Persistent Close Air Support (PCAS) program aims to improve
air-to-ground fire coordination, but could revolutionize military tech
development and deployment as well .
Air-ground fire coordination—also known as Close Air Support or
CAS—is a dangerous and difficult business. Pilots and dismounted ground
agents must ensure they hit only the intended target using just voice
directions and, if they’re lucky, a common paper map. It can often take
up to an hour to confer, get in position and strike—time in which
targets can attack first or move out of reach. To help address these
challenges, DARPA recently awarded a contract for Phase II of its Persistent Close Air Support (PCAS) program to the Raytheon Company of Waltham, Mass.
PCAS aims to enable ground forces and combat aircrews to jointly
select and employ precision-guided weapons from a diverse set of
airborne platforms. The program seeks to leverage advances in computing
and communications technologies to fundamentally increase CAS
effectiveness, as well as improve the speed and survivability of ground
forces engaged with enemy forces.
“Our goal is to make Close Air Support more precise, prompt and easy
to coordinate under stressful operational conditions,” said Dan Patt,
DARPA program manager. “We could use smaller munitions to hit smaller or
moving targets, minimizing the risk of friendly fire or collateral
damage.”
While its tools have become more sophisticated, CAS has not
fundamentally changed since World War I. To accelerate CAS capabilities
well beyond the current technological state of the art, PCAS envisions
an all-digital system that incorporates commercial IT products and
models such as open interfaces, element modularity and mobile software
applications.
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F-18
To maintain a decisive tactical advantage in 21st-century
combat, warfighters need the ability to safely, rapidly and
collaboratively deploy ordnance against elusive mobile targets.
Unfortunately, air-ground fire coordination—referred to as Close Air
Support or CAS—has changed little since its emergence in World War I.
Pilots and dismounted ground agents can focus on only one target at a
time and must ensure they hit it using just voice directions and, if
they’re lucky, a common paper map. It can take up to an hour to confer,
get in position and strike—time in which targets can attack first or
move out of reach.
DARPA created the Persistent Close Air Support (PCAS) program in July
2010 to help address these challenges. PCAS seeks to fundamentally
increase CAS effectiveness by enabling dismounted ground agents—Joint
Terminal Attack Controllers (JTACs)—and combat aircrews to share
real-time situational awareness and weapons systems data. The system
would enable ground agents to quickly and positively identify multiple
targets simultaneously. JTACs and aircrews would then jointly select
precision-guided ordnance that best fits each target and minimizes
collateral damage and friendly fire. Finally, both parties would
authorize weapons deployment.
The program envisions numerous benefits, including:
- Reducing the time from calling in a strike to the weapon hitting the target by a factor of 10, from up to 60 minutes down to just 6 minutes
- Direct coordination of airstrikes by a ground agent from manned or unmanned air vehicles
- Improved speed and survivability of ground forces engaged with enemy forces
- Use of smaller, more precise munitions against smaller and moving targets in degraded visual environments
- Graceful degradation of services—if one piece of the system fails, warfighters would still retain CAS capability
PCAS designs currently include two main components, PCAS-Air and
PCAS-Ground. PCAS-Air would be a platform-agnostic, plug-and-play system
that would consist of an internal navigation system, weapons and
engagement management systems, and high-speed data transfer systems.
Based on tactical information, PCAS-Air’s automated algorithms would
recommend optimal travel routes to the target, which weapon to use on
arrival and how best to deploy it.
PCAS-Air would communicate with JTACs through PCAS-Ground, a suite of
technologies enabling improved mobility, situational awareness and
communications for fire coordination. Parts of PCAS-Ground have already
had field trials that mark some of the first large-scale use of
commercial tablets for air-ground fire coordination. From December 2012
through March 2013, DARPA deployed 500 Android tablets equipped with
PCAS-Ground situational awareness software to units stationed in
Afghanistan. Field reports show that PCAS-Ground replaced those units’
legacy paper maps, dramatically improving ground forces’ ability to
quickly and safely coordinate air engagements.
DARPA expects to develop PCAS in three phases, with a projected budget of $82 million from FY2011 to FY2014:
- Phase I (March 2011-December 2012) accomplishments include:
- Successful comprehensive review of systems requirements
- Successful demonstration of conceptual PCAS interfaces for JTACs and pilots
- Successful development of target designation technology
- Phase II (January 2013—December 2013) included a rescope in April 2013, based on user feedback, to focus on augmenting the effectiveness of multiple fixed-wing, rotary-wing and unmanned systems. Rapid transition across the Services is a priority, as is quick, inexpensive installation with minimal impact on aircraft. Current goals include:
- Complete a comprehensive design of the PCAS demonstration system, including initial work on aircraft integration
- Successfully demonstrate the PCAS-Ground software and communications architecture
- Phase III (January 2014—mid-2014) goals include:
- Prepare for and successfully conduct a series of flight tests and live-fire demonstrations
Raytheon is the systems integrator for PCAS going into Phase II.
Northrop Grumman Electronics Systems was a co-lead systems integrator
for Phase I.
- تهدف الوكالة الأمريكية إلى تمكين القوات الأرضية والطواقم المقاتلة الجوية من استخدامأسلحة متناهية الدقة من منصات محمولة جوا، وتحقيق تقدم ملموس في تقنيات الحساب وتكنولوجيات الاتصال
- تقدر برمجياته على تمكين القوات الارضية من تلقى دعم جوى قريب من خلال تحسين التنسيق بين المتحكمين فى محطة الهجوم المشترك واجهزة الاستشعار المحمولة جوا والاسلحة.
- "قال دان بات المدير العام للبرنامج: " هدفنا هو الوصول إلى دقة وتناسق أكبر للدعم الجوي الأرضي
يعد الدعم الأرضي للضربات الجوية المعروف باسم "CAS" من المهام الخطيرة والصعبة، حيث يتحتم على الطيارين والعناصر الأرضية المساعدة التيقن من دقة إصابة الأهداف المحددة، باستخدام أوامر صوتية، وقد يستغرق الأمر ساعة على الأقل لحين الوصول إلى هدف محدد بالاستعانة بإحدى الخرائط، ثم اتخاذ الوضع الصحيح، وإصابة الهدف.
وحديثا، قامت الوكالة الأمريكية للمشروعات البحثية العسكرية المتطورة DARPA بمنح عقد تنفيذ الطور الثاني من برنامج الدعم الجوي المتواصل PCAS إلى شركة Mass.
وتهدف الوكالة الأمريكية إلى تمكين القوات الأرضية والطواقم المقاتلة الجوية من استخدام أسلحة متناهية الدقة من منصات محمولة جوا، وتحقيق تقدم ملموس في تقنيات الحساب وتكنولوجيات الاتصال.
من جانبه، قال دان بات المدير العام للبرنامج: " هدفنا هو الوصول إلى دقة وتناسق أكبر للدعم الجوي الأرضي.
