A combination of speed — hypersonics can exceed Mach 5, or five times the speed of sound — maneuverability and flexibility means that hypersonics break the old rules of both missile defense and offense. Detecting, identifying and killing a missile that can nimbly maneuver at such high speeds creates a number of challenges when it comes to developing a good defensive plan. While maneuverable missiles have existed for quite some time, the speed of hypersonics adds a new dimension to how they can be used to attack targets.

But creating such a weapon is a major engineering challenge, and finding the right people is a top priority for the industry. In this Q&A, Raytheon’s Nate Szyba, hypersonic attack cruise missile program director, shares insights on the development of hypersonics, a recent contract award for development of the hypersonic attack cruise missile, and the importance of both people and partnerships in turning the program into a reality.

The transcript of this interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Defense News (DN): This is emerging technology, there’s still a lot to be discovered, but what are the skill sets that you need, from a personnel standpoint, to be able to make those discoveries and to be able to really push this program forward?

Nate Szyba (NS): Demand for quality engineers is definitely one of the top priorities for hypersonic programs. You see a lot of discussion on “we need hypersonics engineers.” And while that’s true, when you look at a program that’s developing hypersonic technologies, there are components that are really focused on the hypersonics aspect of it, such as the aerodynamics, the propulsion, and all the thermal-structural behavior. But then, there’s also a very large component of the program that is very similar to the stuff that we’ve been developing for years. So, we do need hypersonics engineers, but we also need more traditional engineers as well. We can put them all to work on this type of program. Electrical, mechanical engineers are key as well.

And I would also say that highly specialized engineers are very useful to us. But what I also value is engineers that have a broad systems understanding across the technologies within hypersonics and beyond, because everything that we do in hypersonics becomes very interrelated.

DN: That’s a really interesting point. You talk about the specialized engineers are great, but you also need just people with good solid engineering competencies. So, how do you define who you need for what roles? Or is it really just looking at, “OK, this person’s a really good mechanical engineer, so we can find a spot for them in the development of this program”?

NS: I’d say that is certainly true. We definitely want skilled engineers. And if somebody is, say, a mechanical engineer, we’ll start putting them to work as a mechanical engineer. And then, what happens naturally is it broadens because you have to interact with all the other different fields. Having that experience and, I guess, just acknowledgement that it is a cross-disciplinary field help from the get go, but it also happens naturally as you execute on one of these programs; you have to be able to be someone that steps outside of your boundaries.

DN: As an offshoot of that, what are the main engineering challenges that you’re facing? What are the big problems that you’re looking at and saying, “OK. How do we crack this one?”

NS: There are many of them. I would say material systems and processes is a key one. We have folks that are developing brand new materials in some cases. We can develop some components at a small rate today. So, we’re still learning exactly how all those materials work together. And also, more importantly, we’re still learning how we transition what we can build a handful of into something that we can build at a more reasonable rate.

DN: I’d like to talk a little bit about how you’re putting this into practice. Raytheon and Northrop Grumman were recently awarded the contract for the hypersonic attack cruise missile (HACM). What does that award mean for hypersonics development? How does that advance the cause here?

NS: The HACM program is a pretty substantial effort. It’s the first of its kind weapon that’s going to be fielded by the US Air Force. It’s really a sign that the Air Force is committed to developing these technologies. The Air Force has entrusted us with a tremendous responsibility, and we’ve talked earlier about how important it is, getting this system out in the field is critical for our war fighters. So, I’d say it’s a show of confidence that this technology has the ability to work on these systems to do the mission, and it’s the commitment that we are going to add these capabilities that we need to, to turn this system into an actual weapon system for the Air Force.

I’d also add that it shows the partnership that we have between the United States and our Australian partners as well. And it’s demonstrating that we are building these international partnerships to develop hypersonic capability for all of our parties that are engaged.

DN: And as you mentioned there, this is a show of faith that, “OK, now, we’re putting this into practical use.” But what’s the next milestone we should be looking for?

NS: The next milestones that’ll be coming up will be design reviews leading up to our flight test program. So, those will be the next major steps in showing the design maturity that’ll start feeding into the flight testing that we’ll have later in the program.

DN: And then, as we look at the HACM itself, what are its main capabilities? What is it that really sets it apart from current weapons in the arsenal?

NS: It’s an air-launched cruise missile. It’s got a Scramjet engine that uses the vehicle speed to compress the incoming air, which enables the combustion and enables a sustained hypersonic speeds, which is Mach 5 or greater. And so, what that really does is reduces your flight time, your time to target gets smaller or more responsive to threats. We also increase the weapon’s survivability, the effectiveness and its flexibility. So, these are all aspects that make the weapon more effective, I would say. We like to also think of it as a force multiplier where if you can bring a couple of HACMs to the fight, that basically extends the capability that you already have into perhaps more areas that you wouldn’t otherwise be able to engage in.

DN: We’ve touched a little bit on partnerships, but I want to explore that a little bit more. These partnerships you’ve mentioned, what role are they playing in the development of hypersonics?

NS: We are going to be doing some of our flight testing in Australia. So, taking advantage of the capabilities that the Australian flight test ranges will have on the program is going to be key. Beyond Australia, there are other partnerships that I mentioned somewhat before, partnerships with universities, relationships that are more than necessarily just building the workforce that we need to support these systems. The infrastructure at some of the universities is key to demonstrating hypersonic capabilities too. The University of Arizona is developing some hypersonic wind tunnel capability that we’ve been very closely involved in, which enables us to capture the data that we need on the ground to flesh out these technologies before we go and do the tests in the air, which is much more expensive. The more we can do on the ground, the better off we’ll be later on when we get to fight too.

We also collaborate with the Joint Hypersonic Technology Office out of OSD and are working very closely with them on developing some of the key technologies that we’ll need for these systems, both today and in the future. So, we’re working across the industry and the universities and so forth. And all those partnerships are very critical because this is an extremely difficult problem that we’re trying to solve as a nation, and we’re all needing to work together to bring the knowledge that everyone has to best breed capabilities to develop these systems.

Due to their size and maneuverability, they are hard to detect and track. They are low cost and the fact that they can be built or modified using commercial off-the-shelf hardware makes them expendable. And if a pilot is sitting miles — or hundreds, or even thousands of miles — away, then there is no risk to them even if the UAS is destroyed.

All of those things add up to UASs quickly becoming a common part of the arsenal for militaries and non-military groups alike. That means technology and a counter unmanned aircraft systems (CUAS) strategy to meet the threat of UAS attacks is critical on the modern battlefield.

To learn more about CUAS, Defense News spoke with Abel Ghanooni, Senior Director of Short Range Air Defense and Rapid Development Programs, Raytheon Missiles & Defense. Ghanooni leads the company’s Counter-UAS portfolio, including the KuRFS radar and Coyote missile programs.

The transcript of this conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Defense News (DN): Abel, we keep seeing these threats from unmanned aircraft systems. They’re becoming more and more common. So what is it about CUAS that makes it so important on today’s modernized battlefield?

Abel Ghanooni (AG): We’ve seen the proliferation of these small UASs over a number of years; however, I think it’s just becoming more prevalent in the news over the last few years. We’ve been working with the Army in developing capabilities to counter this challenging threat. The reason why we’re kind of seeing this proliferating is primarily because of the ease of getting access to these small UASs — they’re low cost, and easily built by hand. So because of that, they’re being used by the adversaries, both OCONUS (outside the continental U.S.), and even CONUS more and more.

There’s a huge importance on being able to neutralize these threats. In addition to the ease of access and ease of use, they’re really difficult to see. They’re small, they can blend in with the biologicals like birds or things of that size, they are slow-moving, fly low and are very maneuverable. In the development of our capabilities, one of the critical things was a highly-effective sensor to be able to see them. Our KuRFS radar is a very precise radar, originally designed for the Counter-RAM mission, which is a very difficult mission in itself.

KuRFS was designed to be able to see very small things, see through clutter, be able to detect, and identify these small threats. Also critical, it is able to discriminate whether it’s a biological or non-biological, to determine that it’s a manmade threat. With that first line of defense, the next step is to be able to combat these threats.

DN: As you mentioned there, they’re the ideal tool for a stealthy attack. They’re very small, they’re hard to detect on radar, they’re cheap, and you aren’t putting a person at risk. So it really is a perfect storm of, ‘we’ve got to figure out a way to effectively stop these things because they open up so many more options for attacks,’ isn’t it?

AG: The contested airspace has changed with these small UAVs, which are now integrated and involved in that air picture. Like you mentioned, they’re easily accessible, and as we are gathering intelligence, we’re learning new things on the way they’re being used. They can fly low, they can hover, they can blend into certain areas and certain scenarios, which really requires you to need a specific radar to be able to first see them, identify them as a threat, and then be able to track them.

DN: So when you want to be able to do that, what technologies are involved here? What are the characteristics of a good CUAS system?

AG: First and foremost, you have to be able to see it and you have to keep track on it, and then you have to identify it as, is it a hostile or not a hostile? Is there a biological or non-biological? You also want to be able to see it a longer ranges to provide more time for the operator and decision maker to decide on what type of effect to use. KuRFS is best in class with regards to detecting these small UAS threats. Once you do that, that’s just the first part of the kill chain: detect and ID. Now you have to track it and make sure you keep track on it. What we’re seeing and what we have seen with other radars in this specific class is they might be able to see it, but then potentially lose track. Or there’re things called false alarms where you might see one and then another one pops up, but it’s not a real one. The one great thing about the KuRFS radar is it’s very precise, it’s 360 degrees, and so it has the ability to detect at long ranges, ID, keep track, and then the next step is, now how do you take it down?

There are multiple ways of taking it down. You can use a kinetic effector, like the Coyote Block 2, which goes out to farther ranges in this specific mission compared to other effects, and defeats the threat before it gets close enough to do any harm. And when I say other effects, you can look at electronic warfare (EW), so you can jam it, or you could look at what we have with Raytheon Intelligence and Space’s High-Energy Laser. RIS, in concert with the U.S. Air Force, developed and deployed a 10-kilowatt and a 15-kilowatt system. Recently, they have been working with the Army to build and deliver a 50-kilowatt laser integrated on a Stryker vehicle called DE-MSHORAD. In simplistic terminology, basically you put a lot of energy on a specific spot of the threat where it’s most vulnerable to take it down.

DN: We’ve talked a lot about how quickly this has changed and become more common, but as you look forward, what’s the next evolution of CUAS? How do you see it changing as we adapt to some of these threats and prepare for new threats that we just don’t know about right now?

AG: I think the next evolution includes continuous development to mature, advance and adapt solutions as well as driving down cost. Cost is a big player in this game. We talked about it, availability of these small UASs at a low cost point makes them appealing to our adversaries. You don’t need or want to expend a sophisticated or expensive missile to down a thousand-dollar drone. And so constantly looking at lower-cost methods or ways of taking down these threats is paramount. I truly believe, you’re always going to need a kinetic effector for this mission space as part of the front end of the layered defense. EW has effects, but these technologies will also need to continuously evolve as the threats evolve because they could potentially figure out ways how to get around the EW effectors. That’s where the mix of effectors is key. It’s very difficult to get around something that goes “boom.” And so in my eyes, I see evolution continuing on both types of effectors. On the kinetic effectors, more development or upgrades to our Coyote Block 2, and potentially a development of a new missile as we see differing requirements, or new improved requirements, to combat the threat maybe five to 10 years from now.

DN: It’s funny how often the answer to some really smart technological attack is ‘hit it with something dumb.’ Like you mentioned, the kinetic weapon is always going to be there because the others can be interfered with, but that really can’t.

AG: Right. When you talk about the non-kinetic stuff that’s matured very quickly over the last couple years and things that maybe a decade ago everyone thought was the future and it was never going to get here, and now it’s here. We talked about directed energy, high-powered microwave, high-energy lasers, kudos to those folks and those teams that have made them a reality. Like all counter-effects, these technologies will continue to evolve to safeguard against efforts to find ways to evade or fortify against those. But you have something that’s kinetic in the mix of defenses, an effector that essentially has a warhead with fragments that can take these things down, it’s very difficult to combat something like that. At the end of the day, we talk about layered defense of the UAS threat, where you have multiple different kinetic and non-kinetic effectors integrated as a single system of systems, since there isn’t one single bullet or way to defend against this complex and challenging threat set.

Modern cruise missiles don’t fly a static trajectory. Unmanned aerial vehicles can be piloted by a human thousands of miles away. Hypersonics reach speeds that can put them within striking distance before a radar system can report them as anything other than a blob on a screen.

Those threats require a radar system robust enough to deal with traditional threats as well as those that are more agile, faster and able to attack from unexpected vectors. The Lower Tier Air and Missile Defense Sensor (LTAMDS) —— is designed to offer full 360-degree scanning without the blind spots created by a traditional rotating radar.

In this Q&A, Defense News spoke with Bob Kelley, Director, US Requirements and Capabilities for Land Warfare and Air Defense, Raytheon Missiles & Defense. Kelley shared his insights on the changing nature of aerial warfare, what LTAMDS provides and how it will change defense.

The transcript of this conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Defense News (DN): The big, first question that comes to mind is what does LTAMDS do that our current existing radar systems don’t do? What’s the argument for “this is why we need this system right now”?

Bob Kelley (BK): It’s a combination of increased velocity, increased maneuverability and sophisticated employment techniques. In September of 2019, there was an attack on a Saudi oil refinery. They had air defenses protecting that Saudi oil refinery. But this attack was sophisticated in that it was simultaneous 360 with multiple threats flying multiple trajectories, but all at the same target. You had a combination of cruise missiles and unmanned aerial systems that were in real time, near simultaneously coming in, in full 360.

That drives you to the understanding that the battlefield is no longer linear. Cruise missiles today, they are limited only by the amount of fuel that you put on them and how far they can fly. They can fly any trajectory. At least a modern cruise missile can fly any trajectory that your potential enemies want it to fly, which means even if the enemy’s directly in front of you, they can fly in a manner that makes it come around outside of your radar detection areas and ingress into the rear of whatever you’re protecting. You need to have a 360-degree capability against these types of threats and it needs to be simultaneous 360.

Our big part was that nothing goes unseen because we are looking in full 360 degrees simultaneously all the time, doing search, detection, tracking, classification, discrimination, identification and interceptor support for engagements all the time in all directions.

DN: As you mentioned, there are so many different possible threat vectors and angles of attack, and the ability to steer cruise missiles instead of just fire and forget, you have to have that 360-degree capability if you really want to have a comprehensive protection, don’t you?

BK: Yeah. The other part is range, right? You’ve got to extend the range. But when you look at some of the velocities that some of these threats are getting to, particularly hypersonics, to have enough time to compute an engagement sequence for a threat like that, you’ve got to detect it pretty far out if you want to have some kind of a standoff range where you’re going to do some engagement. So that was the other part of it, too. 360 and we had to increase the range.

DN: So then when we think about this as the next evolution of missile defense, from what you said, it sounds like this is a big leap forward instead of a small incremental step. Is that accurate?

BK: That is accurate. I would say that’s what we’ve done with Patriot for years. There are people around the world that are in fighting shooting wars today with Patriot, and it’s being very, very successful. But this is a leap ahead technology really over other radars because of the increased ranges that we have, because of the 360, but also because of the technology that went into it.

This is an AESA (active electronically scanned array) radar powered by GaN (Gallium nitride) technology. With a radar, one of the biggest challenges is “I’ve got a fixed amount of input power that’s coming into the radar, and I want to transition as much of that power as I can into RF energy going out the front of the radar, or in this case, going out 360 degrees from the radar.” Well, GaN is incredibly efficient with that.

DN: With the capabilities of LTAMDS, do you expect a change to how we think about missile defense?

BK: In today’s environment, you’re looking at an aerial threat set that is beyond missile defense. So when I think missile defense today, for the most part, I’m thinking very strategic homeland defense. I would say that the changes, unless I’m just focused on an intercontinental ballistic missile, I have to have systems on the battlefield that can handle the multitude of aerial threats that are out there. I can’t have the stove-piped system that only does missiles.

The goal is because current air and missile defense systems are so good, adversaries want to overwhelm the radar and the operator. If they can have more objects than your radar can handle or your operator can understand, then that’s how they feel like they’ll be successful. So we look at it as a layered defense, and you want to have radars that support a layered defense against manned/unmanned aircraft; small, slow unmanned aerial systems; cruise missiles; ballistic missiles.

It’s funny, the term ballistic missiles gets used a lot. Most of them are not ballistic anymore. They do not fly a ballistic trajectory. Ballistic missiles are not the biggest challenge in the world to shoot down. It’s when they don’t fly ballistically that they become more of a challenge.

Its roots go back three decades, but today’s AMRAAM missile is vastly different from its predecessors, thanks to multiple updates of its hardware and software.

“The AMRAAM missile is arguably the most sophisticated air-to-air weapon in use today and for good reason. It has to be in order to address the complex threats we’re seeing from our adversaries,” said Paul Ferraro, president of Air Power for Raytheon Missiles & Defense, a Raytheon Technologies business.

Here’s how this advanced medium-range missile built by Raytheon Missiles & Defense helps militaries dominate the skies.

Every test makes the next version better.

The AMRAAM missile has been test fired more than 5,000 times and used in combat all over the world. The tests often contribute to the next update, improving aspects such as its range, its GPS navigation or its two-way data link.

“From those test shots, we get real-time data that we feed into digital models to see how the system stacks up against new or evolving threats,” said Steve Dickman, executive director for Air Dominance at Raytheon Missiles & Defense.

In use by 41 nations, the AMRAAM missile is flying on the F-15C Eagle and F-15E Strike Eagle, F-16 Fighting Falcon, F/A-18 C/D Hornet and F/A-18E/F Super Hornet, F-22 Raptor, Eurofighter Typhoon, JAS-39 Gripen, Panavia Tornado and Harrier Jump Jet. It is also the only air-to-air missile qualified on the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter.

And each platform has its own customized version of AMRAAM.

“As a platform evolves, we adapt the system to that new platform and take advantage of what’s available from missile performance to bring additional capability to that platform,” Dickman said.

One example is the latest firing of AMRAAM off the U.S. Air Force’s new F-15 fighter jet, the F-15 EX Eagle II.

“It was one of those really long-range shots which is a new capability we’re starting to stress the weapon system with,” Dickman said.

It keeps pace with advanced threats.

Raytheon Missiles & Defense is driving new capability into the AMRAAM missile with F3R, or form, fit and function refresh, using modeling to design, analyze, verify and validate the system. The F3R missile will have improved guidance circuitry and software to address rapidly evolving threats.

“We’re upgrading the GPS and inertial navigation system to be more accurate, and it will be able to discern and work through tough threat scenarios faster,” Dickman said.

The business and the U.S. Air Force have completed the first in a series of guided live-fire tests for F3R, moving it one step closer to Initial Operational Capability – the military’s way of saying it is ready to deploy.

AMRAAM F3R

It’s a perfect pairing of hardware and software.

In lockstep with F3R, the system is getting additional capability with software updates known as System Improvement Program-3, or SIP-3, to improve the weapon’s guidance, range and performance.

Raytheon Missiles & Defense is using model-based systems engineering to integrate F3R hardware with SIP-3 software – the result: SIP-3F.

“The performance (of SIP-3F) – as one of our very senior engineers will gladly tell you – is eye-watering in his view,” Dickman said. “It’s playing out the way we thought it would.”

And the advancements don’t stop there. The AMRAAM missile is getting better with SIP-4, which is “really when all the pieces start to come together,” Dickman said. “It (SIP-4) takes full advantage of the new processing power and speed that the new hardware brings.”

The business will leverage the agile development process to help bring the SIP-4 capability to fruition by 2025.

It has extra battery power to fly farther.

Raytheon Missiles & Defense designed and built the AMRAAM missile to certain specifications, but left room for it to do more. One of those margins is extra battery life, which allows users to drive the missile farther, a capability known as Extended Time of Flight, or ETOF.

“It’s harvesting capability that’s already resident in the missile,” Dickman said. “It’s taking today’s hardware and seeing how we can stress it … how long can it operate, how far can it go, how long will it take to get there.”

It’s more than an air-to-air missile.

The AMRAAM-Extended Range missile will be integrated with the National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile launcher, also called NASAMS, a medium-range air defense system.

In 2022, AMRAAM-ER passed an audit that demonstrated the missile meets the requirements and that the design is ready for production.

The new weapon’s maximum range is 50 percent longer than the standard version, and its maximum altitude is 70 percent higher, thanks to enhancements like an enlarged rocket motor built by Norwegian company NAMMO. Work is underway with NAMMO and KONGSBERG Defence & Aerospace on the AMRAAM-E2 variant that will have an improved rocket motor and a new control actuation system.

New versions are in development.

The AMRAAM-ER and AMRAAM-E2 efforts open the door for more modernization like the AMRAAM Air-launched Extended Envelope, or AXE, which will deliver a boost in range and speed to target.

“Because of the existing work being done on these two systems, we see this as a capability we could field in short order to address the emerging threat,” Dickman said.

Learn more about AMRAAM.

Iceman: Wood, we’ve got four bogeys.

Wolfman: Wrong, make that five!

More than 30 years after the 1986 blockbuster Top Gun, a new upgrade to the Identification Friend or Foe (IFF) system helps pilots avoid dangerous situations like the one featured in the movie’s final scene.

“This is a huge upgrade,” said Frank Whiston, director of IFF for Integrated Communication Systems at Raytheon Intelligence & Space, one of the four businesses that form Raytheon Technologies. “Mode 5, the new system, can better identify friendly aircraft from long-range distances, especially when they are flying in close formation.”

The IFF system identifies friendly forces, increasing situational awareness and reducing risk of fratricide. Mode 5 improvements include new cryptography, stronger security features, modern signal modulation and greater data content, as well as lethal interrogations that provide a final challenge to a targeted platform prior to weapons engagement — even when the platform is flying radio silent.

In 2019, Raytheon Intelligence & Space and Hanwha Systems signed a $170 million technical cooperation agreement to produce IFF Mode 5 systems across more than 40 types of air and maritime platforms for the Republic of Korea military.

When Whiston was describing these capabilities to a Republic of Korea colonel and his team, Whiston said the colonel remarked “Oh, like Top Gun.”

“I had to think about it for a second and go back. I remembered the scene and said to him, ‘absolutely…just like Top Gun,’” Whiston said.

There are three stages to identifying an aircraft as friend or foe: radar detection, antenna reception and IFF interrogation.

“An aircrew establishes themselves in a Combat Air Patrol waiting for an event that would trigger a response,” said Joe “Grip” Beissner, who flew the F-15E Strike Eagle in the U.S. Air Force and now works for Raytheon Intelligence & Space. “If the trigger is met, then the aircrew will engage the adversary using on-board sensors.”

“In a typical scenario, you are initially too far from the adversary to detect them on your own radar so you have to use off-board systems for situational awareness,” Beissner said. “As you close in on the threat, you transition to your own avionics, in this case your fire control radar, and you activate the IFF system.”

If a pilot is flying in an F-15, it would be equipped with an active electronically scanned array, or AESA, radar. The radar would detect an oncoming aircraft and signal to the IFF Electronically Steered Antenna. The antenna would pass the signal to the IFF Mode 5 system for interrogation.

“What you need in today’s environment is a ‘lack of friendly’ and a ‘positive hostile’ before you can engage,” said Beissner. “So, when you activate IFF, you essentially are trying to elicit a response to find out whether you’ve got a good guy or a bad guy in front of you.”

Pilots sometimes fly in a state of radio silence. They disable their transponders so the aircraft doesn’t reply to any interrogations, which could potentially reveal themselves to detection by hostile forces who might be listening.

Lethal interrogation, one of the biggest Mode 5 updates, enables the interrogating pilot to override another aircraft flying radio silent and elicit a response, enhancing fratricide prevention. It’s a pilot’s last steps in a shoot-no shoot decision.

Raytheon Intelligence & Space has installed and maintained IFF interrogators and transponders on more than 120 types of aircraft, ships and land vehicles around the world.

Learn more about RIS’s Communications & Navigation Solutions here.