ESSM Inventory Perspective

Just a quick follow up on the previous post about the Blk 2 ESSM inventory.  As a bit of perspective, if the entire Blk 2 ESSM inventory were applied across the 70+ Burke class, that would give each ship approximately 7 missiles.  How’s that for an inventory?!
 
Of course, there are other ESSM variants but not all that much more.  If we go to war, I hope it’s a very, very short war!

ESSM Blk 2 Delivery

In case you missed it, here’s a brief update on ESSM Blk 2 missile deliveries.  According to DOT&E[1], ESSM production missiles began delivery to the Navy in July 2022.  Raytheon has just delivered the 500^th missile to the Navy.[2]  That’s 500 missiles in a bit over three years.  That also tells us what the entire current, maximum Blk 2 inventory for the Navy is.  Those who envision ships teeming with quad-packed ESSM missiles should note that a single Burke, with 96 VLS cells, would consume almost the entire inventory of ESSM Blk 2 missiles!
 

ESSM Blk 2

 
_____________________________

 
[1]https://www.dote.osd.mil/Portals/97/pub/reports/FY2022/navy/2022essm.pdf?ver=OqRFEN_Af764y6bEgF_k3A%3d%3d
 
[2]Naval News website, “RTX’s Raytheon delivers 500th ESSM Block 2 to U.S. Navy”, staff, 2-Sep-2025,
https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2025/10/rtxs-raytheon-delivers-500th-essm-block-2-to-u-s-navy/

Australian ESSM Test

Be still my beating heart!  Someone has finally conducted live fire missile testing that wasn’t completely useless and, to the shame of the US Navy, it was the Australian Navy that did it.  HMAS Perth (FFH-157) conducted several live fire exercises for the ESSM and CEAFAR/CEAMOUNT sensor systems at the US Navy's Pacific test range and the testing apparently included multiple targets and supersonic targets.

HMAS Perth is an Anzac class (MEKO 200 variant) frigate with an 8-cell Mk41 VLS, single 5” gun, and two triple torpedo launchers.  Sensors include the CEAFAR/CEAMOUNT S and X band radars.  Wiki has a good description of the ship.

HMAS Perth

To be sure, the tests were still highly scripted, staged events with all the attendant unreality imposed by US Navy safety regulations.  Consider the following quotes extracted from Robert Macklin's report describing the Anzac program and the live fire testing that was conducted.

Now the targets being fired at Perth included two supersonic Coyote missiles—each costing $4  million—which would come screaming out of the blue, cutting a path across Perth’s station as the combined radar and combat system on board responded with the ship’s own relatively slow ESSMs in the hope of intercepting the incoming target. In addition, Perth would track at least seven subsonic missiles, some of which would be in combination with supersonics. (1)

This statement is a bit misleading as it suggests that Perth faced seven or more missiles, some of which were supersonic, at the same time.  That would be a major challenge, indeed!  The reality, as best I can tell, is that the Perth faced a total of seven missiles over four or so separate tests (referred to in the quotes as “profiles”).  There is a YouTube video that shows three missiles being fired from Perth simultaneously so three seems to be the maximum number of simultaneous threats faced in the exercise.

As indicated in the next quote, a subsonic and a supersonic were paired in a single test.  Whether the two missile types appeared in the engagement window at the same time or whether they arrived separately is not clear.

First up, he says, they did the seven subsonics but on occasion they were mixed with supersonic interference. The test, he says, ‘was designed so you could potentially be attracted to the subsonic target at the expense of the supersonic. And in fact I can assure you each of them was a success—in fact probably more successful than we thought possible.’  (1)

Note is made of the difficulty of intercepting a crossing missile as opposed to a head-on target.  The write up suggests that Perth did test a crossing missile and, if this was the case, this is a degree of difficulty and reality that the US does not test.

The ESSM missile has traditionally been a point defence system designed for a weapon coming in directly, which is easy [to take out]. But once it starts crossing—heading for a high‑value unit, especially if it’s doing mach 3—then it becomes exponentially more difficult.

We’d simulate being a short distance from a high‑value unit on its quarter, so when we’d take out the incoming supersonic mach 3 missile with the ESSM, they’d never seen it done before. (1)

If the US Navy had never seen a supersonic missile being intercepted by an ESSM before (referring to a crossing missile?), that speaks volumes about the lack of realistic testing by the Navy.

On one occasion—I think in profile three—we actually lost the target momentarily—and that happens sometimes in the fog of war—and when it came up again a young operator, a sailor who was literally in front of me in the Operations Room—saw it and intuitively pressed a ‘hostile’ and a missile went and took it out at the minimum engagement range. So at the last moment we were able to save the [high‑value unit]. (1)

The next quote illustrates the point that we’ve made repeatedly and that is that the engagement window against a supersonic threat is very short.

They saved the last two profiles for the supersonic Coyotes. The first one, Goddard says, came at them skimming at its minimum safe height. ‘You probably have 10 to 11 seconds to react, and as soon as you’ve made it “hostile” the system just automatically does it and of course it’s just “hands off.”’

In fact, when that first Coyote came at them the system fired two missiles. The first smashed into the target and the second took out the debris. ‘The Americans said “We’ve never seen that. You’ve actually taken out the target and we thought the second missile would just disappear. But all of a sudden it turned and actually took out the debris on the way through.”’  (1)

In the next quote, note the reference to a ‘ghost’ radar image and the resultant wasted defensive missiles.  We recently noted a ‘ghost’ image of sorts being part of the reason why a US Aegis cruiser was hit by an out of control drone.  Also, in terms of overall system efficiency and performance, the unintended and unnecessary expenditure of extra defensive missiles is a problem.  To be fair, if the main target(s) is destroyed, no Captain is going to begrudge a few wasted missiles.

On the second attack, only one ESSM was needed—the Coyote was pulverised. However, a ‘ghost’ image had appeared briefly on the screen and Lee Goddard actually fired three ESSMs, two of which weren’t needed. ‘So it was all very positive,’ he says. (1)

In summary, Perth’s testing was far more extensive and realistic than anything I’ve read about the US Navy conducting.  Is this enough?  Not by a long shot!  They should conduct similar tests ten times over to get a feel for long term reliability and success rates.  They should use different approach angles.  They should conduct the test under adverse weather conditions.  They should try the test with a ship that wasn’t ‘tweaked’ for the test and didn’t have tech reps helping out.  Still, for whatever drawbacks, limitations, and flaws the test might have had, it was still leaps and bounds beyond what the US Navy does and the Australians are to be commended. 

________________________________

(1)Australian Strategic Policy Institute, “Rearming the Anzacs”, Robert Macklin,

https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/ad-aspi/2017-12/Rearming%20the%20ANZACs_3.pdf?ttG8fYqc_iQGzyArk.LvSIL_1xo4rIpj

Ship Magazines - Do The Math

One of the recurring fears among some naval observers is the inability to reload VLS systems at sea.  We’ve just recently debunked the concern but the fear lingers (see, "War Deployments").  Well, here’s yet another perspective on the issue that proves reload capability is not needed:  the math!

A carrier group, for example, will consist of 3-4 carriers (4 is ComNavOps preferred number) and 20+ escorts (25-30 being ComNavOps preferred number) (see, "Carrier Task Force").  Let’s assume that each escort is a Burke with 96 VLS cells and that 50 are Standard missiles, 30 are quad packed ESSM, and the remainder are Tomahawks and VL-ASROC, neither of which are relevant to this discussion.

So, let’s do the anti-air warfare (AAW) math.

Standard Missiles:  20x ships X 50 Standards per ship = 1,000 Standard missiles

ESSM Missiles:  20x ships X 30 cells X 4 ESSM/cell = 2,400 ESSM missiles

Total = 3,400 AAW missiles

This ignores any SeaRAM point defense missiles the group might have.

So, in order for reloads to even be required, the group would have to fire off well over three thousand missiles!  Given that the enemy’s anti-ship missile inventory is limited just like ours, does anyone really believe a single battle will see the enemy bring over three thousand anti-ship missiles to bear on a single carrier group????

Let’s do some more math.  The average modern warship carries somewhere around 8 anti-ship missiles and possibly up to a dozen or two.  For sake of discussion, let’s use the higher number of 24.  How many ships would be needed to launch three thousand missiles?  Well, 3000 missiles / 24 missiles per ship = 125 ships.

The enemy would need to assemble a force of 125 ships to launch 3000 anti-ship missiles!  No navy in the world can do that and even if an enemy had that many ships it couldn’t assemble that many in range in time.  A reasonable assembly of enemy ships opposing a carrier group might be 12-24 which would give an anti-ship missile inventory of 96 – 576.

Well, you say, the enemy can also launch anti-ship missiles from aircraft.  Yes, yes they can!  Let’s assume, say, 4 anti-ship missiles per aircraft – I know, there are some aircraft that can theoretically carry more but the impact on aircraft range and endurance is significant and that load would be uncommon.  So, 4 missiles per aircraft is a reasonable average.  Thus, the number of aircraft needed to launch over 3000 anti-ship missiles is, 3000 missiles / 4 missiles per aircraft = 750. 

The enemy would need to assemble, in short order, a force of 750 aircraft (of the right type!) to deplete our carrier group’s defensive missile inventory!  Not possible.

Of course, this analysis is simplistic.  Defending missiles aren’t launched one-for-one at attacking missiles.  A ratio of 2:1 is more realistic.  That means that the defending force in our example can only engage 1,700 attacking missiles.  Go ahead and rerun the math.  That’s still way, way beyond the attack capacity of any actual enemy.

A more realistic scenario is a single engagement with, perhaps, a dozen surface ships and/or a few flights of 10 or 20 attack aircraft.  Of course, the attackers would have to get past the carrier’s defensive aircraft before missiles even come into play but we’ll ignore that aspect.  We see, then, that a realistic scenario likely involves only a few to several dozen attacking missiles versus the defensive inventory of over 3000 missiles.  Depletion of the ship’s missile inventory is simply not conceivable and, therefore, reloading at sea is not a requirement.

Recall the old Soviet attack plan against US carrier groups?  Regiments of bombers would launch a couple of anti-ship missiles each for a total of 70+ attacking missiles.  Again, not even remotely near depleting the ship’s defensive missile inventory.

Here are the salient points to keep in mind regarding ship’s missile inventories.

• The enemy’s inventory of attack missiles is just as limited as a ship’s inventory of defensive missiles.

• Assuming even a small amount of surprise, the enemy has to assemble their attacking forces with little notice and can only bring a small fraction to bear in time.  This assures that attacking missile numbers will be small and manageable.

• Ship’s don’t just stand in one spot and slug it out.  They appear, execute a mission, and retire.  Typical missions (the combat portion) last hours or a few days.

• Ships don’t fight individually, they fight as groups and it’s the group’s missile inventory that matters.

Missile depletion is simply not a concern and, therefore, at-sea reloading is not a requirement.

ESSM Test Firing

The Navy is excited about the first live fire test of an Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile (ESSM) Block II which just recently occurred.  The Block II incorporates an active guidance seeker in addition to the legacy semi-active seeker of the previous version.  In the test, the ESSM Blk II successfully intercepted a BQM-74E drone target.  The BQM-74E is a subsonic drone with a max speed of around 500 kts at sea level.

Okay, so what’s noteworthy about this?  The noteworthy part is the extent of the test program, or lack thereof.  From a USNI News article,

“The recent test follows two June 2017 Controlled Test Vehicle flight tests to prove the missile’s ability to launch. Four additional live fire tests will follow, ahead of starting production of the Block 2 missile.” (1)

So, a grand total of five live fire tests will be conducted prior to beginning production.  Does that really sound sufficient?  Will five tests really prove out the reliability of the missile, the performance of the seeker under the hundreds of possible scenarios, the effect of an ECM/decoy environment on the seeker, the effectiveness of the seeker against supersonic missiles, the stability of the seeker in response to launch and Mach 4+ maneuvering stresses, etc.?

The simple lack of testing against a supersonic target would seem reason enough to delay production, wouldn’t it?

The Navy, in their zeal to enter production, is glossing over critical testing.  We’re putting essentially untested weapons into the fleet.  People are potentially going to get killed expecting this thing to work, only to be tragically proven wrong.

Come on, now, ComNavOps, you say, the ESSM has been around for quite a while and this is just a seeker head upgrade – no big deal and no big test program is needed.  Once a missile has been in service for a while we don’t really need repeats of extensive testing – there’s nothing else to go wrong and nothing else to find out.

Well, there’s a few things wrong with that.  First, while I don’t have the data, I’m pretty sure the original testing program was far from extensive.  For example, I don’t recall off the top of my head that the ESSM has ever been tested against a supersonic target drone.  Just as importantly, I know there hasn’t been enough testing to demonstrate overall missile reliability.

To illustrate the reliability concern, consider the Standard missile which has been around forever and, supposedly, thoroughly tested.  Guess what?  They keep blowing up!

• A Standard SM-2 Block IIIa blew up upon launch from a German frigate on 21-Jun-2018. (2)

• Previously, a Standard SM-2 Block IIIa blew up on launch from the USS The Sullivans (DDG-68) during a training exercise off of Virginia on 18-Jul-2015. (2)

In both cases, it appears that the rocket motor exploded.  Apparently, testing was insufficient to detect the rocket flaw and the missile was released into the fleet where it is now putting ships and personnel at risk.

Considering how few live fire tests are performed each year, even these couple of explosive failures are disturbing.

The point of this post is not the reliability of the Standard SM-2 Block IIIa missile.  I have no problem with failures.  That’s how you find problems and fix them.  The point is that without extensive testing, these kinds of problems can’t be found.  Five test launches is not enough to detect whatever problems are lurking in the ESSM – and they’re there - we just haven’t tested enough to see them.

This reluctance to test is typical of the Navy’s constant, on-going battle with DOT&E.  DOT&E wants to conduct proper testing and the Navy constantly wants to skip testing and rush weapons into production.  Recall that DOT&E had to go around the Navy to get the Navy to conduct shock tests on the LCS.  Remember the result of those tests?  Sure enough, the LCS failed and the tests had to be conducted at reduced explosive levels and the final tests had to be dropped due to the certainty of excessive, possibly fatal, damage.  And yet, the Navy keeps wanting to rush systems into production.

Everyone except the Navy is all too aware of the now legendary problem with the WWII torpedoes that the Navy refused to properly test.  Everyone except the Navy recognizes the wisdom of extensive and realistic testing.  Everyone except the Navy understands that it is far better to find problems in peacetime than during combat.

The Navy needs to put the ESSM through rigorous testing under realistic conditions and against supersonic target drones using evasive maneuvers and ECM. 

The Navy got people killed by not taking the time to train and certify personnel on the recent Burke collisions and now they’re failing to take the time to properly test the ESSM.  More people will die someday.  Why can’t the Navy learn its lessons?  Why do people have to die because the Navy won’t take the time to properly train and test?  CNO Richardson, this is directly on you.

___________________________________________

(1)USNI News website, “Evolved Seasparrow Missile Block 2 Successfully Intercepts Aerial Target in First Live Fire Test”, Megan Eckstein, 6-July-2018,

https://news.usni.org/2018/07/06/evolved-seasparrow-missile-block-2-successfully-intercepts-aerial-target-in-first-live-fire-test

(2)USNI News website, “Missile Explodes During German Frigate Training Exercise; Incident Similar to 2015 U.S. Navy Explosion”, Sam LaGrone, 27-Jun-2018,

https://news.usni.org/2018/06/27/video-missile-explodes-german-frigate-training-exercise-incident-similar-2015-u-s-navy-explosion

Anti-Ship Cruise Missile Characteristics - Follow Up

You undoubtedly recall the recent discussion about anti-ship cruise missile characteristics and how they impacted likely defensive engagement scenarios (see, "Cruise Missile Characteristics Related To Detection And Engagement Range")?  The conclusion was that intercept engagements were likely to occur much closer to the ship (radar horizon) than the Navy believes and that what is needed is an optimized medium/short range radar paired with ESSM.  Some people struggled to understand how demanding the engagement scenario would be due to the short engagement window, the need to immediately flood the skies with ESSM missiles, and the resultant need to be able to deal with the immense amount of targets, both incoming, outgoing, and engagement debris.  Well, here’s some bits of information from the recent DOT&E 2017 Annual Report that illustrate and support the conclusions from the post.

“Investigate means to mitigate the chances of an ESSM pre-detonating on debris before approaching its intended target.” (p. 213)

This is exactly what I described.  With a very short engagement window, we won’t be able to leisurely fire off one or two ESSM and then wait for the radar picture to clear to see what the result was.  We’re going to have to launch many missiles and the radars are going to have to be able to function in a debris-filled sky.

“Correct the SSDS scheduling function to preclude interference with the RAM infrared guidance stemming from prior intercepts and warhead detonations.”  (p. 213)

Again, this is the ability to distinguish valid targets from debris in a chaotic sky.

“Investigate and correct the combat system time synchronization problem that prevented the launch of a full salvo of ESSMs.”  (p. 213)

This acknowledges the need to be able to launch many missiles as nearly instantaneously as possible.

“Improve SSDS MK 2 integration with the MK 9 Track Illuminators to better support ESSM engagements.”  (p. 212)

This demonstrates that it’s not enough to just have a radar that is capable of the required resolution.  We need to be able to take that resolution and actually distinguish valid targets among large debris fields and outgoing missiles and do a much better job of integrating the radar with the combat fire control software.

As I stated in the post, an engagement that begins at the radar horizon will be over in 120 seconds for even a relatively slow 600 mph, high subsonic, incoming missile.  A 1200 mph, supersonic, incoming missile will have an engagement window of just 60 seconds.  Actually, that’s not true.  Those engagement windows are vastly overstated.  We can’t engage when the incoming missile is one second from impact.  The engagement window closes when the either the minimum safe arming distance of the defensive missile is reached or the defensive sequence can’t react in the flight time remaining for the incoming missile.  Thus, the engagement window is more likely from the radar horizon to about 10 miles (I’m purely speculating about these values).  Thus, the engagement window for ESSM against the 600 mph incoming missile is just 60 seconds and the 1200 mph engagement window is just 30 seconds.

Of course, the engagement windows assume that the threat is instantaneously identified and the defensive reaction also occurs instantaneously.  If there is any hesitation, like waiting for human command and control, the engagement window essentially is non-existent.  This mandates a purely automatic defensive mode.  This, in turn, raises some questions.

• Have we developed fleet doctrine to safely operate our ships and aircraft in the vicinity of ships whose defensive systems are in full auto mode?

• Can our full auto systems reliably distinguish incoming targets from our own decoys, flares, and countermeasures?  CIWS had this problem in the past.

• Can our systems operate in full auto mode without hazarding our own ships to friendly fire?  The corollary to this is, do we know how to position and operate our ships so as not to interfere with our own defensive fires?  With engagement windows of 60 seconds or less, there won’t be time to reposition ships.

• Do we know how to coordinate our countermeasures with our defensive sensors so as not to inadvertently confuse our own defensive fires?  Is it more effective to use countermeasures and risk disrupting our own active defenses or is it more effective to forego countermeasures in favor of a cleaner radar picture?

To summarize this post and its predecessor, there is every reason to expect that anti-ship cruise missile defensive engagements are generally going to start at the radar horizon (say, 20 miles or so) and will have a correspondingly very short window of opportunity.  The traditional shoot-shoot-look engagement sequence is not going to be feasible or effective.  We need to modify and upgrade our systems for the medium/short range, short time frame engagement scenario.  We need radars, both ship and missile, that can discriminate targets amid a debris filled sky and we need the ability to salvo lots of missiles in an incredibly short time frame.  To the best of my knowledge, we currently have little or none of this capability, as indicated by DOT&E test results and recommendations.  We also need a comprehensive set of operational and tactical procedures to enable full auto defensive modes.

Now is the time we should be testing and developing these capabilities, not when actual combat occurs.  We need to largely pull back from the many peacetime, worthless missions (partnership, show the flag, forward presence, deterrence, anti-piracy, etc.) and concentrate on bringing our ships and crews up to combat readiness and developing the capabilities we’ll need to fight the next war.

Cruise Missile Characteristics Related To Detection and Engagement Range

The US Navy is committed to an anti-air warfare path of long range intercepts using the Aegis and Standard systems.  The wisdom of this is debatable for a variety of reasons.

Long range intercepts depend on being able to detect the target at long ranges.  You can’t engage what you can’t see!  For targets that obligingly fly at high altitudes, this is a viable approach.  For targets that fly at low altitudes or are less detectable due to small size and/or stealth, this approach is not feasible.  Unfortunately, the trend in anti-ship missile (ASM) technology is towards stealth and sea-skimming altitudes.  Many missiles have options for an initial high altitude cruise phase followed by a sea-skimming attack phase.  The question is how far out from the target does the cruise phase terminate and the sea-skimming attack phase commence?  If the cruise phase terminates and converts to the low altitude attack phase beyond the effective range of defensive missiles then the ASM is, for all practical purposes, a purely sea-skimming missile.  This is what seems to be the typical case today.  Thus, it is quite likely that a defending ship will never see, or at least not have the opportunity to engage, the attacking missile until it enters the radar horizon (20 miles or so).

Another problem with the Navy’s long range intercept path is that it’s very expensive.  For example, the Standard SM-6 costs around $4M each and has a claimed range of 150-300 miles.  Launching volleys of $4M missiles quickly becomes prohibitively expensive.  Of course, the cost of a volley of $4M missiles is, arguably, a bargain if it prevents the destruction of a multi-billion dollar ship!  Still, the price tag of Standard missiles does impact the budget and the number of missiles procured. It’s not just the missiles that are expensive.  The Aegis system that enables the Standard missile costs hundreds of millions of dollars and the developmental costs for the ever-changing software are astronomical.

Before we go any further, let’s take a moment to look at some characteristics of common potential enemy anti-ship missiles as provided by readily available open source information.  Note the attack altitudes and relatively small sizes.  These missiles will be hard to detect and engagement windows will be very short.

C-801

Speed   Mach 0.75

Flight Altitude  <20 m

Attack Altitude  <20 m

Range  40 km

Length  5.8 m

C-802

Speed  Mach 0.9

Flight Altitude  7 m

Attack Altitude  5 m

Range  120 km

Length  6.4 m

Exocet

Speed  Mach 0.92

Flight Altitude  2 m

Range  72-180 km

Length  4.7 m

P-270 Moskit (SS-N-22 Sunburn)

Speed  Mach 3.0

Flight Altitude  20 m

Attack Altitude  <7 m

Range  90-240 km, depending on version and flight profile

Length  9.7 m

P-700 Granit (SS-N-19 Shipwreck)

Speed  Mach >1.6

Flight Altitude  high

Attack Altitude  <25 m

Range  625 km

Length  10.0 m

P-800 Oniks (SS-N-26 Strobile)

Speed  Mach 2.5

Flight Altitude  high

Attack Altitude  10 m

Range  370 miles

Length  8.9 m

Kh-59 MK (AS-13 Kingbolt)

Speed  Mach 0.8

Flight Altitude  7 m

Attack Altitude  ?

Range  285 km

Length  5.7 m

BrahMos

Speed  Mach 3.0

Flight Altitude  high

Attack Altitude  5 m

Range  280 miles

Length  8.4 m

Even if not designed as stealthy airframes, ASMs are small and have an inherently small radar cross section.  A small missile, in sea-skimming mode, down in the wave clutter, will not be readily detected.  First detection is likely to be inside the radar horizon.  Even the presence of an airborne radar plane will not greatly increase the detection range of an incoming sea-skimming missile. 

Also, detection and targeting are two separate issues.  An airborne radar may detect a missile further out but being able to maintain a steady lock sufficient to guide a defensive missile is another matter and likely will not be achievable until the attacking missile has gotten much closer to its target.

What is the overall point of this discussion?  It’s that I suspect that the actual targeting detection range of most ASM’s is going to be very short.  That being the case, one can’t help but ask whether the Navy’s focus on very long range Standard missiles is appropriate.  It would seem that the Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile (RIM-162 ESSM) would be a more likely and useful defensive system.  ESSM range is given as 27 nm which would seem to be an appropriate match to the expected detection range.

In fact, I have doubts that intercepts at ranges of hundreds of miles are even feasible given the cruise characteristics of enemy anti-ship missiles.  What enemy missile or aircraft is going to fly obligingly high, straight, and level for an extended period while we guide a Standard missile to it?  Ballistic anti-ship missiles do fly predictable paths and, for those, long range intercepts are both feasible and desirable – but that’s another topic.

If my conjecture is correct and the vast majority of anti-ship cruise missile engagements are going to occur at radar horizon ranges, shouldn’t the vast majority of our defensive systems also be optimized for those same ranges?  Wouldn’t it be better to emphasize ESSM defenses over Standard missiles?

Further, given engagement ranges of radar horizon and closer, shouldn’t we also greatly beef up our short range engagement capabilities such as RAM, SeaRAM, and CIWS?  Sure, debris from a successful short range intercept may still impact the ship and cause damage but it will be a lot less damage than having an intact, functioning anti-ship cruise missile hit the ship.  Consider that most Burkes have only a single CIWS for close in defense and, for a time, Burkes were built with none.  Burkes do not mount RAM/SeaRAM.  Our short range defenses are lacking, to put it mildly.

We need to do several things to beef up our medium range (out to 30 miles or so) AAW capability.

1. Install multiple RAM/SeaRAM launchers on every ship.
2. Provide at least 3 CIWS for every Burke.
3. Focus on electronic anti-missile defenses (soft kill).
4. Develop radars/sensors optimized for medium/short range use.
5. Develop methods to effectively launch and utilize high density volleys of ESSM and RAM.  This would include the ability to track the incoming target even in the presence of high clutter returns due to near miss defensive missile explosions.  Given the short engagement window, it is vital that we can continuously track and engage rather than have to wait for the radar picture to clear after a near miss.  The traditional engagement sequence of shoot-shoot-look is no longer viable.  The engagement sequence has to be shoot-shoot-shoot-keep shooting!  We also need to be able to track the incoming missile in the presence of many outgoing missiles.

The last point also suggests that Aegis is likely not the optimum AAW radar.  We don’t need bigger and longer range AMDR radars (well, we do for ballistic missile defense but, again, that’s a topic for another post); we need very high definition, very rapid response, enhanced capability medium/short range radars combined with much greater numbers of medium range ESSM and integrated fire control systems.  We need to greatly reduce our emphasis on Aegis/Standard and put far more emphasis on medium range engagement.

We also desperately need to improve our AAW electronic countermeasure (ECM) capability.  The venerable – and never all that effective, according to reports – SLQ-32 needs to be enhanced far beyond even the current SEWIP (Surface Electronic Warfare Improvement Program) block improvements.  We need massively more capable and powerful detection and active jamming/decoy systems (remember our discussion about an electronic warfare version of the Zumwalt?).

In summary, future naval AAW engagements are not going to be the long range intercepts that the Navy has designed for – they’re going to radar horizon, close range, short window, affairs that require an optimized radar fire control system capable of operating a continuous fire defensive system, backed up by extensive short range and ECM capabilities.

ESSM Distributed Lethality

We’ve talked repeatedly about how the US military is abandoning high end, heavy combat in favor of low end “combat”.  While much of the most obvious examples of this trend are within the ground combat community, the Navy is following the same path.  For example, the Navy retired an entire class of Perry frigates and replaced them with an almost non-combat-capable class of LCS. 

We’ve also discussed the absence of critical and logical operational and tactical thinking that plagues the entire military.  We’ve shown that the military has abandoned strategic thinking and is no longer capable of devising sound strategic plans.

Finally, we’ve discussed the myopic focus on technology at the expense of operations and tactics.

Now, the latest issue of Proceedings shows us another example illustrating these trends (1).  Cdr. Lukacs suggests converting the Navy’s amphibious ships (the LXX vessels) into anti-surface warfare (ASuW) ships using the Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile (ESSM) controlled by the Ship Self Defense System (SSDS) combat software program.

For starters, let’s set aside the fact that the SSDS has been plagued by problems and, according to DOT&E’s annual reports, can’t even properly perform its intended defensive purpose.  Problems include poor sensor placement, legacy sensor integration issues, target detection and identification issues, weapon employment and guidance issues, and ESSM performance issues.  Thus, the author wants to begin modifying the SSDS to perform offensive warfare before the system’s primary function is even working – but we’ll set that aside for the purpose of this discussion.

Moving on, the author proposes utilizing the ESSM for offensive warfare.  The proposed list of candidate ESSM offensive warfare ships includes carriers and all amphibious ships.  Certainly, the ESSM can be used to hit a slow moving target (a ship) with the proper software modifications.  The question, though, is whether this is a good idea and a worthwhile use of time and limited funds, given all the other problems the Navy faces.

Let’s start with the missile, itself.  The RIM-162 ESSM is 12 ft long, 10 in. diameter, and weighs 620 lbs.  It has an 86 lb blast fragmentation warhead with a proximity fuze.  Guidance is provided by mid-course datalink and terminal semi-active radar homing.  Speed is Mach 4 and range is 27 nm.  The missile costs around $1.5M.

As best I can interpret it, the 86 lb warhead is not 86 lbs of explosive but, rather, the total weight of the warhead which is mainly the “fragmentation” component.  The actual explosive weight is some fraction of the total.  Note that I may be misinterpreting this and some reader may be able to shed more light on this.

The first thing to look at in assessing an anti-surface weapon is lethality.  A 0.50 cal. machine gun, for example, despite having a high rate of fire, has almost no lethality in the anti-ship role.  The ESSM, being a fragmentation weapon, has limited lethality.  Shrapnel can disable topside electronics but has very little lethality against a ship.

Even the Standard missile, which has an anti-surface mode, is considered a marginal anti-ship weapon and the ESSM is a much smaller, less capable anti-ship weapon than that.  As the author states,

“While possessing only a fraction of the range and carrying one-third the warhead of the SM-6, …”

So, the ESSM is somewhere between ineffective and marginally effective in terms of lethality.  The obvious question, then, is why pursue it?  Well, in continuing the author’s statement, above,

“While possessing only a fraction of the range and carrying one-third the warhead of the SM-6, this missile is nonetheless fast, maneuverable, …”

So, the author views the ESSM’s speed and maneuverability as positive attributes of an anti-ship weapon.  I agree.  However, the missile’s maneuverability is designed to allow it to engage incoming missiles.  It has no maneuverability in an anti-ship mode – it flies straight at the target.  It has no terminal evasive maneuver capability.  Possibly some kind of terminal evasion routine could be programmed into the missile but that would require a new developmental effort and raises questions like whether the missile could maintain communications links and target lock.  The missile was designed to bore straight in at the target (incoming missile) while maneuvering just enough to achieve intercept.  It was not designed for evasive maneuvers.  Thus, the author’s contention that the missile’s speed and maneuverability are positive attributes is only half right.  The speed is a benefit but the maneuverability does not apply in the anti-ship role.

ESSM - Offensive Weapon?

The lack of terminal evasion capability renders the missile susceptible to the target ship’s defenses.

So, the ESSM is marginally effective in terms of speed and maneuverability.  The obvious question, then, is why pursue it? 

The next question to look at in assessing an anti-ship weapon is range.  The reported range of the ESSM is 27 nm.  Of course, that’s the range against an aerial target and it assumes a viable means of target detection and designation.  Remember that the author proposes installing the ESSM on carriers and amphibious ships, neither of which possess any particularly useful long range surface radar.  Thus, the effective anti-ship range is probably around the radar horizon, perhaps 15-20 miles.  Is this useful, tactically?  As the author puts it,

“If, however, an SSDS-equipped HVU [High Value Unit] had its own ASUW capability, when an enemy combatant appeared on the horizon, the HVU could counter that ship herself, instead of retreating to safer waters or diverting her aircraft from their critical missions.  The ship would simply take care of the enemy and continue with the critical mission at hand, reducing the demand for escorts.”

The lack of tactical thought in this statement is stunning.  If an enemy ship “appears” on the horizon, our ship is probably already sinking.  Even if not, and a completely surprise encounter has occurred, the tactical reality is that a carrier or amphibious ship will be facing an enemy warship.  To believe that an amphibious ship with a handful of non-lethal ESSM missiles is going to “simply take care of the enemy” is ludicrous.  Our amphibious ship is going to simply sink. 

Hey, if we had the ESSM on our amphibious ship and could inflict some minor damage on the enemy before we sink, why not do it?  The reality is that the time, effort, money, and ship’s deck and internal volume that would be consumed by mounting an ESSM launcher is not justified by the remote possibility of inflicting some minor damage in an incredibly unlikely scenario.

Let’s not let the aircraft carrier part of this go unnoticed.  The author proposes mounting ESSM on carriers.  If a carrier is surprised by an enemy ship appearing on the horizon, one has to ask where the carrier’s aircraft have been.  The likelihood that none of the dozens and dozens of daily aircraft sorties (not to mention the E-2 Hawkeye) would have noticed an enemy ship slowly approaching the carrier during the previous day or two is vanishingly small.  This is just an absolutely illogical proposition.  This demonstrates a total absence of tactical and logical thinking.

The author proposes not just using the anti-ship ESSM in a self-defense role but using the ESSM equipped ship in an active offensive role.

“If every LSD, LPD, or LX(R) were armed with an NSSM or ESSM launcher, those ships would instantly be more relevant and could be employed offensively before and after they delivered Marines ashore.”

The author is proposing to use amphibious ships in an active offensive role before they deliver their Marines.  So, he would have us risk a multi-billion dollar ship and the entire Marine complement to go ship-hunting with a near sensor-less, short ranged, non-lethal ship and missile????  The best case scenario for this is that the amphibious ship finds a target, inflicts some minor damage, and then is sunk with the entire Marine complement.  The likely case scenario is that the amphibious ship is sunk before it can accomplish anything.

Even using a multi-billion dollar ship to go ship-hunting with a near sensor-less, short ranged, non-lethal missile after delivering its Marines is stupid and near suicidal. 

Finally, let’s consider the overall scenario.  The author proposes arming the carriers and amphibious ships with anti-surface ESSM against the possibility that enemy ships “appear” on the horizon.  How likely is that?  During war, carriers and amphibious ships will always be in groups escorted by rings of Aegis destroyers and cruisers and patrolling aircraft.  No enemy ship is going to “appear” on the horizon.  If they do, it means they’ve shot their way through all the escorts and aircraft.  An enemy ship or force powerful enough to do that isn’t going to be even momentarily bothered by a handful of ESSM missiles and will have already sunk the carrier and amphibious ships from well beyond the horizon.  There is no realistic scenario in which a single carrier or amphibious ship will be surprised by an enemy ship appearing on the horizon.  Again, this is a complete absence of tactical thought.

The author states,

“This is the exciting implication of distributed lethality taken to its logical conclusion.”

No, this is the complete absence of intelligence, logic, and tactical thought taken to its logical conclusion.

Honestly, I can’t believe the author is even in the Navy.  Sadly, he’s not alone in this kind of total absence of operational and tactical thought and blind pursuit of the next “gee-whiz, look what we can do” technology.  For instance, one or more commanders in the Navy had to have approved the author’s article and, at the very least, found it reasonable.  The Navy is raising officer-idiots with no fundamental understanding of operations and tactics. 

____________________________________

(1)USNI Proceedings, “Setting the Defense on the Offensive”, Cdr. John A. Lukacs IV, Nov 2016, p.38

Respond or Leave

Everyone has heard by now of the apparent cruise missile (C-802 is the most likely) attacks on two US Navy ships.  If you haven’t, you can check out the USNI article (1).  The USS Mason, a Burke destroyer, launched two SM-2 missiles and one ESSM in response to the cruise missiles.  Both cruise missiles landed in the water short of the ships and there is no indication that either was shot down by the destroyers missiles.  It appears that either the cruise missiles never had a target lock or the destroyer’s electronic countermeasures prevented a lock.

I’m not going to waste time speculating about the performance of the weapon systems since we don’t have enough information.  Instead, let’s see what other lessons we can learn.

First, the fog of war is eternal.  Despite all our sensors, electronics, radar, IR, optics, and computer software, we don’t know whether the missiles we fired in defense hit anything.  How is that possible?  No one was trying to deny us sensor data as would happen in a peer war.  We had a completely unhindered view of a small battlespace and yet we couldn’t even see whether any of our three missiles hit anything?  This should serve as a lesson to all those who want to commit us to the vaunted Third Offset strategy based on networks, unmanned vehicles, and a wholly unfounded belief that we will have an omniscient view of the battlefield thereby enabling and enhancing our forces.  What a bunch of cow droppings!  We can’t see an uncontested battlefield clearly and it’s only going to be much, much more confused when a peer enemy contests the battlefield with electronic warfare.  We won’t know jack about what’s going on.  That’s the reality of war.  That’s the fog of war.  We should be training for that confusion rather than blindly believing we’ll see everything.  The fog of war is eternal and all-encompassing.  We need to embrace it and train for it, not ignore it.

Second, we need to respond with massive and deadly force – or leave the area.  Any other course is just going to get US sailors killed and ships sunk.  Failure to respond will simply embolden our enemies and ensure further attacks.  The various actors in the area need to understand that threatening US ships is a fatal mistake.  If it’s not a mistake and they can launch missiles at us with impunity as we demonstrate our restraint and passivity then we need to leave the area because we clearly aren’t doing any good.  I think the odds of us responding are negligible so I think we should leave the area.

Third, this illustrates the need for a counterbattery (countermissile, in this case) capability.  The moment the incoming cruise missiles were detected, Tomahawk missiles should have been heading towards the cruise missile launch point.   Further, a UAV should have been directed to the launch point to look for follow up attack possibilities.  The two cruise missile attacks were apparently launched an hour or so apart.  It’s not clear whether they were launched from the same point (there’s that fog of war, again!) but a UAV should have been overhead, watching, for the second launch.  A UAV might also have allowed us to preemptively attack the second missile launch site.  If we’re going to operate on the modern battlefield, split seconds will be all we have and a countermissilebattery fire capability is badly needed.

What response will the Navy and the country make?  If history is any indicator, none. 

What lessons will the Navy learn?  If history is any indicator, none. 

______________________________

(1)USNI News website, “USS Mason Fired 3 Missiles to Defend From Yemen Cruise Missiles Attack”, Sam LaGrone, 11-Oct-2016, https://news.usni.org/2016/10/11/uss-mason-fired-3-missiles-to-defend-from-yemen-cruise-missiles-attack

Ship Self-Defense System (SSDS)

Here’s a little-known system that is critical to Navy ship survivability and yet is struggling to achieve effective and reliable operation – the Ship Self-Defense System (SSDS).  SSDS is intended to be the self-defense weapons control system for all carriers, amphibious ships, and LCS.  The system comprises software and networking which links existing, legacy sensors to existing and new weapons.  Supported weapons include, notably, Rolling Airframe Missile (RAM) and Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile (ESSM).  In concept, any sensor or any weapon can be added to the system through software modifications.

In their 2011 Annual Report, DOT&E stated the following.

“… the ability to effectively complete the self-defense mission against the types of threats for which the overall system was designed has not been successfully demonstrated. In addition, reliability problems further degrade the ships’ ability to complete this mission.”

 

ESSM - Part of a Troubled System



Several ship classes including the LPD-17 and CVN-68 carriers have been evaluated as unable to meet their self-defense requirements.  This doesn’t mean that the system is totally inoperable, only that aspects of the threat spectrum can’t be reliably countered, as yet.  For instance, the report describes the CVN-68 problems,

“The CVN-68 ship class combat system has several problems that keep it from successfully completing the ship self-defense mission. Specific problems include deficiencies in weapon employment timelines, sensor coverage, system track management, and North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) SeaSparrow Missile System performance, as well as deficiencies with the recommended engagement tactics provided for use against multiple ASCM threat classes.”

 

One of the common and continued problems is that the physical placement of some of the legacy sensors has proven to be sub-optimal, leading to detection difficulties in some scenarios. 

One of the major issues identified in the report is a lack of realistic threat surrogates which will allow meaningful testing.  This is a several year, standing criticism/recommendation to the Navy from DOT&E.  We’ve covered this general issue in multiple posts.  I find it disturbing that year after year the Navy somehow finds the funds to build new ships but makes little or no attempt to field realistically performing threat drones so as to test and develop the self-defense systems that will keep the new ships afloat.  The Navy’s internal priority is new construction at the expense of maintenance, training, testing, and so on.  Navy leadership has their priorities completely ass-backwards and they desperately need to wake up as Adm. Harvey urged in his farewell note to the fleet.

DOT&E issued a classified report to Congress on the SSDS program in March of 2011 describing details of the problems.

This is one of those posts about which I have no meaningful analysis beyond the Navy’s scrambled priorities.  Consider this simply interesting information that is worth keeping an eye on because it is the backbone of so many ships.