Moderadores: Lepanto, poliorcetes, Edu, Orel
By Brian Todd, CNN
Updated 0923 GMT (1723 HKT) December 8, 2017
Washington (CNN)With Kim Jong Un pushing aggressively to develop missiles that could hit the United States with nuclear warheads, pressure has been mounting on US officials to answer the threat. One effective countermeasure could lie in an obscure military lab in New Mexico.
It's called CHAMP, for Counter-electronics High Power Microwave Advanced Missile Project. James Fisher, spokesman for the Air Force Research Lab at Kirtland Air Force Base, said it's a high-powered microwave weapon that can be delivered on an air-launched cruise missile, deployed from an American bomber.
Fisher says the cruise missile with a CHAMP system strapped to it would fly into enemy airspace at low altitude, and send out strong pulses of electromagnetic energy. The enemy's electronic command-and-control systems would be jammed. Analysts say the cruise missile it's deployed on could then be splashed down at sea.
...
Fisher said the Air Force tested the CHAMP system in 2012, at a testing range in Utah larger than the state of Delaware. Buildings were rigged with communications and other systems similar to what enemy militaries would have.
Mary Lou Robinson, who heads research and development of CHAMP at the Air Force Research Laboratory, told NBC News, "It absolutely did exactly what we thought it was going to do." Robinson said they had several target classes, and they "predicted with almost 100% accuracy" which systems would fail.
While CHAMP holds the promise of a nonlethal weapon against the North Koreans, skeptics say it has potentially dangerous drawbacks.
"The North Koreans would see many of these missiles flying in," says Jeffrey Lewis, an adjunct professor at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey. "They would try to shoot them down. They're not actually going to know that they're armed with high-powered microwaves instead of, say, conventional explosives or even nuclear weapons."
CHAMP weapons are not currently operational. Neither Fisher, Robinson, nor other Air Force officials would say when the weapons could be deployed. But Leighton said in a crisis, "The CHAMP system could be deployed within days."
CNN's Brad Hodges contributed to this report.
By: Pierre Tran 23 hours ago
PARIS — The former director of international development at the French procurement office Direction Générale de l’Armement has joined MBDA and will manage the airborne nuclear sector, the European missile company said.
“Stéphane Reb has joined MBDA on Dec. 1 as deputy to the executive group director programs Patrick Tramier, in charge of supervising all activities concerning the French airborne nuclear component,” the company told Defense News.
MBDA is prime contractor on the ASMPA nuclear-tipped missile, due for replacement by the ASN4G, or air-to-surface, fourth-generation nuclear weapon, in the 2030s.
...
The airborne and submarine weapons are due to be updated around 2035, and the annual budget for nuclear deterrence is expected to double to €6 billion (U.S. $7 billion) at the peak of the programs in the mid-2020s, according to “The President and the Bomb,” a book co-authored by Jean Guisnel and Bruno Tertrais.
France is working on studies for ASN4G, the book said. There are studies at Onera, the aerospace research center, on two projects exploring concepts for the fourth-generation missile. The requirement is for a missile range much greater than 1,000 kilometers and which might be hypersonic — above the speed of Mach 5.
The first option, dubbed Camosis, relies on stealth and would fit well with a replacement for the Anglo-French Storm Shadow/Scalp cruise missile, the book said. A Camosis weapon would fly at 4,000-5,000 kph and double the performance of ASMPA.
A second option, dubbed Prometheus, would be more advanced and would be equipped with a scramjet to fly at 7,000-8,000 kph, the book said. MBDA prefers that project, which is being explored on its Lea technology demonstrator. That weapon would be more expensive.
Technology on the ASMPA missile is vastly different from that on the Scalp cruise missile, a defense source said. There are concerns pieces of the latter could be gathered up after they hit their target and passed on to enemy nations for reverse engineering.
Concept studies for a new nuclear warhead are also planned, as the present systems will turn obsolete in the 2030s, the book said.
Design and development studies began in 2014 for a midlife upgrade of the ASMPA aimed at allowing the weapon to beat future air-defense systems out to 2035.
Nuclear weapons account for some 20 percent of the annual defense budget, and that is expected to rise as work picks up for next-generation systems. Britain and France signed in March an agreement to launch a three-year, €100 million concept study of a successor to the Storm Shadow/Scalp missile as well as the Boeing Harpoon and Exocet anti-ship missiles.
Shomer escribió:Pero las armas de pulso electromagnético no son nada nuevo. Aquí existen. Son parte del arsenal de la HHA para uso en una eventualidad muy extrema, e imagino que a esta altura habrán muchos países que disponen de ellas.
El uso de armas EMP es infinitamente preferible a las NQB.
...
General Dynamics Ordnance and Tactical Systems, Garland, Texas, was awarded a $12,657,260 modification (00501) to contract W52P1J-13-D-0050 for 4,848 MK82-1 bomb bodies and 2,860 MK84-4 bomb bodies. Work will be performed in Garland, Texas, with an estimated completion date of Dec. 31, 2018. Fiscal 2017 army procurement appropriation funds in the amount of $12,657,260 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Contracting Command, Rock Island Arsenal, Illinois, is the contracting activity.
...
Lockheed Martin desarrollará el Gray Wolf,
Usuarios navegando por este Foro: No hay usuarios registrados visitando el Foro y 0 invitados