APG-81 vs ASQ-239

The F-35 compared with other modern jets.
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by sferrin » 23 Oct 2019, 21:45

A shame they're not integrated. Is there a plan to replace the ALQ-99 with something that CAN be integrated with the APG-79? Or is that called, "F-35C"?
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by marsavian » 23 Oct 2019, 21:57

All the Growler next generation jamming pods that are currently under development and testing will be AESA based and compatible with the APG-79. Growler is still a WIP.


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by doge » 30 Nov 2019, 19:11

I found a long interview about F-35 EW, so I am posting it. 8) EW of F-35 is full of mystery!! :doh:
https://defaeroreport.com/2019/03/23/ba ... er-sunset/
BAE’s Caruso on New F-35 Electronic Warfare System; EA-6B Prowler Sunset
BY ADMIN AWS 2019,
Lt. Col. Todd Caruso, USMC Ret., business development director at BAE Systems, discusses the new electronic warfare capability for the F-35 Lightning II fighter by Lockheed Martin, and the retirement of his old unit and aircraft, Marine Tactical Electronic Warfare Squadron 2 — VMAQ-2 — and the Northrop Grumman EA-6B Prowler with Defense & Aerospace Report Editor Vago Muradian. The interview was conducted at the Air Force Association’s 2019 Air Warfare Symposium where our coverage was sponsored by L3 Technologies and Leonardo DRS.

Vago Muradian: Welcome to the Defense and Aerospace Report. I’m Vago Muradian here in Orlando, Florida for the Air Force Association’s Annual Air Warfare Symposium, the number one winter gathering of U.S. Air Force leaders from around the world, as well as industry executives, thought leaders and media here in Florida. Our coverage here is sponsored by Leonardo DRS and L3 Technologies.
We’re here on the BAE Systems stand to talk to retired United States Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel Todd Caruso, a former Prowler driver. Anybody who knows me knows I’m a big fan of electronic warfare and I think the Battle Hog is one of the coolest aircraft in history. It’s going to sundown next week, actually, down in Cherry Point. You worked the F-35 electronic warfare platform for the Lightning II.
Todd, first, it’s great to reconnect.
Second, congratulations on the big award on the new sort of EW capability for the F-35. The jet is such a critical part of what all the forces want to do, and the electromagnetic spectrum and electronic warfare is more important than ever.
Talk to us a little bit about what this upgrade does in terms of the capabilities of the jet.

Lt. Col. (Ret) Todd Caruso: Sure, thanks a lot.
The ASQ-239 EW countermeasure suite is the electronic warfare suite for the F-35 and it’s gone through some major upgrades over the years. The most recent one is an upgrade or a program we call DTIP. It’s an acronym within an acronym. Of course the D is DCRTG — Digital Channelized Receiver/Techniques Generator that goes into the system. The TIP part of DTIP is the Tuner Insertion Program. That makes up the acronym and the program that upgrades the airplane.
Some years ago, even when I was still in uniform in the Pentagon, we were talking about a DTIP upgrade to the jet. Essentially some diminishing resources and having to put a new componentry into the airplane. So DTIP really sets a foundation for the future modernization of the airplane.
We were able to replace and redesign some of the componentry in the racks within the system itself to allow it to take on more capability in the future. So as F-35 transitions now from a system design and development on into a modernization, the EW suite is positioned for that modernization of the future.
In Block 4 we’ll see a lot of new changes coming to the EW suite, a lot of new capabilities coming on board for the system itself, both in the EW side in the ESM and then the countermeasure side as well.

Mr. Muradian: One of the challenges, obviously, with the airplane is whether it’s the ALQ-99 or [ICAT-3] or whatever else, you’re looking at big pods, whereas all of this kind of capability, and it’s not like for light capability, but a lot of capability has to fit within the mold lines of the airplane.
Talk to us a little bit about the challenge you guys have to fit that kind of capability into what is a relatively small box that’s on the airplane.

Lt. Col. (Ret) Caruso: Again, part of the DTIP program is to make more space for more capability in the future. So it actually provides more space for componentry in the racks themselves, and it provides some Group A changes for more capabilities in other parts of the airplane to be added to it from an electronic warfare standpoint.
So if you need some capability on board that will bring a lot more processing power to the airplane, we have the space available now to put in higher processing cards and things like that for more capabilities in the future.

Mr. Muradian: And from a task management standpoint, you’ve got four people that’s on a Prowler, two people on a Growler which is the EF-18G. Are you guys doing anything special in terms of the user interface to be able to, because it is a true multi-mission jet in terms of being able to do counter-air, obviously optimized for ground, but also an EW mission set.

Lt. Col. (Ret) Caruso: The very unique thing about the F-35, fully integrated mission systems, right? All mission systems report to fusion. Fusion then decides what’s the best answer for the pilot and displays that to them. So we continue to report our information to fusion as we have in the past, and we’re very connected and collaborative with the APG-81, the radar for the jet as well.
So the EW capabilities on the airplane are fully integrated with all of the mission systems reporting to fusion and then fusion determines what the pilot sees and what’s displayed and how the airplane reacts to the electronic warfare environment around it.

Mr. Muradian: Is there, the airplane is in stealthy mode, obviously, with internal carriage and internal portage, but it does have hard points externally so it can actually carry a rather large — in the less stealthy mode. The Beast mode as Jeff [Babbione] used to say. Quite a lot of stuff can be hung off the airplane.
Is there any discussion, or are you guys thinking about sort of future fits that give the airplane kind of a more significant electronic warfare payload capability and power set that would allow it to do missions, because it’s a game-changing capability to be stealthy and yet have that capacity on the aircraft?
As you look at the road map for this, what are the different sorts of applications that the aircraft’s stealthy features allow — whether hanging external things on it, which you can still do in a relatively stealthy fashion — but growing that capability over time, I guess is my question.

Lt. Col. (Ret) Caruso: F-35, being as unique as it is, a stealth platform with robust mission capability on it, can sense the environment and can access battlespace that a lot of the traditional EW platforms can’t. The F-35 isn’t designed to be an electronic warfare or electronic attack platform. It’s a strike fighter aircraft. But it does sense the environment and has lots of good information from other parts of the battle space on it. So being able to share that information is really part of a road map for the future of F-35. Be able to send electronic warfare like information across the battlefield, share it with other F-35s, share it with other 4thGen fighters, and then of course when you come back, analyze that data and share it with the EW community at large as you go into reprogramming systems and things like that in the future.

Mr. Muradian: Let me ask you kind of a broader question. Electronic warfare was obviously something very important in the Cold War. Air Force had the EF-111s and a lot of EF coated airplanes. The Navy and the Marine Corps obviously, you had the EA-6A, then you had the EA-6B, the Prowler. And then it sort of winnowed down and it became much more of a Navy/Marine Corps expertise thing because of the community. There were some Air Force guys in the joint unit. I remember the big agreement when the F-111s went away and Air Force guys were going into that jet.
Talk to us a little bit about the renaissance of electronic warfare, and the enterprise-wide approach that folks are taking in terms of melding this capability, the Army’s working on capability, the Navy, across the force this is working. How does this element of it integrate into that platform? As Dog Davis used to say, former Deputy Commandant for Aviation for the Marine Corps, the Intrepid Tiger, sort of a distributed electronic warfare space as opposed to a whole bunch of dedicated electronic warfare.

Lt. Col. (Ret) Caruso: The F-35 becomes part of the system of systems of electronic warfare capability on the battlefield that’s out there. It has a very unique mission that it has to accomplish on its own, but again, as a capable system and a very robust electronic warfare suite aboard it, it can share data across the battlefield. So it’s another node in that system of systems. So getting them all connected, really important. It’s a joint asset, and each of the services will fight it and use it in a different manner. For instance the Navy will be very collaborative with its Super Hornet fleet and its Growler fleet. When next gen jammer comes on board for the Growlers there will be a whole ConOps behind how they employ an F-35 in conjunction with those other aircraft as well.
The same is true for the Marine Corps with MAGTF EW and how F-35 will be sort of a centerpiece for MAGTF EW in that system of systems with Intrepid Tiger and other things there. And then the Air Force has their whole suite of electronic warfare capabilities that will be collaborative in nature with an F-35 as well.

Mr. Muradian: And let me ask you about your reminiscences on the Prowler, one of the coolest looking airplanes. One of “the” all-time coolest airplanes ever. Let’s just be honest. It is. And I think it’s a gorgeous looking airplane, by the way. Anybody who tries to make fun of it I think is totally wrong and doesn’t know anything about airplanes. Talk to us about why the airplane was so cool, what you liked about it, what was unique about it, and what were some of the challenges of flying something that at first blush does not look like the sleekest, most aerodynamic thing, but could still go through the air at a pretty decent rate.

Lt. Col. (Ret) Caruso: The Prowler’s a great jet. Really sad to see it go and the Marine Corps will give it an appropriate sundown coming up here next week.
The jet itself, a very, very capable jet, designed way back in the Vietnam era for just exactly what it does, airborne electronic attack, which is a very important thing to have on the battlefield. We’ve realized that for many, many years.
The uniqueness about the Prowler and what I liked the best about it was its adaptability and flexibility. Designed to go after the traditional surface-to-air missiles and the early warning radars to protect those striker aircraft. As the enemy has done different things, our adversaries in our global commitment around the world to be able to control the electromagnetic spectrum has changed. The Prowler’s mission has also adapted as well. So we did very, very different missions in Afghanistan and Iraq utilizing that jet in many different ways. Not just the standard electronic warfare, take down the IADS type of a mission.
The Prowler’s adaptability to that, to bring on things like communications jamming and even do some PsyOps in some cases and do other types of electronic warfare commanding the spectrum with that jet was really unique to that platform.
Again, sorry to see it go, but we’re bringing on a lot of those capabilities that we have in the Prowler and spreading them through a system of systems in the future systems that we have. So it’s really neat.

Mr. Muradian: Todd, thanks very much for all your time. I appreciate it. Best of luck on the program and looking forward to talking to you again.

Lt. Col. (Ret) Caruso: Yes, sir. Thank you. Appreciate it.

https://youtu.be/p4-5qC8wfmA


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by doge » 14 Jan 2021, 15:47

I tried to web search find an article about the F-35 EW. 8)
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHR ... g24678.pdf
MILITARY SERVICES FIFTH–GENERATION TACTICAL AIRCRAFT CHALLENGES AND F–35 JOINT STRIKE FIGHTER PROGRAM UPDATE
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON TACTICAL AIR AND LAND FORCES, Washington, DC, Thursday, February 16, 2017.

Mr. BACON.
Success in a contested environment will depend on our ability to dominate the electro-magnetic spectrum. How has the AN/ASQ–239 electronic war-fare suite performed in testing and live fly against high-end threats? What improve-ments are required to ensure the F–35 can dominate in a contested environment? What additional enhancements are required at the U.S. Reprogramming Facility (USRF) to ensure our pilots have the most up to date mission data?
General BOGDAN.
The AN/ASQ–239 Electronic Warfare (EW) system has per-formed well in testing. The detection range, Advanced Emitter Location (AEL), En-hanced Geolocation (EGL), threat Identification (ID) performance and system re-sponse time all meet or exceed performance specification against the F–35 Block 3 advanced threats. Threats are continuously evolving and the current AN/ASQ–239 will face challenges against future advanced threats. Future planned improvements to stay ahead of the evolving threats include expanded Radio Frequency coverage, expanded Electronic Attack modes, and improved processing algorithms for ad-vanced and emerging threats. Improved Mission Data File (MDF) development and testing capabilities are also important to the successful performance of the AN/ ASQ–239. It is imperative that the United States Reprogramming Laboratory (USRL) be able to test and verify future MDF performance against the advanced threats. The F–35 Enterprise has plans to upgrade and improve the Reprogramming Labs to ensure we have the most up-to-date mission data. Examples of these future upgrades include a new, more robust Combat Electromagnetic Environment Simu-lator (CEESIM) and additional closed-loop threat simulation capability as well as improved tools to enable more rapid and efficient MDF creation.

Mr. BACON.
The demand for traditional ISR by the Combatant Commanders con-tinues to vastly exceed Service capacity to source. In many situations, ‘‘fast air’’ fighter aircraft are the only eyes and ears over the battlespace capable of observing the enemy and sharing critical information with the joint force. The F–35 is equipped with one of the most capable sensors suites ever developed; warfighter need and fiscal prudence requires that DOD smartly leverage the ability of our 5th gen aircraft to function as critical sensors over the battlefield. This capability is also important to many of our international partners, notably the U.K. Can you tell us what work has been accomplished to date to fully integrate the information collected by each F–35 sensor into our joint intelligence architecture? When will we have to ability to record and share what the F–35’s active and passive sensors collect?
General HARRIS.
The F–35’s sensor fusion solution and data sharing capabilities are focused on providing the interoperability required by the warfighter in support of the execution of the mission at the tactical level. The program is currently plan-ning increased capability in these areas as part of Follow-on Modernization, to in-clude Tactical Data Recording capability, which will allow the warfighter to record and use this data for ‘‘next day’’ missions. While there is no current capability or approved operational requirement to contribute to the Process, Exploit, Dissemina-tion (PED) architecture, the Services continue to investigate future opportunities to include this capability in future F–35 upgrades.


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by doge » 14 Jan 2021, 15:50

Breakingdefense.com is a frequent watcher. 8) But The mysterious F-35 EW. :doh:
https://breakingdefense.com/2019/01/201 ... e-warfare/
2019 Forecast: Hard Choices On Invisible Warfare
There are real signs of a renaissance in electronic warfare. Now comes the hard part: translating new strategies and concepts into doctrine, requirements, and systems in the field.
By BRYAN CLARK on January 04, 2019

A weakness of both traditional direction finding and advanced geolocation is the target needs to emit radio frequency energy to be detected and tracked. Visual electro-optical (EO) and infrared (IR) sensors can get around that problem by detecting the visible light or heat energy an object reflects or emanates — and EO/IR sensors are inherently passive, with no active emissions for an enemy to detect. Ground forces and unmanned aircraft have long relied on EO and IR sensors to find enemy troops and other targets because of the sensors’ relatively small size and power requirements. Now EO/IR is increasingly important to manned aircraft as well: With the F-35’s upgraded EO/IR Distributed Aperture System and new infrared search and track (IRST) pods, the Navy and Air Force will be improving their ability to find and engage targets that are not operating their radars or radios.


https://breakingdefense.com/2019/04/air ... -ecct-2-0/
Air Force Launches Electronic Warfare Roadmap: EMS ECCT 2.0
By COLIN CLARK on April 24, 2019

The Air Force, Navy and Marines now have, by all accounts, an excellent EW and cyber capability in the F-35 but we don’t know much about it, beyond the fact that people seem to like to use the term “eye-watering” to describe them. The general said very little about the F-35. BAE Systems builds the F-35’s dedicated EW system but the aircraft’s AESA radar is also a powerful cyber and EW tool, I understand, though it’s almost never discussed.


https://breakingdefense.com/2019/11/ele ... od-enough/
Electronic Warfare: Better, But Still Not Good Enough
The US military is rebuilding its ability to protect its radios, sensors and radars while jamming those of its adversaries. But we're still probably second or third in the world.
By SYDNEY J. FREEDBERG JR. on November 01, 2019

“Time To Start Moving Out”
Of course, getting organized to tackle the problem is not the same as actually solving the problem. “There’s a lot of good talk going on,” Bacon said, “[but] you can talk for decades, it’s time to start moving out…. We want to start seeing action.”
The Navy and Marines are building on their traditional strengths in electronic warfare, which they never gave away, but the land-based services are building up from very little. The Air Force is betting heavily on the heavily classified capabilities of the new F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, and it’s upgrading its Compass Call aircraft from aging EC-130 turboprops to modified Gulfstream jets, but the service is still pondering its overall approach. The Army has a clear plan, but it will take years to train the highly specialized personnel and build the new equipment to build its proposed EW units.


https://breakingdefense.com/2019/12/who ... r-answers/
Who’ll Fix EW? Task Force Gropes For Answers
Russian and Chinese jammers could cripple US radio, radar, and GPS. The Pentagon's still wrestling with who should fix that, let alone how.
By SYDNEY J. FREEDBERG JR. on December 18, 2019

Jammers, Analysts, & Coders
While the Defense Department is still debating organization, it is taking action to shore up the spectrum. That includes an array of new equipment across the services, most notably
    ・The Navy’s Next Generation Jammer for its EA-18G Growler jet and the Surface Electronic Warfare Improvement Program (SEWIP) for Navy warships;
    ・The Army’s ground-based jammer, the Terrestrial Layer System (TLS), and the drone-borne Multi-Function Electronic Warfare (MFEW) Air program;
    ・The Air Force’s upgrade of its Compass Call EW aircraft from the aging EC-130 turboprop to the EC-37B jet; and
    ・The highly classified but allegedly awesome cyber/electronic warfare capabilities of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter.
    Landrum and the Cross Functional Team, for their part, are working on cross-cutting issues (hence the name) that affect all four services and the Intelligence Community.
For example, every combat aircraft has electronic protection systems to detect and jam incoming anti-aircraft missiles. Every time a potential adversary upgrades their radar, all those countermeasures need to know how to recognize the new threat. But the laborious process the Defense Department uses to do this – from detecting enemy radar signals, to analyzing them, to issuing updated threat data across its fleets of aircraft – struggles to keep up with rapid advances in enemy electronics. While the F-35 program’s struggles with its mission data files have been the best publicized problems of this sort, it’s an issue across the force.
“What’s the process by which we characterize and validate that information?” Landrum said. How does it move from the collectors of the intelligence to the analysts to the program managers and coders who have to make specific updates to specific weapons systems?
“From the moment a new signal is detected until the time it is reprogrammed into a weapon or platform… that’s the enterprise process that we’re looking at, to streamline that and make it go a lot quicker,” said Oliver.

“The work that we envision will inform not just the F-35 process but also all the other weapon systems that need to understand the characterization of signals,” Landrum said. The ultimate goal is to have at least some of this detection-analysis-countermeasure cycle happen nigh-instantaneously on individual aircraft and vehicles, so-called cognitive electronic warfare using artificial intelligence to figure out what’s happening and how to respond faster than any human mind.
The Cross Functional Team is not only looking at technology, but at the human dimension as well. “We’re a couple of months into what we anticipate to be a year-long work force study,” Landrum said. The goal is to identify everyone across the Defense Department – uniformed military and civilian – who works on some aspect of the spectrum – from allocation frequency and bandwidth in conjunction with the FAA, to jamming enemy systems in combat – and figure out better ways to develop them as professionals from recruitment to retirement.


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by doge » 14 Jan 2021, 15:53

Radar is not the main sensor !? :shock: wow! :doh:
https://www.aerosociety.com/news/farnbo ... 6-day-two/
Farnborough Air Show 2016 - Day Two
TIM ROBINSON and BILL READ provide a look at some of the most exciting news and highlights of the second trade day, 12 July, of Farnborough International Air Show 2016.

‘Cognitive EW’ will counter enemy radars in real-time
Smart missiles will use EW to hunt down the most dangerous threat.
Over at BAE Systems the company was giving a rare public insight into the ‘dark arts’ of electronic warfare (EW). While EW has a long history (In WW2 the Blitz saw both sides play cat and mouse as Britain attempted to foil German bombing navigation aids), BAE’s EW history, via a US legacy company goes back almost as far, to 1951. BAE Systems EW systems have now been installed on over 80 platforms, including F-15s, EC-130H Compass Call, F-22s (the first digital EW system) and the latest AN/ASQ-239 suite on the F-35. One clue to the sophistication and accuracy of the F-35s EW system was a comment by an F-35 pilot at RIAT last week who said “the radar isn’t even the primary sensor anymore”.

Particularly interesting was BAE’s thoughts on future trends for EW, including smaller equipment to go on missiles and UAVs, network centric EW and ‘cognitive EW’. More compact and lighter EW systems, says BAE means it is now possible to out EW on smaller platforms – including missiles. The DARPA/Lockheed Martin Long Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM) will carry a BAE EW kit that will locate and classify threats and then attack the most promising target. 'Cognitive' EW which BAE is working on with a DARPA project, would allow EW systems to counter previous unseen emitters. Previously in the Cold War, detecting a new hostile threat emission, like a radar and then developing countermeasures to jam or spoof it, would take ‘weeks’. Cognitive EW aims to do this in real-time, in flight.


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by magitsu » 14 Jan 2021, 19:46

doge wrote:Radar is not the main sensor !? :shock: wow! :doh:
https://www.aerosociety.com/news/farnbo ... 6-day-two/

It might've been a reference to EODAS instead of EW.


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by wrightwing » 14 Jan 2021, 22:57

magitsu wrote:
doge wrote:Radar is not the main sensor !? :shock: wow! :doh:
https://www.aerosociety.com/news/farnbo ... 6-day-two/

It might've been a reference to EODAS instead of EW.

More likely ESM/EOTS working together.


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by quicksilver » 15 Jan 2021, 02:20

F-u-s-i-o-n

...and to clarify — the fusion engine is continuously processing/commanding the entire array of sensors it has available whether it be active/passive radar, das, eots, cni, offboard, etc. It situationally prioritizes sensor inputs based on what it needs to gain more clarity about what is happening around the jet.


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by doge » 18 Mar 2021, 19:06

From the F-35 official Twitter account. 8)
https://twitter.com/thef35/status/1372198844742692874
The wing leading edge and tail are sparkle shining on jamming radars. :doh:
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