Satellite Imagery Dispersal

There is a significant faction of military/naval observers who have the mistaken belief that satellites can see every vessel sailing on the ocean and that the satellites have some sort of direct link to the firing controls on ships and aircraft thus rendering every ship a kill waiting to happen.  This is nonsense, as ComNavOps has repeatedly pointed out.  The resolution of satellite imagery precludes that kind of omnipotent detection and tracking.  If you have sufficient resolution then you give up breadth of field.  If you have breadth of field then you give up resolution.
 
All this is compounded by the fact that satellite imagery is in high demand and the raw image must be processed and analyzed.  After that, it has to be dispersed to the hundreds of offices wanting access to it.  In the case of fire control, you have to add in layers of command (bureaucracy) before any useful detection/tracking imagery can reach a ship or aircraft where it can be put to actual firing use. 
 
The entire process takes hours or days.  We simply don’t have the kind of instantaneous, raw image-to-the-missile-launch-button that so many imagine.
 
Many of you still doubt that reality.  Well, here’s more proof. 
 

The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) is working with US Combatant Commands (COCOMS) to operationally test an early version of its Joint Regional Edge Node (J-REN) system designed to speed satellite-based intelligence to the battlefield, according to NGA officials.
 
NGA began development of J-REN — a modernization of NGA’s current information technology “pipe” to more rapidly fulfil commanders’ requests for urgent access to remote sensing imagery and analysis — just last year.[1]

The lack of timeliness of satellite imagery has been a known and on-going issue for many years and even recent advances have been insufficient.
 

The ever-increasing calls from COCOMS for more timely imagery and analysis from remote sensing satellites has been the subject of a tug-of-war between NGA and the Space Force — an issue the two agencies have been struggling to work out for more than a year.
 
The concept is to avoid clogging up limited communications bandwidth with overly-dense data packages, while still ensuring that military operators have good enough information to work with …[1]

There you have it.  If satellites were the omnipotent, all-seeing miracles with direct links to firing controls, this entire effort wouldn’t even be happening, would it?  The blindingly obvious conclusion is that the image-to-fire-control process is a slow one, as ComNavOps has repeatedly stated.
 
 
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[1]Breaking Defense website, “NGA field testing new processor to speed imagery to US regional commands”, Theresa Hitchens, 18-Apr-2025,
https://breakingdefense.com/2025/04/nga-field-testing-new-processor-to-speed-imagery-to-us-regional-commands/

Constellation Mk 110 57 mm Gun

One of the [many!] weaknesses of the LCS is that the Mk110 57 mm gun is not radar controlled but is, instead, optically (EO) controlled.  The gun has not performed well in testing to date.  Surprisingly, it appears that the new Constellation class is repeating this EO controlled 57 mm gun system.  From the Department of Defense, Fiscal Year (FY) 2022 Budget Estimates, May 2021, Navy Justification Book, Volume 1 of 1 Shipbuilding and Conversion, (1)

 

The MK 48 MOD 2 Gun Weapon System (GWS) is fully integrated with MK 160 MOD 18 Gun Computer System w/ MK 20 MOD 1 Electro Optical Sight System and MK 110 MOD 0 57mm gun.  The MK 160 Gun Fire Control System (GFCS) is the standard USN gun fire control system; the MK 20 Electro-Optical Sensor System (EOSS) is the standard gun optical sight used for gun engagements; and the MK 110 is an automated 57mm gun system used for surface and air engagements of hostile targets. (1) [emphasis added]

 

This statement is not quite 100% conclusive but , presumably, if there was a radar control component it would have been mentioned so it appears that the Constellation’s 57 mm gun control will be strictly optical and will likely repeat some of the LCS fire control and accuracy problems as described in the various annual DOT&E reports.

 

If correct, this is troubling and baffling.

 

Mk 110 57 mm Gun

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(1)https://www.secnav.navy.mil/fmc/fmb/Documents/22pres/SCN_Book.pdf

Offensive Aegis

As ComNavOps was reviewing some general naval history and pondering the Navy’s current force structure he couldn’t help but be reminded that the strength and backbone of the fleet (well, the surface fleet, anyway) is Aegis.  Any surface combatant that doesn’t start with the letters CVN (carrier) is an Aegis ship, either a Burke or a Tico.  I’m reminded that Aegis is a strictly defensive system.  True, that's not exactly headline news but thinking a bit further I realized that the entire might of the fleet was designed as a defensive force.  Now, by good fortune, VLS and Tomahawk have allowed the Aegis ships to project a bit of offensive firepower, as well, but it remains a fact that the Navy hasn't commissioned a purpose-built offensive platform since [not sure?].  If you care to look at it this way, the surface Navy consists of defensive Aegis platforms and carriers.

Still not earthshaking revelations.  Where's this going?  Well, it occurs to me that the Navy needs an offensive equivalent to Aegis.  I'm not just talking about a better anti-ship cruise missile than Harpoon or a bigger gun but a complete game-changing offensive system. 

Such a system should have several hundred mile to 1000+ mile weapons range.  The weapons should be stealthy, supersonic, and pack a punch with a range of weapons varying from one-hit, one-kill on the largest ships to Hellfire size weapons for small targets.

The most important aspect of a game-changing offensive system, though, would have to lie in the sensor and fire control systems (SFC).  A system should have the ability to detect and classify targets at several hundred to thousand mile ranges.  The fire control should be capable of not just guiding the weapons but assigning individual targets once in the target area. 

The problem, of course, is that current technology can't provide that kind of performance from the weapons launching platform.  So, what about launching the sensor/fire control system along with (or ahead of) the weapons?  The Soviets were working towards this but I don't know how far along they got.  Basically, large missiles whose payload is sensors and fire control rather than a warhead.  Several of these would form a line-of-sight SFC network for the accompanying missiles.  By definition, this would involve a significant degree of autonomy.  Basically, waves of missiles capable of reasoned search, target classification, and intelligent weapons allocation.

I could imagine waves of SFC missiles with accompanying anti-ship missiles sweeping the East/South China Seas.  Maybe we have a use for the Mk57 launch cells?

To an extent, UAVs could do this except that no UAV has anywhere near the speed, range, and payload to be effective.

Going further, launching platforms, meaning the ships themselves, that can detect and target at the required distances would be nice.  From what I can gather, the old Spruance Outboard system was attempting to do exactly that by collating passive sensor information from multiple sensors on multiple platforms – and not just sea based, either.  Land and air based sensors can contribute just as readily as ships.  The concept is that each individual sensor’s information is woefully insufficient by itself for targeting but that the combination of information from the multitude of sensors can be assembled into a targeting quality picture.  Think of it as triangulation on a vast scale.  If that could be refined, that might provide the hugely over-the-horizon detection that's needed.  If you think about it, it’s not all that different in concept from the Co-operative Engagement Capability (CEC) that’s currently used for defensive anti-air warfare.

Well, enough rambling.  I don't know the specifics but I just know that we need an offensive system equivalent to what Aegis gave us defensively.

What do you think?  Anything to this or does ComNavOps need to up the dosages of his medications?