downtown Beirut in August 2020. Many citizens are upset that the government has not revealed the cause of the explosion.

In addition to the anger caused by the economic crisis, many Lebanese citizens have expressed frustration that their government’s apparent corruption and mismanagement seem to have remained intact. A new cabinet that committed to fixing the economy in September has not met in three months, and various factions have battled over the investigation into the causes of the port explosion.

The country’s embattled president, Michel Aoun, has pushed for the creation of a cross-sectarian commission to open a national dialogue regarding the country’s economic situation. However, this proposal has failed to attract support in the country’s sharply divided sectarian parliament.

In the West, observers have argued that Lebanon’s failure to implement badly needed reforms is in large part due to a political elite’s reluctance to surrender its power by reforming the country’s political and economic system, even though changes have been demanded by Lebanon’s international creditors.

Human Rights Watch indicated in its world report on Thursday that the “corrupt and incompetent Lebanese authorities” had “deliberately” failed to solve the economic crisis in order to protect their own interests, which the organization argued constituted blatant disregard for the country’s citizens.

Trevor Filseth is a current and foreign affairs writer for the National Interest.

Image: Reuters

Sebastien Roblin

North Korea, Pacific

A four-hour rescue effort saved 170 crew from Pledge and Pirate—though a dozen crew from Pirate and Pledge would never make it back home

Here’s What You Need to Remember: In February 1951, the port was subject to a U.N. naval blockade that would become the longest in modern history. During the 861-day long blockade, three more small boats were sunk by mines.

At noon sharp on October 12, 1950, the minesweeper USS Pirate had just completed a busy but productive morning off the North Korean port of Wonsan when everything went wrong at once. 

Hours earlier, the small, 625-ton vessel had led the five ships of Mine Division 32 based in Sasebo, Japan through two belts of contact mines laid in a channel just one mile wide, and fourteen miles long leading into Wonsan Harbor in North Korea. 

At the time U.N. troops were on the offensive following a successful amphibious landing at Inchon on the western coast of the Korean peninsula. Therefore, a second landing called Operation Tailboard at Wonsan on the eastern coastline was planned. But that meant the minefields barring access to Wonsan had to be cleared first. 

This was no piece of cake, as North Korean boats had laid over 3,000 Soviet-supplied contact and magnetic mines in the 400 island-congested square miles surrounding the port.

Knowing the division was entering dangerous waters, skipper Lt. Cornelius McMullen ordered all non-essential personnel on deck with life jackets to minimize the number that might be trapped below should things go wrong. Cornelius’s superior, Lt. Commander Bruce Hyatt, was also aboard to coordinate the actions of the five-ship division.

But for the first few hours things went swimmingly. Pirate’s crew detected and disabled six mines spaced 50 meters apart using the vessel’s mechanical “sweep” that fanned the water behind it, cutting the cables connecting mines to the seafloor. The mines then floated to the surface where they could be blasted by the ship’s gunners. Fellow Admirable-class minesweepers Pledge and Incredible located another string of four.

But at a minute past noon, a Navy helicopter orbiting overhead reported a third, dense ‘cabbage patch’ of mines near Pirate’s position. At the same time, Pirate’s sonar operator reported multiple contacts all about her hull.

Then eight minutes later a lookout spotted a large spiky contact mine straight before the Pirate.

Pirate’s sweep was designed to disable mines behind her, but her current trajectory meant she was bound for a deadly collision.

McMullen faced a terrible choice, as turning risked triggering the mine as well.

Crew member Earl Richard, at the time manning an anti-aircraft gun close to the bridge, recalled what happened next to the CNO’s Naval History Division:

“The skipper called for a hard left rudder to try and turn away from the mine, but we were so close that by the time the ship began its turn, the port side of the ship came right on to the mine and it stuck the back quarter of the ship on the port side. The hole was wider than a two-car garage.

Everyone on the bridge was blown in different directions. Some were blown over the side, and I was blown to the main deck. I can only remember being showered by what smelled like diesel oil and tons of dust and debris.”

Her back broken in two, the Pirate’s separate halves rapidly sank. 

Richard recounted the horrifying four minutes:

“When I finally realized what had happened, I was picking myself up from the main deck and heard a shipmate yelling, only to find he was trapped under several hundred feet of 2 inch diameter mooring line that had been coiled on top of ventilating unit. When the ship listed the line slid off and trapped his legs. One other shipmate and myself were able to get him out from under at the same time the ship was going down. It had listed to the starboard side and when it came back to the port side, we slid off into the water. With the other guy and myself we were able to drag the injured guy away from the ship before it went completely under water which was in about four minutes.

I remember the water was very cold and at first most of the crew began swimming towards the shore until the beach guns opened fire and began blowing guys out of the water.”

The three coastal batteries were situated upon Sin Do island three miles to the southwest. Another battery of smaller, rapid-fire guns opened fire from Ryo-Do island to the southeast. This map shows the positioning of the minefield belts and the two islands here.

Fellow minesweepers Pledge, Incredible and Kite began dueling the battery with their single 3” deck guns. But the most effective fire came from beefier 1,600-ton USS Endicott, with her four 5” gun turrets. 

Six years earlier during World War II, the Gleaves-class destroyer had sunk two German corvettes in a swashbuckling action off southern France. Since then she had been converted into a “fast minesweeper,” but had not lost her fighting spirit (nor her guns).

Meanwhile, Pledge surged towards the Pirate’s position in an effort to rescue the scattered survivors but was bracketed by accurate shellfire.

Just ten minutes into the engagement, a second huge explosion announced that Pledge too struck a mine while engaged in a hard turn attempting to dodge shellfire.

For 45 minutes, skipper Lt. Richard Young led a frantic effort to save his wounded ship as water poured into her ruptured hull. But the North Korean shore gunners zeroed in on the floundering minesweeper.

Finally, Young too had to give the order to abandon ship.

It was the turn of the even smaller 320-ton USS Redhead—named after the duck, not gingers—to come to the rescue.

The YMS-1 class boat managed to weave around the numerous mines in the channel, but was repeatedly battered by North Korean shells as she trawled for thirty minutes picking up survivors, all the while her smaller 3” deck gun returned fire at her tormentors.

The Incredible too helped rescue twenty-seven sailors before her engines seized up and she had to disengage.

Soon, Corsair fighter bombers from the carrier USS Leyte came howling overhead, blasting gun positions with napalm, rockets and bombs. Meanwhile, a paunchy PBM5 Marine flying boat from Navy squadron VP-47 flew overhead to help the Endicott’s and Redhead’s shellfire.

Together, shells from Endicott and Redhead managed to silence all three North Korea batteries. Navy divers belonging the Underwater Demolition Teams swam and boats launched from the Endicott recovered additional sailors.

The four-hour rescue effort saved 170 crew from Pledge and Pirate—though a dozen crew from Pirate and Pledge would never make it back home. 

The following day, Navy divers swam to the sunken Pledge and Pirate and recovered their sensitive encryption systems, before demolishing the wrecks. The ships and their commanders would all be decorated for their valor in action.

The amphibious landing at Wonsan never took place as it would be overrun by U.N. troops advancing on land. But just a few weeks later Wonsan fell to a massive Chinese-North Korean counterattack. Beginning in February 1951, the port was subject to a U.N. naval blockade that would become the longest in modern history. During the 861-day long blockade, three more small boats were sunk by mines, and over two dozen more ships were damaged by them and coastal gunfire.

Two years after the traumatic incident, the Pirate’s skipper McMullen received a mysterious package in the mail: the Pirate’s flag, recovered by an anonymous benefactor.

Sébastien Roblin holds a master’s degree in conflict resolution from Georgetown University and served as a university instructor for the Peace Corps in China. He has also worked in education, editing, and refugee resettlement in France and the United States. He currently writes on security and military history for War Is Boring.

This article first appeared in September 2019 and is being reprinted for reader interest.

Image: Reuters

Osama Rizvi

Supply Chains, World

Some data points may suggest that things are getting better but that is only in relative terms—supply chain pressures are still at historic highs.

There seems to be nothing new about this new year. We have an even worse wave of Covid-19 sweeping the globe, with governments reimposing restrictions, flights being canceled, and health infrastructure coming under pressure. Yet what is new is a realization that inflation isn’t transitory and that there is a need to raise interest rates—which the U.S. Federal Reserve will do, faster than previously thought.

However, another issue that has spilled over into 2022 is that of supply chain disturbances. Some data points may suggest that things are getting better but that is only in relative terms—supply chain pressures are still at historic highs.

The case of Hong Kong provides a good example. Bloomberg recently covered the country’s plight: new restrictions on general mobility in Hong Kong will negatively affect the services sector while flights continue being canceled and cargo capacity is impacted as the cost of logistics surges an expected 40 percent in the next three weeks. Many companies have shifted to air cargo as shipping remains problematic which is costing them dearly—these costs will certainly be transferred to the consumers at some point, contributing to the overall rising trend in inflation. Businesses are expecting a rise in delivery times and an increase in costs by 30 percent.

It isn’t only Hong Kong facing such problems; the issue is global. The disruptions in supply chains have understandably affected the food business as well. KFC has recently confessed to reducing its menu as the famous food outlet faces problems procuring certain items due to coronavirus outbreaks in different meat processing plants. Many other industries are facing a similar fate. Semiconductors, part and parcel of our life, is another one. According to a recent report, chip shortages will continue this year as well because of the Omicron variant. Mark Rossano from Primary Vision Network has discussed these issues in detail, revealing how lead times for chips are higher once again.

Global shipping rates also remain on the higher side with some moderate reduction. In fact, the Baltic Dry Index and China Containerized Freight Index (CCFI) have started to inch up and a continued trend in this direction might be worrisome. This is especially concerning given the rise in inflation. The Shanghai Containerized Freight Index was up 76 percent in the last week of December 2021 as compared to 2020. The number of container ships waiting at Los Angeles ports is still near its peak. Xeneta, in their latest outlook for 2022, highlighted that contracts for 2022 will be “at record-high levels.”

Due to shifts in global consumption patterns and subsequent changes in trade, the whole schedule of shipping containers, that are responsible for moving more than 1.9 billion tonnes annually, was disturbed and now a typical container spends more than 20 percent of its time in transit compared to pre-pandemic levels. As explained above, this has resulted in an increase in shipping rates to the tune of 80 percent on a year to year basis—according to one estimate, a 10 percent uptick in rates can lessen industrial production by 1 percent.

A very interesting barometer, the Global Supply Chain Pressure Index (GSCPI), also points towards the higher side. On the other hand, vaccine mandates may provide another hiatus in streamlining supply chains disruptions as an estimate says that such a mandate will lead to 22,000 Canadian workers leaving there jobs.

Many industry insiders and business leaders share the view that the current supply chain disruptions, that started because of Covid-19, will take time to improve. Almost everyone expects it to carry on for the rest of the current year. It may take well longer for supplies to run smoothly. The issue is not that the contemporary conditions are better but the fact of how bad the circumstances were. Manufacturing, transport, shipping, etc. all are long term process that can’t be restarted or realigned to function at an optimum level: the back-log needs to be cleared, the issue of manpower (people who are responsible for different checks and regulations and documentations as containers come and go) still persists and might get worse due to Omicron, inventory to sale ratio is still skewed, and once again the current coronavirus wave makes future planning a real challenge. These and other issues will persist. On top of which we must not forget that rising inflation across the globe will continue to raise shipping rates as well create further complications for global supply chains.

Osama Rizvi is an economic and energy analyst at Primary Vision Network.

 

 

David Axe

Cyclone Patrol Boat, Middle East

If the United States and Iran go to war in the Persian Gulf, the U.S. Navy’s smallest warships could be the first to see combat.

Here's What You Need to Remember: Ten Cyclones, operating from a base in Bahrain, comprise America’s naval vanguard in the Persian Gulf.

If the United States and Iran go to war in the Persian Gulf, the U.S. Navy’s smallest warships could be the first to see combat.

The Navy’s 13 Cyclone-class patrol boats -- also known as “PCs” for “patrol, coastal” -- each displace just 330 tons of water. An Arleigh Burke-class destroyer, by contrast, displaces more than 9,000 tons of water. A standard crew aboard a Cyclone includes just 28 officers and sailors.

Ten Cyclones, operating from a base in Bahrain, comprise America’s naval vanguard in the Persian Gulf. They are the only U.S. warships that permanently operate off the Iranian coast. Other, larger vessels periodically deploy to the region.

The Cyclones are not widely known. Even the Navy in the past has failed to appreciate the 180-foot-long vessels, despite the extreme danger they could encounter during wartime. Congress in 2015 struck the Cyclones from the official tally of around 280 “battle force ships” that the Navy expects to play a major role in a large-scale conflict.

Each packing two 25-millimeter cannons plus machine guns, grenade-launchers and two quadruple mounts for short-range Griffin anti-ship missiles, the Cyclones arguably are the most heavily-armed American warships relative to their size.

Since acquiring the patrol boats in the mid-1990s until recently, the Navy struggled to find a place for the diminutive vessels in a fleet dominated by much larger, ocean-going aircraft carriers, cruisers and destroyers. The patrol boats lack the range and seakeeping to deploy on their own, so the fleet must hire heavy-lift vessels to haul the tiny warships across oceans.

The Cyclones spent a decade in a kind of planning limbo. But then in 2003, the United States invaded Iraq. The patrol boats suddenly found their calling.

The waters of the Persian Gulf around Iraq’s sole oil terminal, where tanker ships hook up to load the precious crude, are too shallow for destroyers and cruisers. So to protect the strategic oil facility, the Navy deployed Cyclones.

The tiny but hard-hitting boats proved adept at shallow-water patrols. After the reborn Iraqi navy took over oil-terminal protection in the mid-2000s, the Cyclones shifted to more general missions in the waters separating Iraq and Iran.

“They are fulfilling long-standing and validated naval missions, functions and tasks, protecting U.S. national interests while providing stabilizing assurance to our allies and partners in a volatile region of the world,” the Navy said of the Cyclones.

To better prepare the patrol boats for combat in crowded, chaotic waters, in 2013 the Navy began improving the vessels — adding the Griffin missiles to greatly boost the boats’ firepower.

The Cyclones perhaps could outfight many of the gun- and rocket-armed boats and corvettes that make up the bulk of the Iranian navy and the naval militia of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. But any patrol boat lacking serious air-defense systems is vulnerable to shore- and air-launched heavy anti-ship missiles.

The Navy plans to keep the Cyclones in service beyond the current five-year planning period that ends in 2024. After that, the fleet should consider replacing the patrol boats with “PC(R)” robotic vessels, Navy lieutenant commander Collin Fox argued in the February 2019 issue of Proceedings, the professional journal of the U.S. Naval Institute.

"Medium-displacement unmanned surface vessels are coming to the fleet; but when, how, and what roles they will fill are open questions," Fox writes. "Rather than developing a new MDUSV from scratch, the Navy should take advantage of the requirement to replace the Cyclone-class patrol coastal ships to develop a capable, mature MDUSV—killing two birds with one stone."

The new robotic patrol boat could borrow the hull of the Coast Guard’s 350-ton-displacement Sentinel-class cutter, Fox pointed out. The Coast Guard also refers to the Sentinels by their class code “WPC.”

“The Navy should latch onto the Coast Guard’s WPC program to acquire a PC(R) that could also serve as a MDUSV development platform and, eventually, a MDUSV,” Fox wrote. “A vessel based on the WPC would take advantage of the Coast Guard’s sunk development costs and production learning curve, while also leveraging multiyear procurement to achieve still greater cost savings.

A robotic patrol boat, in theory, could perform the same dangerous mission that the Cyclones do, but without risking American lives.

David Axe serves as Defense Editor of the National Interest. He is the author of the graphic novels  War Fix, War Is Boring and Machete Squad. This first appeared in June 2019 and is being republished due to reader interest.

Image: U.S. Navy, Flickr.

Trevor Filseth

Russia-Ukraine Crisis, Europe

Russian leaders have questioned the value of continued talks.

The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) met in Vienna on Wednesday in the most recent attempt to de-escalate the crisis along the Russo-Ukrainian border.

The OSCE meeting marks the third attempt to negotiate an end to the crisis in the past week. Although a breakthrough is not expected, most security professionals have agreed that it is preferable to continue discussions than to break them off. The OSCE is a vital venue for discussion over the Russo-Ukrainian issue because it contains all parties to the crisis: Russia, Ukraine, the United States, and the rest of NATO.

Michael Carpenter, the U.S. ambassador to the OSCE, indicated on Wednesday that concrete results were not expected from the first week of OSCE meetings. The ambassador claimed that the priority of the meetings would be to find mechanisms capable of deepening international dialogue between Russia and the West throughout 2022.

“Our main goal is … to establish a dialogue,” Carpenter told a Russian television network. “Our positions are polar, but this does not mean that there are no elements and areas on which we cannot agree.”

The Russo-Ukrainian crisis has built up over several months as Russian troops have steadily gathered on the border, leading to alarm over a potential Russian military intervention. An estimated 100,000 Russian troops are present on the border, although precise numbers are difficult to determine.

Russian leaders have denied any plans of invading Ukraine and have defended their right to position troops within their own country. In spite of these denials, the Kremlin has also expressed its anger over NATO’s eastward expansion, claiming that the presence of NATO members on its borders, and the military alliance’s outreach to Ukraine, represents a major national security threat.

To resolve the crisis, Russia has demanded an unequivocal NATO commitment not to expand further east and an end to NATO training exercises in Eastern Europe. NATO’s leaders have rejected these demands, and talks have thus far failed to resolve the crisis.

The Kremlin announced on Wednesday that it will be evaluating whether it is worth continuing to attend the talks.

At the NATO-Russia Council meeting earlier in the week, Russian deputy foreign minister Alexander Grushko claimed that NATO was “trying to gain supremacy in all areas and all possible theaters of war.”

The deputy foreign minister warned that “unpredictable and … severe consequences” could result if Russian demands are ignored or brushed aside.

Trevor Filseth is a current and foreign affairs writer for the National Interest.

Image: Reuters.

David Axe

H-6K, China

Today just three countries operate long-range heavy bombers. Russia has 170 or so Bears, Backfires and Blackjacks. America fields 160 swing-wing B-1s, radar-evading B-2s and stalwart B-52s. China’s bomber force is smaller with around 130 H-6s.

Here's What You Need to Know: But the H-6K could have a big weakness — one that actually has little to do with the bomber itself.

Today just three countries operate long-range heavy bombers. Russia has 170 or so Bears, Backfires and Blackjacks. America fields 160 swing-wing B-1s, radar-evading B-2s and stalwart B-52s.

China’s bomber force is smaller with around 130 H-6s. And most of the H-6s, copies of Russia’s Cold War Tu-16, lack the long range and heavy payload that many of the Russian and American bombers boast.

But that’s changing. After years of work, the Chinese air force has reportedly outfitted two regiments—together possessing around 36 bombers — with a new, much more capable “K” version of the H-6.

The H-6K is Beijing’s B-52 — a far-flying, fuel-efficient heavy bomber combining a simple, time-tested airframe with modern electronics and powerful, precision weaponry. Although to be fair, the B-52 flies much farther with more bombs and missiles.

Still, over the vast Pacific Ocean, where the tyranny of distance prevents most aircraft from operating efficiently, the H-6K could prove to be one of China’s most important planes in wartime.

But the H-6K could have a big weakness — one that actually has little to do with the bomber itself.

Tupolevs forever

The H-6K is a 21st-century version of a Soviet bomber that first flew in April 1952. The Tupolev design bureau’s Tu-16 was the Soviet Union’s first big, jet-propelled bomber. Powered by two AM-3 turbojets buried in the wing roots, the subsonic Tu-16 could haul up to 10 tons of bombs — nuclear or conventional.

With a standard bombload and no aerial refueling, a Tu-16 could fly more than 1,000 miles before needing to turn back.

The Tu-16, which NATO called “Badger,” proved to be a solid, reliable airplane, much like the United States’ B-52, which first flew in 1954 and, with lots of upgrades, is still going strong.

Moscow quickly developed different versions of the Tu-16 for reconnaissance, electronic warfare, aerial refueling and to haul cruise missiles for attacks on U.S. Navy aircraft carriers.

Faster and more modern Tu-22Ms and Tu-160s — NATO designations “Backfire” and “Blackjack,” respectively — replaced the Badgers as the Cold War ended. But the Tu-16 soldiered on … in China.

Beijing’s heavy bomber

China bought the rights to the Tu-16 in the late 1950s. Over the next 60 years, state-owned manufacturer Xian churned out nearly 200 copies of the redesignated H-6.

Like the Soviets, the Chinese modified the basic, four-person H-6 for a wide range of missions. The H-6A was an atomic bomber. The H-6B was a recon plane. The H-6C was a conventional bomber. There’s an H-6U tanker version. The H-6H, M and K models carry cruise missiles.

But until the H-6K first flew in 2007, all of Beijing’s bombers were still 1950s-vintage Tu-16s in their guts. Swapping old engines and electronics for modern gear, the H-6K represents a huge evolutionary leap over the old Xian bombers.

The H-6K replaces the original AM-3 turbojets — which one analyst called “thirsty and maintenance intensive by current standards” — with much more efficient D-30 turbofans. Without aerial refueling, an armed H-6K can cruise 1,900 miles or so before needing to turn around — a big improvement over older models.

Even more impressive, an H-6K that refuels in mid-air twice can reportedly range 3,100 miles from base while hauling 12 tons of weapons, including up to six YJ-12 supersonic anti-ship missiles or CJ-20 subsonic land-attack cruise missiles, capable of striking targets 250 and 1,500 miles away, respectively.

Supported by tankers, an H-6K armed with YJ-12s or CJ-20s could venture deep into the Pacific, hunting for American ships or even flying within striking distance of America’s own main bomber outpost in Guam, some 3,000 miles from the Chinese mainland.

“That is, if it can slip through air defenses,” analyst Hans Kristensen pointed out. But Jon Solomon at Information Dissemination assumed Chinese fighters would accompany the bombers in order to protect them. “H-6Ks can be escorted thousands of miles out to sea by J-11s,” Solomon wrote.

Targeting dilemma

But it’s not enough to just safely fly that far. Long-range strikes — especially against moving ships at sea — require careful planning and precise targeting. The H-6K sports a new nose radome housing a modern air-to-ground radar, which might help guide a YJ-12 but undoubtedly lacks the power to spot targets for a CJ-20.

Instead, the CJ-20 probably requires mission planners to pre-load precise coordinates into the missile’s computer prior to launch. The YJ-12 has its own seeker but the bomber needs to lob the missile into the right general area for the munition to have any chance of detecting and hitting a ship.

“It is not clear whether China has the capability to collect accurate targeting information and pass it to launch platforms in time for successful strikes in sea areas beyond the first island chain” — that is, a couple thousand miles from the Chinese coast, the Pentagon explained in its 2013 report on China’s military.

Targeting, more than the physics of flight and fuel consumption, is likely the current practical limit on the H-6K’s reach, and thus its wartime usefulness to Chinese commanders.

In battle, a long-range bomber is only as good as the intelligence that tells it where to strike. And when it comes to intel for bomber raids, China might not be quite ready to steer its new H-6Ks.

Just wait. According to William Murray from the U.S. Naval War College, “it seems reasonable to assume that China has assessed what is necessary and is investing aggressively to satisfy those requirements.”

David Axe served as Defense Editor of the National Interest. He is the author of the graphic novels War Fix, War Is Boring and Machete Squad.

This article first appeared in 2015 and is being republished due to reader interest.

Image: Flickr.

Trevor Filseth

Yemen War, Middle East

Millions of Yemenis have seen their rations reduced due to budget cuts. 

The United Nations is seeking $3.9 billion in donations to continue its humanitarian programs in Yemen in 2022, according to a top UN official.

Ramesh Rajasingham, the acting assistant secretary-general for Humanitarian Affairs and deputy emergency relief coordinator, told the UN Security Council that the body’s “biggest constraint right now is funding” with regard to its programs in Yemen.

These programs currently provide aid to 16 million Yemenis, or nearly two-thirds of the country’s population, Rajasingham said.

“I call on all donors to sustain—and if possible to increase—their support this year,” the official added, noting that the program had only received 58 percent of the budget it needs to operate last year. Rajasingham argued that funding shortfalls have directly impacted Yemenis’ lives, noting that “vital programs” including access to clean drinking water, reproductive services, and security saw cutbacks in recent weeks.

Because of budget cuts, the UN World Food Programme’s mission in Yemen was forced to cut its assistance programs and provide reduced rations to 8 million Yemenis.

Humanitarian aid is often difficult to provide in Yemen, where an ongoing civil war has leveled much of the country’s infrastructure and caused widespread poverty and famine. A Saudi-led military intervention failed to end the conflict, and while Saudi Arabia’s leaders have sought to extricate themselves from Yemen in recent months, they have continued to maintain a strict blockade on the country.

Although the war has reached an effective stalemate—with the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels occupying the country’s north, the Southern Transitional Council secessionist group controlling the city of Aden in the south, and the internationally recognized government of Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi controlling the rest—it has continued unabated, with Houthis fighting against government forces for control over the oil-rich Marib province.

UN envoy to Yemen Hans Grundberg suggested that violence in the country was “entering an escalatory cycle, with predictable devastating implications for civilians and for the immediate prospect of peace.” He estimated that 350 Yemeni civilians had been killed in December and at least 15,000 had been displaced by violence.

Grundberg emphasized that there would be “no sustainable long-term solution [to the conflict] to be found on the battlefield,” and argued that all sides should open negotiations to end the war, “even if they are not ready to put down their arms."

Trevor Filseth is a current and foreign affairs writer for the National Interest.

Image: Reuters

Kris Osborn

Drones,

ZALA Aero is a leading Russian developer and manufacturer of unmanned aerial vehicles and mobile systems.

Here's What to Remember: Having a mini drone organically tied to ground units could potentially bring significant advantages to Arctic warfare, simply given the terrain.

Russia is now operating hand-held military drones able to function in temperatures as extreme as minus 52 degrees Celsius, a technology that introduces new operational combat options for fast-increasing numbers of Russian forces in the Arctic.

The drone, according to a report in Russia’s TASS news agency, can fly in both the Arctic and Antarctica. Called the ZALA 421-08M, the five-pound drone is hand-launched and able to fly for an hour and half and transmit data at ranges up to 30m using thermal imaging and EO/IR video cameras.

“The drone’s fixed design, lightweight and smart control system allow for its operation by the personnel with the minimum training level,” the TASS report says.

Having a mini drone organically tied to ground units could potentially bring significant advantages to Arctic warfare, simply given the terrain. A hand-launched drone could transmit video images back from the opposite side of a glacier, mountain or other kinds of extreme cold-weather terrain. While snowstorms or inclement weather might obscure any kind of EO/IR signal, however thermal imagers in that kind of environment might be well-positioned to detect heat signatures from enemy forces, vehicles, or ships seeking to remain undetected.

The ZALA might be able to launch from a ship or Arctic vessel of some kind with great impact, given that water, ice and mountain-like glacier structures are often in close proximity to one another. The greatest advantage something like a ZALA might offer could be described in terms of man-vehicle interface. If the drone can operate in extreme temperatures less amenable to ground infantry in any way, soldiers could remain warmer inside a vehicle to sustain operations. The Arctic landscape, by extension, may not lend itself to dismounted operations involving infantry moving away from or outside of armored vehicles. While the military services are making strides with efforts to engineer cold-weather capable platforms such as fighter jets, ships, weapons and armored vehicles, the Arctic environment does not necessarily allow for armored ground advances with surrounding infantry.

The underlying significance of this Russian report on Arctic drones may simply be that it adds new elements to Russia’s well-documented military build-up in the region which includes the addition of land facilities as well as icebreakers, air and naval assets, and a visible uptick in operations in the region. 

ZALA Aero is a leading Russian developer and manufacturer of unmanned aerial vehicles and mobile systems. The company has been part of the Kalashnikov Group since January 2015, TASS report.

Kris Osborn is the defense editor for the National Interest. Osborn previously served at the Pentagon as a Highly Qualified Expert with the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army—Acquisition, Logistics & Technology. Osborn has also worked as an anchor and on-air military specialist at national TV networks. He has appeared as a guest military expert on Fox News, MSNBC, The Military Channel, and The History Channel. He also has a Master's Degree in Comparative Literature from Columbia University.

This article is being republished due to reader interest.

Image: Defense Post.

Mark Episkopos

BrahMos Missile, Indo-Pacific

BrahMos is expected to be succeeded by BrahMos-II, a hypersonic cruise missile that can reportedly reach speeds of up to Mach 8, or around 9800 kilometers per hour, and boasts an operational range of up to 1,000 km.

India’s military has test-launched an improved version of the BrahMos cruise missile from its latest stealth guided missile destroyer, according to a statement issued by the country’s Defence Research and Development Organization (DRDO).

"Advanced sea to sea variant of BrahMos Supersonic Cruise missile was tested from INS Visakhapatnam (destroyer) today,” the DRDO tweeted on Tuesday. “The missile hit the designated target ship precisely.” India’s Navy added that the test “represents a twin achievement,” attesting to the “accuracy of the ship’s [Visakhapatnam’s] combat system” and validating the BrahMos missile’s capabilities. Indian minister of defense Rajnard Singh congratulated the team working on the project, according to Naval News. “The robustness of the Indian Navy mission readiness is reconfirmed today after the successful launch of the advanced version of BrahMos Missile from INS Vishakhapatnam today,” he stated.

The Vishakhapatnam is the lead ship of the P-15 Bravo-class of guided-missile stealth destroyers, laid down in 2013 and commissioned in late November 2021. The other three vessels of the  P-15 Bravo-class are in various stages of testing and construction and are expected to be introduced into service through the mid-2020s. The Vishakhapatnam improves on its Kolkata-class predecessor with upgraded onboard electronics, a more robust 127 mm naval gun, and revised bridge design intended to minimize the vessel’s radar cross-section (RCS). The Vishakhapatnam carries up to sixteen BrahMos missiles and thirty-two Barak-8 surface-to-air missiles.

BrahMos is a supersonic cruise missile jointly developed by Russian design bureau NPO Mashinostroyeniya and the DRDO. The missile, which was first test-fired in 2001, boasts an operational range of up to 400 kilometers when air-launched and 500 km on surface and sea platforms. The BrahMos missile is expected to be compatible with a wide range of Indian surface vessels, land-based systems, submarines, and aircraft, the latter including as many as forty of the Indian Air Force’s modified SU-30MKI multirole fighters. The missile’s air-launched version, BrahMos-A, was cleared by the Indian Defense Ministry for serial production after a successful test launch in  December 2021. Russian state news outlet TASS reported that Rajnath Singh previously hailed the BrahMos project as “a symbol of the Russia-India strategic partnership.” The Defense Minister also reportedly stressed that the missile substantively boosts India’s capability to repel sophisticated threats.

BrahMos is expected to be succeeded by BrahMos-II, a hypersonic cruise missile that can reportedly reach speeds of up to Mach 8, or around 9800 kilometers per hour, and boasts an operational range of up to 1,000 km. The new missile, which will be carried by both Russian and Indian platforms, is expected to enter testing in the mid-2020s.

Mark Episkopos is a national security reporter for the National Interest.

Image: Reuters.

Kris Osborn

Hypersonic Missiles,

The Missile Defense Agency believes hypersonic missile defense is achievable.

Here's What to Remember: This emphasis on prioritizing R&D is entirely consistent with the Pentagon's effort to confront the current challenges facing missile defense.

The Missile Defense Agency is investing in a new kind of space sensor intended to track and ultimately stop hypersonic weapons traveling at more than five times the speed of sound, a modern weapon expected to greatly inform, if not change, paradigms for future warfare. 

As part of its 2022 budget submission, the Missile Defense Agency has requested funds to deliver a “hypersonic and ballistic tracking space sensor,” intended to “provide fire control quality data to track dim ballistics threats and global maneuvering hypersonic threats,” Navy Vice Admiral Jon Hill, Director of the Missile Defense Agency (MDA), told reporters according to a Pentagon transcript. 

The new sensor program, which the MDA is developing with the U.S. Space Force and Space Development Agency will deploy its first two satellites in 2023, Hill added.  The new technology will ultimately replace the existing Space Tracking and Surveillance System, or STSS, which is now in orbit. 

Interestingly, the emerging program is consistent with a broad emphasis throughout the MDA budget request, which is the massive amount of money being devoted to research and development. Of the entire $8.9 billion 2022 budget request, $7.2 billion, or eighty percent, is slated for research and development. 

This emphasis on prioritizing R&D is entirely consistent with the Pentagon's effort to confront the current challenges facing missile defense. Not only are hypersonic weapons causing new problems for existing missile defense technologies, but lasers are approaching operational readiness for space and potential rivals are massively expanding their Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) arsenals. As part of this threat equation, adversaries are likely to deploy newer kinds of advanced countermeasures, decoys, or anti-jam technologies intended to ensure an attacking ICBM is able to continue on to its intended target.  

The budget request also includes requests for money to develop a regional hypersonic defense glide phase intercept capability, a kind of sensor-tracking system potentially analogous to what is being developed in space. Upon target approach, a hypersonic glide weapon uses its speed of descent to hit targets and destroy or overwhelm them before there is an opportunity to respond. Hill mentioned this intercept capability in coordination with mentioning funding defenses for Guam to support specific requests from the Pacific theater. 

Advanced space-based sensing to track hypersonic weapons might represent one of just several areas of hope for Pentagon weapons developers confronting the challenge of how to attempt defending against hypersonic weapons. Guided missiles traveling at hypersonic speeds may simply be arriving so quickly that ground-based commanders will not be able to detect a threat in time to respond. Part of this challenge is compounded by the fact that a weapon traveling at hypersonic speeds will likely transit from one radar aperture to another so quickly, that coordinated radar systems may not be able to keep a consistent track on a target across different geographical reasons, something it is able to do with non-hypersonic weapons. 

Detecting hypersonic weapons from space, however, at very rapid speeds, can greatly change the equation and increase the likelihood that defenders could establish a more continuous track of the approaching weapon sufficient to coordinate some defense or intercept. 

Kris Osborn is the Defense Editor for the National Interest. Osborn previously served at the Pentagon as a Highly Qualified Expert with the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army—Acquisition, Logistics & Technology. Osborn has also worked as an anchor and on-air military specialist at national TV networks. He has appeared as a guest military expert on Fox News, MSNBC, The Military Channel, and The History Channel. He also has a Master's Degree in Comparative Literature from Columbia University.

This article is being republished due to reader interest. 

Image: Air Force Mag.