• Military Menu                       

• Introduction
• Systems
• Facilities
• Agencies
• Industry
• Operations
• Countries
• Hot Documents
• News
• Reports
• Policy
• Budget
• Congress
• Links

• WMD
• Intelligence
• Homeland Security
• Space

Not seeing, not hearing, still continue fighting. Ramstein Guard tested air capabilities with system jamming

Ministry of Defence & Armed Forces of the Czech Republic

24.5.2024
Author: by Major Zuzana Sekaninová

From fighters in the sky to radars on the ground. Almost a complete order of battle of air assets and ground equipment of the Czech Air Force was involved in exercise Ramstein Guard last week. In the context of the changing security environment, traditional training gains on importance again, this time with focus on combat with the opponent employing various system to disrupt communication and seeking to gain superiority in the electromagnetic spectrum. The new Israeli manufactured Mobile Air Defence Radar (MADR) was involved in the exercise for the first time.

Chief of Czech Air Force Command Combat Training Department and Exercise Director Colonel Michal Kudyn regards exercise Ramstein Guard as highly important and useful - the drilled situations are as real as it possibly gets: "Pilots have been required to prove their ability to operate in the conditions of electronically contested navigation, communication and weapon systems. Scenarios changed and escalated day by day. The trainees had to evaluate the missions on daily basis and identify procedures to eliminate the consequence of jamming along in conjunction with electronic warfare specialists," COL Kudyn explains.

The manoeuvres over half of the territory of the Czech Republic trained nearly all units of the Czech Air Force as well as service members from other NATO nations. The movement of units in the air and on the ground were controlled by the National Air Command Post together with the Control and Reporting Centre (CRC). Service personnel of the Combined Air Operations Centre (CAOC) from Uedem, Germany, monitored and evaluated performance directly in the CRC.

Czech Air Force Commander Major General Petr Čepelka singled out the verification of the capabilities of the ground based air defence to effectively operate in environment with targeted jamming of radar and radio communication systems as one of the primary objectives of the exercise. "The units have to be able to detect and track opposing force aircraft even with interference of standard surveillance, target acquisition and communication systems," MG Čepelka said and underlined that pilots are trained to use alternative navigation and communication techniques in such situations and their aircraft are equipped with technologies that minimise the impact of jamming.

Premiere of MADR

The key role in the detection and analysis of signal interference played the 26th Air Command, Control and Surveillance Regiment that contributed the Israeli-made ELM 2084 mobile radars the first time from their introduction to the inventory. As opposed to the ex-Soviet stationary radars, the new equipment can be easily moved to any location, plus it has an integrated north-finding and is fully compatible with NATO radars.

"Moreover, it also detects and acquires unmanned systems as well as artillery and mortar shells, which makes highly effective," said Chief of Staff of the 262nd Radio Technology Battalion Captain Jiřina Polcrová. MADR stood the premiere test excellently: "It is equipped with Electronic Counter Counter-Measures (ECCM) and best coped with the jamming emissions, as opposed to both ex-Soviet and even advanced Czech radars."

CASA tested its protection suite, helicopters deployed flares

The 22nd Helicopter Air Force Base Náměšť participated in the exercise with aircrews flying the Mi-171ShM machines that deployed flares to counter the very short range air defence threats. Joint Terminal Attack Controllers from 22 HAFB were involved too. "Their mission was to enable close air support with the presence of both jammers and spoofers that fake GPS coordinates," Colonel Kudyn added.

The 24th Transport Air Force Base Prague-Kbely assigned for Ramstein Guard a transport airplane that verified defence against air defence missile in airspace above the Boletice Military Training Area. "Upon detection, the CASA self-protection suite automatically deploys flares that confuse missile homing onto the aircraft," COL Kudyn elaborated.