Posted on 07/29/2002 4:59:53 PM PDT by aculeus
EGLIN AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. (AP) - The Air Force plans to improve the delivery of anti-personnel and anti-armor bomblets by adding satellite guidance systems and wings to dispensers that spread them by the dozens over the battlefield.
The Air Armament Center, headquartered at this Florida Panhandle base, is looking at two prototypes for delivering those weapons as well as mines.
Both versions use off-the-shelf technology, said Col. James Knox, who heads the center's Area Attack Systems Program Office.
An unguided dispenser has to be launched at low altitude, below 3,000 feet, to be accurate because wind can push it off course, but that exposes warplanes to anti-aircraft gunfire and missiles, Knox said.
An improved version employed for the first time in October over Afghanistan permits drops from higher altitudes by using an inertial navigation guidance system to compensate for wind drift. It is called the wind-corrected munitions dispenser.
The next step will be to increase the dispenser's range up to 45 miles by adding the satellite guidance and wings for gliding.
Knox's office is seeking a $16 million authorization for fiscal year 2003, which starts in October. That would keep development, which began last year, on track. A total of $65 million is estimated to see it through completion. The dispenser could be fielded 2006.
Not hardly, the basic idea has been around for a couple of decades. Electronics have finally shruken enough, and the $$ was there, to make it practical. Besides, it's only the dispensers that get the wings and GPS guidance, not the bomblets. They may or may not have guidance. I believe there was a program, SKEET maybe?, that had self forging warheads coupled to IR seekers. The things would drift around on their 'chutes, scanning for targets, then shoot themselves down into the thinner top armor of tanks or other armored vehicles. Just the things for the Yellow/Red Hordes, or originally the Russian/Red Hordes.
Thanks ever so much, you sheeple who put him in office.
The Wind Compensated Munitions Dispenser [WCMD "Wick-Mid"] is intended to remedy this current shortfall in Tactical Munition Dispenser munitions, such as the CBU-87 CEM [Combined Effects Munition], CBU-89 GATOR and CBU-97 SFW [Sensor Fuzed Weapon]. The weapon will use inertial guidance only (no GPS). The WCMD program develops a tail kit for these inventory dispenser weapons. These weapons will be capable of delivery from medium to high altitude delivery when equipped with a WCMD kit. The WCMD weapon will correct for wind effects and errors during the weapon's ballistic fall. The WCMD kit will turn these "dumb" bombs into accurate "smart" weapons. Currently, the dispenser is achieving an accuracy of within 30 feet. Both fighter and bomber aircraft will be able to employ WCMD from a wide range of altitudes, in adverse weather, using various tactics such as level, dive, and toss bombing, and bombing on coordinates.
WCMD Limited Initial Operational Capability was achieved on the B-52 in November 1998. WCMD-equipped weapons are planned for employment on the B-1, B-52, F-15E, F-16, and F-117 aircraft.
The WCMD is seen as one solution to four deficiencies identified in the Strategic Attack/Air Interdiction Mission Area Plan (MAP): multiple kills per pass, adverse weather capability, Cluster Bomb accuracy (mid-course wind correction), and the ability to carry/dispense future submunitions and US Army mines. With the addition of a guidance kit and "smart" aircraft stores stations, aircrew members should be able to independently target weapons and strike multiple targets on a single release/pass. WCMD will be targetable by on-board aircraft systems and be capable of being targeted on a coordinate reference system. To minimize aircraft heading, velocity, and position errors, all aircraft will have Global Positioning System (GPS) quality heading, velocity, and altitude data. This will provide aircraft an adverse weather capability for targets with known positions. GPS is not required on the WCMD. The guidance kit will provide WCMD an adverse weather capability and negate a need for electro-optical guidance systems which are severely degraded by adverse weather or man-made or battlefield obscurants such as smoke or dust. The WCMD kit will reduce susceptibility to wind induced errors, not fully compensated for by aircraft avionics, by providing mid-course wind correction. Finally, the modular design of the SUU-64/65/66 Tactical Munition Dispensers (TMD) allows for future incorporation of wide area anti-armor mines, anti-helicopter mines, and other future smart submunitions.
The Air Force announced 27 January 1997 that Lockheed Martin had won the $21 million contract to complete development and begin production of the Wind-Corrected Munition Dispenser. The Air Force plans to modify 40,000 tactical munitions dispensers.
Department of Defense officials originally predicted the dispenser tail kits would cost approximately $25,000 per unit. However, through the application of a no-nonsense acquisition strategy adopted by the Eglin WCMD team, the dispenser unit cost is $8,937.
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