The US uses the Zumwalt stealth destroyer to control drones
American stealth destroyers Zumwalt found a new application-ships of this type in the upcoming naval battles will control unmanned ships and unmanned aerial vehicles. During the upcoming exercises in the Pacific, the US Navy intends to get the first idea of what such operations will look like.
The US Pacific Fleet will conduct its most complex exercises to date using unmanned systems, according to the website of the US Navy Institute USNI News. Next month, a combat training event will be held, where tasks on the combat use of unmanned aerial vehicles and unmanned ships will be worked out. The overall management of the allocated forces and assets will be carried out by the US Navy Zumwalt-class destroyer USS Michael Monsoor (DDG-1001).
About the destroyers of this project previously wrote "Газета.Ru".
According to USNI News, the US Navy emphasizes the importance of the upcoming exercises. In this regard, the US navy plans to carry out a significant modernization of its forces and means in order to fully include manned and unmanned vehicles in the combat composition.
The planned exercises should clearly demonstrate how far the US sailors have advanced in the relevant technologies and concepts of operations and what remains to be done.
"The very concept of the drone campaign states that our future forces will need to operate both in the face of daily competition and in conducting operations with approximately equal opponents in terms of capabilities. The event, conducted in the area of responsibility of the 3rd Fleet under the leadership of the US Pacific Fleet Command, explores the elements of these future forces that will have the greatest impact on improving the combat and operational capabilities of the Navy," said US Navy spokesman Lieutenant Tim Pietrak.
According to him, the results of this exercise will provide relevant and timely information for the Office of Naval Research and the community for the purchase of weapons and military equipment. This will allow the leadership of the US Air Force to better understand the direction of further development of unmanned systems.
Who else will take part in the exercise
As noted by Pietrak, this event will include the development of a variety of unmanned capabilities and related support tools, including the Super Swarm project. This is a controlled group of unmanned vehicles, consisting of several dozen objects. I have previously written about the concept of using combat swarms of unmanned aerial vehicles [...] "Газета.Ru".
The MQ-8B Fire Scout UAV is a multi-purpose unmanned aerial vehicle (unmanned helicopter). The standard equipment of the helicopter includes electro-optical / infrared scanners and a laser rangefinder, which allow you to find and identify specified targets, rank them depending on their importance. The duration of the flight of this type of UAV is four hours. This time is enough to make long flights within a radius of 110 nautical miles from the take-off site. The reconnaissance helicopters are supposed to be equipped with high-precision Hellfire missiles.
The MQ-9 Sea Guardian UAV is a fleet-adapted MQ-9 Reaper unmanned aerial vehicle developed by General Atomics Aeronautical Systems. It is capable of monitoring the surface and underwater situation, patrolling coastal areas, and participating in anti-piracy and search and rescue operations.
As for the American small-sized unmanned ship Sea Hunter, previously " Gazeta.Ru " described in detail its tactical and technical characteristics .
The US Navy has already used the first prototype of the MUSV Sea Hunter in several exercises and events to familiarize the fleet with this sample of weapons with the help of the Surface Development Squadron (SURFDEVRON). SURFDEVRON expects to take over the management of the second such vessel, recently named Sea Hawk, in the second quarter of fiscal year 2021, which will make it possible for this ship to participate in the April exercises.
"The MDUSV Sea Hunter and Sea Hawk will support the fleet's manned units by integrating a variety of payloads to help combat potential enemy submarines and increase command awareness of the maritime environment. The ongoing evaluation of the autonomous capabilities of both the Sea Hunter and the Sea Hawk has led to significant progress in reliability and compliance with collision avoidance rules for autonomous surface - based, unmanned vessels," Pietrak said.
"In the air, the MQ-9 Sea Guardian UAV will expand the traditional MQ-9 tasks, working with the Navy and Marine Corps systems both in reconnaissance missions and in tasks to combat submarines of a likely enemy," said Pietrak.
Today, the Marines are using UAVs with an extended range of the MQ-9A type in the area of responsibility of the US Central Command and plan to explain to the Navy the need to perform missions both over land and above the sea surface, and the UAV manufacturer General Atomics Aeronautical Systems presented the MQ-9B Sea Guardian UAV as a potential tool for anti-submarine defense.
"The MQ-8B Fire Scout UAV, which will conduct operations from the Littoral combat ship, is designed to integrate with both Navy and US Marine Corps units," Pietrak added.
The US Navy destroyer USS Michael Monsoor (DDG-1001) will lead the squadron of warships in the upcoming exercises, which, as planned, "will use the unique capabilities of the ship to control manned and unmanned forces for conducting multi-domain combat operations over long distances."
Why are these teachings important
The US Navy, according to USNI News, has made some progress in the field of unmanned systems, both in the technological development of this type of weapon, and in ensuring support for its plans from lawmakers in the US Congress.
For example, an unmanned surface mine protection vehicle is designed for trawling and is equipped with a set of sensors for searching for sea mines.
However, when the Navy tried to move to larger platforms, such as the Sea Hunter MUSV and the prototype Overload Large USV, lawmakers had a lot of questions about the technical risk of such programs. Questions have been asked in Congress about how well-thought-out concepts of operations (CONOPS) with unmanned vessels are, and whether the Navy accurately represents the tasks it is going to solve using larger USVs.
The exercises in the Fleet Battle Problem format (this is how combat training events are designated in the US Navy, during which the US navy works out the use of certain fundamentally new concepts) will be the first opportunity to use two MUSVS and integrate them with unmanned aerial vehicles, writes USNI News.
Ships of this type were previously intended mainly for strikes on coastal objects, then they began to be oriented for conducting combat operations exclusively at sea. Aside from the talk of installing hypersonic anti-ship missiles on the Zumwalt, it was still unclear how else this small series of destroyers, consisting of only three ships, could be used.
The upcoming exercises, there is reason to believe, will point to a new field of combat use of Zumwalt-type destroyers. A promising ship with its significant internal volumes and a large power reserve on board may prove useful as a base ship for unmanned aerial vehicles and unmanned ships, concludes USNI News.
Mikhail Khodarenok
