WASHINGTON \u2014 The U.S. Navy\u2019s ship-based electronic countermeasure system will provide an unlimited supply of ammunition against incoming threats, allowing the service to be more dynamic, and will open up new concepts for other capabilities, the system\u2019s contractor said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Block III of the Surface Electronic Warfare Improvement Program, or SEWIP, provides ships a non-kinetic, electronic attack capability and will be outfitted to Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, but contractor Northrop Grumman said there are bigger plans in the works.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Navy awarded Northrop a contract in June to develop a technology data package based on the SEWIP technology for larger-deck ships such as aircraft carriers and amphibious assault ships.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThis system was developed at a really good time because as our peer and near-peer adversaries are growing in capability, one of the areas that they\u2019re growing in is anti-ship missiles,\u201d said Mike Meaney, vice president of land and maritime sensors at Northrop. \u201cReally, really essential that all of our deployed forces have effective EA [electronic attack] against some of our adversaries\u2019 weapons.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The SEWIP system essentially provides an \u201cunlimited supply of bullets\u201d against incoming missiles or any other threats, Meaney said, to non-kinetically confuse the missile or deny it information, forcing the weapon to crash into the ocean.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Meaney added that with further development and deployment of this type of technology, ships will have the ability to increase their kinetic missile magazines and be more flexible to use those kinetic weapons in other ways rather than dedicating some to shooting down incoming missiles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWhat we see as the future is by having effective electronic attack systems like SEWIP on ships, it\u2019s going to allow the ship\u2019s captain and crew to depend on them and solve the anti-ship threat with non-kinetic solutions, allowing them more missiles than their magazine to shoot for offensive purposes,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s the opportunity that SEWIP provides to the Navy, is an opportunity to rely out how they configure their ships\u2019 missile magazines. And as it\u2019s proven out there and fully demonstrated, the confidence will grow, and then the Navy can look at putting more offensive weapons into their ship magazines than they currently have today.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In terms of deployment, for the two systems on which Northrop received low-rate initial production approval, Meaney said the service will install them to the destroyers later this year. He declined to identify the warships or offer a concrete timeline. The equipped ships will then undergo sea trials \u2014 the capstone test for the system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
SEWIP was built with an open-architecture, hardware-designed, software-enabled approach, allowing for rapid upgrades to keep pace with changing threats. It was also designed to be multifunctional, providing the Navy additional options, including signals intelligence capabilities, limited radar and communications.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe developed an advanced communications link using some of the best technology and showed a brand-new communications signal coming out of our system,\u201d Meaney said. \u201cThat was a new comms link we demonstrated, but we have the capability to interface with and interact with other communications systems that are out there. We also are integrated into the combat systems on the ship, so the information flowing from our system can be connected to those combat systems, and those combat systems are being connected via other activities into the larger kill web, if you will.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He said this approach is in line with the Defense Department\u2019s larger push to ensure sensors and platforms are interconnected to rapidly and seamlessly share data so commanders have what the department calls decision advantage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In terms of forthcoming capabilities, Meaney said Northrop is investing significant research and development dollars toward introducing artificial intelligence and machine-learning algorithms to the system. The aim is to have these capabilities be able to rapidly identify unknown emitters and provide estimates on what those are, and create jamming waveforms on the fly.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Contractor Northrop Grumman is set to adapt its SEWIP system for larger-deck ships to protect against incoming anti-ship missiles.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":80744,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":12,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":{"10":{"categories":["daily-news-roundup","newsletters","digital-show-daily","navy-league","digital-show-dailies","techwatch","industry","naval"],"primary_category":"navy-league"}}},"categories":[106,12,29],"tags":[],"coauthors":[3268],"class_list":["post-28115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-daily-brief","category-electronic-warfare","category-home"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"TUIZQ7W64BA63BCBO5WJ4G7GFY","arc_canonical_url":"\/digital-show-dailies\/navy-league\/2021\/08\/02\/electronic-attack-system-to-provide-navy-more-capabilities-flexible-options\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n