m e s s a g e ___

from the president

STEALTH
OREW?

The Journal of Electronic Defense I January 2015

or years, there have been many debates on whether the Department of

Defense (DOD) should invest its precious research and development dollars
on stealth or Electronic Warfare (EW). I have been pulled into more than my
share of meetings where these heated discussions took place. In fact, I think
one of the outcomes of these polarized debates was the phrase: "DOD is the
only place in the world where the speed of sound exceeds the speed of light." So in
this era of tightening defense budgets, which approach seems to provide the most
effective warfighting advantage - stealth or EW?
It is clear that the Air Force is relying more and more on the advantages of low
observable technologies in the F-35 Lightening II, and the Navy is relying on a more
effective EA-18G Growler aircraft. Then you have to consider what potential adversar
ies are doing.
At the recent Zhuhai air show, the People's Liberation Army (PLA) showcased some
pretty impressive anti-access and area denial (A2/AD) capabilities. The gigantic JH27A VHF active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar - the first of its type in
service anywhere - is designed to track stealthy targets. Regrettably, there is little
information on how it actually works. So, if you had that discretionary DOD dollar,
where would you spend it? My response is that I would spend it on a mix of both EW
and stealth - which is exactly what DOD is doing. As we have seen in past conflicts,
stealth platforms become much more effective when escorted by standoff jammers.
However, adversaries in future conflicts may prevent the standoff jammers from get
ting close enough to achieve the required J/S effectiveness.
With the advent of stand-in jamming, we need to fully model a force-on-force en
gagement, and quantitatively measure the effects of a dedicated swarm of stand-in
jammers supporting a strike package of 4th/5th generation strike aircraft.
Our near-peer adversaries are increasing their understanding of, and emphasis
on, countering low-observable capabilities. They have invested in passive systems;
bi-static capabilities; AESAs; scanned, lower-frequency, early-warning surveillance
systems; digital processing capabilities; and enhanced cross-cueing operational tech
niques. Accordingly, it is wise to consider complementing standoff jammers with
stand-in jammers because their synchronized employment could significantly deny
an adversary's ability to provide the weapons-quality tracks needed to guide a missile
onto a target. The initial assessment is that a combination of standoff and stand-in
jamming will require an adversary to improve his detection capabilities by 6- to 9-dB.
It also will extend convergence time responsiveness by at least 10 times, and decrease
adversary geolocation accuracies by a significant margin. These are operational met
rics that we need to pay attention to.
For too long, the EW community has been disadvantaged in the capability vs.
capacity tradeoff assessments. If the recommendations from the DSB's recently pub
lished "21st Century Military Operations in a Complex Electromagnetic Environment"
study are taken to heart, this unbalanced mission mix between stealth and EWwill
be corrected soon. - Maj Gen Kenneth Israel, USAF (Ret)

^VOC
Association of Old Crows
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PRESIDENT
Ken Israel
VICE PRESIDENT
Dave Flime
SECRETARY
Vickie Greenier
TREASURER
Joe Koesters
PAST PRESIDENT
Wayne Shaw
AT-LARGE DIRECTORS
Powder Carlson
Todd Caruso
Vickie Greenier
Craig Harm
Brian Hinkley
Amanda Kammier
Mark Schallheim
Muddy Watters
Paul Westcott
APPOINTED DIRECTORS
Robert Elder
Anthony Lisuzzo
REGIONAL DIRECTORS
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Central: Joe Koesters
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M ountain-W estern: Sam Roberts
M id-Atlantic: Douglas Lamb
Pacific: Joe Hulsey
International I: Robert Andrews
International II: Jeff Walsh
10: Al Bynum
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Executive Director
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Director,
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