Friday, October 28, 2011

Access to Power

The Army is getting the Air Force AESA radar:

At the request of the U.S. Army, a defense manufacturer adapted jet fighter AESA radar to operate on a moving vehicle. ... The radar can operate while the vehicle is moving, providing 360 degree radar monitoring for aircraft, as well as mortar, rocket or artillery fire. ...

The army has used air force technologies before, most notably air-to-air missiles (Sidewinder and AMRAAM) fired from launchers on ground vehicles.

The most interesting aspect, to me, is the weapons potential of AESA (quoting Strategypage):

Sort of like the EMP (Electromagnetic Pulse) put out by nuclear weapons. The air force won’t, for obvious reasons, discuss the exact “kill range” of the of the various models of AESA radars on American warplanes (the F-35 and F-22 have them). However, it is known that “range” in this case is an elastic thing. Depending on how well the target electronics are hardened against EMP, more electrical power will be required to do damage.

Obviously, power limitations are more rigid on a plane. But won't a ground-based AESA radar have the potential of plugging in to practically limitless power (relative to what it could process and direct)? Note, too, that the original post mentions that the Army has commonly adapted Air Force weapons for air defense.

Can we ramp up the power enough to be a weapon that can defeat the hardened electronics of an incoming ICBM warhead?