New Defenses

The Marine Corps foresees a web of integrated air defenses to replace its stove-piped systems and protect expeditionary forces far inland

By RICHARD R. BURGESS, Managing Editor

The Marine Corps is developing new warfare systems to extend a web of air defenses over its expeditionary forces ashore.

At its center will be a new command-and-control (C2) complex, the first phase of the Corps’ effort to unify its various C2 systems, according to Lt. Col. Debra Beutel, head of C2 Program Harmonization in the Expeditionary Force Development Command, a component of Marine Corps Combat Development Command.

The planned improvements are part of a new C2 strategy for the Corps to improve the integration of Marine fighting forces, sensors and weapons platforms.

Scheduled for deployment in 2008, the C2 complex, called the Common Aviation Command and Control System (CAC2S), is designed to replace current stove-piped C2 systems and integrate aviation command functions, including air defense, to support all Marine Corps warfighting concepts. The CAC2S will feature a suite of scalable modules to support all levels of operations.

Integrated into the CAC2S will be two radar systems now under development, which are designed to provide warning ashore with seamless connectivity to sea- and air-based systems.

Beutel’s unit is taking a holistic look at existing and future platforms, sensors and weapons deployed or in development, “looking for gaps that need to be filled,” she said. Beutel also is assessing the infrastructure — including the computing network, data backbones and bandwidth — to ensure the system’s connective tissue will accommodate existing and future components.

“By 2015, we will have a [fully netted] force that can participate in expeditionary operations,” she said.

Beutel’s branch is modernizing C2 for air defenses as the Marine Corps moves ahead with a new C2 strategy for expeditionary warfare.

The goal of the Marine Air-Ground Task Force Command and Control (MAGTF C2) strategy is to unify the various components of expeditionary warfare, including air defense, into a combat force greater than the sum of its parts.

In February, the Marine Corps Requirements Oversight Council approved the new strategy for the Marine Corps. Chaired by Gen. William N. Nyland, assistant commandant of the Marine Corps, the council approves new ventures in the Corps’ concepts and technology.

“MAGTF C2 is how the Marine Corps is going to implement FORCEnet,” Beutel said. FORCEnet is a concept of warfare adopted by the Marine Corps and Navy to integrate warriors, sensors, command and control, platforms and weapons into a networked and distributed combat force.

The MAGTF C2 will be “completely tied to and dependent on FORCEnet,” she said, and is designed from the perspective of a MAGTF commander to maintain effective integration of Marine units as expeditionary forces move inland toward their objectives.

Shielding expeditionary forces from enemy attack is no longer a matter of pulverizing the beach and providing a combat air patrol. In recent years, ballistic cruise missiles armed with conventional warheads or weapons of mass destruction have joined tactical aircraft and attack helicopters as potential aerial threats to power projection ashore.

The goal of the Marine Corps and Navy is to project “a highly effective air and missile defense umbrella that reaches over the horizon and deep inland, extends from ground level to the exo-atmosphere, and defends against multiple types of aircraft [and] ballistic and cruise missile threats,” according to the services’ “Naval Transformation Roadmap 2004.”

One anticipated result will be a reduction in the requirement for fighter aircraft to defend forces ashore. That would free up the fighters for strike sorties against enemy forces.

Under the MAGTF C2 strategy, some of the air-defense systems to be integrated into the Common Aviation Command and Control System have been in service for many years. Others are in development to fill gaps in capability.

Marine Air-Ground Task Forces now deploy the Lockheed Martin-built TPS-59(V)3 radar system, a land-transportable, long-range solid-state radar designed to detect and track incoming aircraft and ballistic missiles. The TPS-59 can calculate launch and impact points of ballistic missiles and transmit the information to the Composite Tracking Network, which receives, generates and distributes sensor data to weapons platforms. The TPS-59 is primarily used for sustained operations ashore, including use as a landward extension of a theater missile-defense surveillance network.

The Corps is maintaining the TPS-59 while developing a replacement, called the Highly Expeditionary Long-Range Air-Surveillance Radar (HELRASR), which will be more mobile and require less support infrastructure. It is scheduled for deployment in 2008.

The Corps also is developing the new Ground/Air Task-Oriented Radar (G/ATOR) to be staged ashore during expeditionary operations as the first land-based sensor in an air defense network. The radar will be mounted on a Humvee to give it the agility to keep up with maneuvering ground forces and maintain coverage as a ground force proceeds inland.

The G/ATOR will include a medium-range surveillance radar designed to provide three-dimensional coverage of areas beyond the range of the TPS-59 or the HELRASR. It will detect, identify and track targets with small cross sections — a measure of the target’s radar reflectivity — including cruise missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles.

In addition to its surveillance role, the G/ATOR will provide cueing information to local short-range air defense systems deployed with a task force, including the current Stinger shoulder-fired surface-to-air missile, and Stingers fired from an Avenger, an air-defense version of the Humvee. The G/ATOR also will serve another missile system under development, the Complementary Low-altitude Weapon System (CLAWS).

Scheduled for initial deployment in 2006, CLAWS marries Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missiles designed for jet fighters to a Humvee and will provide a rapidly deployable, highly mobile air-defense capability to expeditionary forces against targets at medium range.