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Anti-Radiation Missile

Anti-radiation missiles have been used since the Vietnam War, and they can also be described as a long-standing air-to-ground guided weapon. Its main task is to discover and destroy the enemy radar base stations and vehicle-mounted radars deployed on the ground. In modern warfare, the use of anti-radiation missiles is particularly important: it often determines whether the attacker can successfully destroy the enemy's radar, so as to gradually destroy the surface-to-air air defense network and anti-artillery system outlets established by the defender. The anti-radiation missile is part of the electronic warfare system, and its killing method is hard kill. Anti-radiation missiles attack and destroy enemy electromagnetic equipment. For the purpose of detecting radar, since the 1960s put into actual combat use, it has been One of the main threats to radar systems. During the Battle of Bekaa Valley, Gulf War Fight, NATO air strikes Yugoslavia, until the end of the Iraq war, anti-radiation missiles played a major role in the battle for electromagnetic power on the battlefield. Due to the important role of missiles in information warfare, all major military powers in the world are actively developing this technology. The US military’s anti-radiation missile include many types of advanced technology, including the most representative of anti-radiation missiles in the world. In the 1950s, the United States began to research anti-radiation missile, successfully developed in 1963 the first generation of anti-radiation missile - the AGM-45 Shrike. First used in the Vietnam War in 1965, it initiallly achieved good results. But after teh North Vietnamese took counter-measures such as radar shutdown, the missile hit probability dropped significantly. Second-generation anti-radiation missile AGM-78 added memory circuit pair a counter anti-radar shutdown, with sensitivity and range improvement. But the complex structure and large volume was not conducive to airborne operations. In 1981, the United States developed the third-generation High-speed Anti-Radiation Missile AGM-88 HARM. The missile has strong autonomy and frequency coverage, and was used extensively during the Gulf War and Kosovo War. The new-generation American AARGM-ER anti-radiation missile, which has the advantages of small size, fast flight speed, long range, high precision, multi-function, and certain stealth capabilities, is currently the most advanced anti-radiation missile in the world. One of the radiation missiles. In the future, the missile not only plans to complete the corresponding research and development work in 2023, but also has many derivative development plans, including the ability to use multiple platforms, a longer range The Kh-58 anti-radiation missile is the third-generation airborne anti-radiation missile of the former Soviet Union. NATO calls it the AS-11 "KILTER". It was developed in the 1970s and was equipped with troops in 1978. The size and performance are similar to those of the American-made AGM-78 HARM. The Kh-58 missile model is mainly used to attack a new generation of air defense radar. Anti-radiation missiles, also known as anti-radar missiles, refer to missiles that use the electromagnetic radiation of the enemy's radar to guide them to destroy the enemy's radar and its carriers. In electronic countermeasures , it is the most effective weapon against radar. Active air-to-ground anti-radiation missiles are usually used to attack selected targets. Before launching, the target should be reconnaissance, and its coordinates and radiation parameters should be measured. After launching, the seeker continuously receives electromagnetic signals from the target and forms a control signal, which is transmitted to the actuator, so that the missile is automatically guided to the target. During the attack, if the attacked radar is turned off, the missile's memory device can continue to control the missile to fly to the target. Anti-radiation missiles mainly rely on passive radar seekers to provide guidance and attack data for guidance. Take the Mozu anti-radiation missile as an example. The guidance of the Mozu anti-radiation missile mainly relies on the main beam of electromagnetic waves emitted by the radar antenna. Therefore, in theory, anti-radiation missiles are completely capable of launching attacks on early warning aircraft. Moreover, the warhead of anti-radiation missiles is relatively suitable for ground strikes, and the damage effect on AWACS may be considerable. If the signal strength of the main beam of the radar wave is greater, the accuracy of the anti-radiation missile will be higher. But if the radar is not turned on, then the early anti-radiation missiles will lose their original effects with a high probability. Almost all anti-radiation missiles in the world need to be powered on by a radar for precise guidance. Obviously, this provides an opportunity for ground radar to counter anti-radiation missiles. Most countries will choose to use anti-radiation missiles and air-to-surface missiles together: if the anti-radiation missile fails after the launch of the opponent’s radar and the target is in a discovered state, it will be directly attacked by the air-to-surface missile. With the development of science and technology, ARM designs are constantly developing, and its deterrence capability against surface ships is constantly improving. Surface warships must continuously develop corresponding countermeasures based on the technical characteristics of the ARM. Under the current high-tech conditions, a single countermeasure method is often ineffective, which instead requires a comprehensive combination of various technical and tactical means, and active and proactively adopted targeted defensive measures, in order to effectively improve the surface ship's resistance under ARM attacks. The anti-radiation seeker works in a wide frequency range, and its antenna and microwave components of the angle measuring receiver are both broadband. From the perspective of process manufacturing, there is always a limit to achieving very precision, so the produced seeker always has various deviations. For this reason, the angle measurement error of the anti-radiation seeker is generally larger than that of other types of missile seekers, which seriously affects the hit rate. When hitting airborne radiation sources, operators try to reduce the angle measurement error to achieve the required destruction rate. Since the infrared seeker has high angle measurement accuracy, the infrared seeker is added to the ARM, and the two kinds of seekers form a composite guidance system. The infrared seeker uses infrared sensors to detect the infrared radiation emitted by the heat source, which can be used track the heat source. The engine tail flame of aerial targets such as airplanes is a very high temperature heat source, so the infrared seeker can track the airplane target. However, the infrared sensor sensing the distance ratio of the radar RF seeker much closer, it is first guided by the ARM complex radio guidance seeker, when the relatively close distance to the target, to turn controlled by the infrared missile seeker, to achieve precision-guidance so as to obtain high hit accuracy. Anti-radiation missiles mainly rely on the seeker to continuously track the radiation of the radar to determine their flight path, and finally guide the missile to the target radar. This guidance method in which the seeker guides the missile is also called the homing method. However, ARM only has the ability to seek when the target radar is turned on and radiates electromagnetic waves. Therefore, the radar often turns off the transmitter to avoid ARM's attack and makes ARM lose the target. This has become a major problem for ARM. To solve this problem, modern air-to-surface anti-radiation missiles have memory tracking functions. Before the radar shuts down, the seeker continuously measures the angular position of the radar, continuously guesses and corrects the indication of the radar's azimuth and pitch angle, and stores it in the missile computer. Once the radar is turned off, it will continue to control the missile to fly toward the radar according to this memory angle. In addition, designers are studying ways to guide missiles with the help of other radiation that may be generated by radar. Most tactical ground radars require generators to provide electricity for it. Generator combustion diesel inevitable issues a fuel such as a large amount of heat, hot gas discharged from the exhaust pipe to form a heat radiation source, it may be used to heat the ARM very sensitive infrared sensors to guide the missile strikes radar generation Device. This requires installing two seekers in ARM. One is a radio frequency seeker sensitive to electromagnetic waves, and the other is an infrared seeker sensitive to heat sources. When the RF seeker guides the ARM near the radar, even if the radar turns off the transmitter, its generator device is still working. The infrared seeker takes over the RF seeker and continues to guide the missile, which can accurately strike the radar’s power generation. The system also paralyzed the radar. Experts also imagine that the future ARM may be equipped with a variety of very sensitive homing sensors, so even if the radar generator is turned off, the residual heat it emits can be detected by the highly sensitive infrared sensor, and it cannot escape the destruction. fate. Along this line of thinking, it can be further imagined that all electronic equipment, no matter whether it radiates strong electromagnetic energy like a radar or not, it will emit heat, and will radiate weak electric sparks and electrical noise . As long as the seeker sensor Sensitive enough and "smart" enough, it is possible to detect, identify and track these unintentional radiation energy. Therefore, in the future, there may be "anti-radiation missiles" capable of striking various electronic devices. Anti-radiation unmanned aircraft, like anti-radiation missiles, belong to anti-radiation weapons and equipment. The anti-radiation unmanned aircraft uses an unmanned aircraft as a means of delivery, equipped with a warhead and passive radio frequency seeker. In combat, the unmanned aircraft can hover deep over the enemy's position to lure the enemy's radar to turn on. After the seeker intercepts the radar radiation signal, it guides the anti-radiation unmanned aircraft to attack downward from the radar headspace. This kind of combat method is very effective in suppressing the enemy's air defense system. In theory, anti-radiation missiles can indeed shoot down early warning aircraft; and if "appropriate modifications" are made, then the modified anti-radiation missiles may be more suitable for this type of task. All in all, the future anti-radiation missiles will become more and more perfect. But whether the attack early warning aircraft can be realized and whether it is necessary still needs to be demonstrated. In contrast, air-to-air missiles guided by active radar are sufficient to threaten early warning aircraft, and anti-radiation missiles are not necessarily required to attack early warning aircraft. However, in the future, the ability to attack early warning aircraft will be the design indicator of various anti-radiation missiles. In terms of anti-radiation missile technology, priority should be given to the development of new LPI radar, dual (Multiple) base radar, electronic warfare equipment, high Energy laser weapons and high-speed short-range anti-missile weapons system. Modern warfare has developed into informatization war, and the electromagnetic power of the battlefield becomes the belligerent's focus of the competition.