Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
STEALTH WARSHIP
TECHNOLOGY
Published by Adlard Coles Nautical an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 50 Bedford Square, London WC1B 3DP www.adlardcoles.com Copyright Christopher Lavers 2012 First published by Adlard Coles Nautical in 2012 ISBN 978-1-4081-7525-5 ePDF 978-1-4081-7553-8 ePub 978-1-4081-7552-1 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means graphic, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or information storage and retrieval systems without the prior permission in writing of the publishers. The right of the author to be identied as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988. A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. This book is produced using paper that is made from wood grown in managed, sustainable forests. It is natural, renewable and recyclable. The logging and manufacturing processes conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin. Typeset in 10.5 pt Baskerville by MPS Ltd Printed and bound in the UK by MPG Ltd Note: while all reasonable care has been taken in the publication of this book, the publisher takes no responsibility for the use of the methods or products described in the book.
pgauguin(a.k.a. ExLib) :
The LORD lives! Praise be to my Rock! Exalted be God, the Rock, my Saviour! 2 Samuel 22:47 (New International Version UK)
CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS INTRODUCTION 1 RADAR Early Radar Stealth SR-71 Measuring Stealth Maximum Detection Range (MDR) and Radar Cross Section Stealth Approaches 2 VISIBILITY Dazzle Camouage and the First World War Origins of Camouage 3 INVISIBLE FUTURES Radar Metamaterials Optical Metamaterials 4 INFRARED Infra-red Heat Reduction IRCS Contributors The Laws of Infra-red Emission 5 MAGNETIC SIGNATURE Magnetic Stealth Degaussing Ships Hulls 6 THE ACOUSTIC THREAT AND OTHER SIGNATURES Acoustic Noise Various Environmental Factors Active Sonar Passive Sonar Sonar Comparison Cavitation Future Acoustic Technology Bioluminescence Wake Eects Extremely Low-Frequency (ELF) Signature Likely Future Cross Sections Biologically Inspired Design Emissions Control Policy IX X 1 6 8 11 13 19 30 30 36 52 54 59 66 66 71 78 82 82 86 95 95 97 98 99 100 102 103 104 105 108 108 109 111
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7 MODERN STEALTH SHIPS Sweden United Kingdom Italian and French Destroyer Variants United States of America India Russia France Saudi Arabia Singapore Germany China 8 FUTURE NAVAL STEALTH PLATFORMS Queen Elizabeth-Class Aircraft Carrier A Brief History of the Build So Far Radar and Weapons Systems Embarked Fleet Air Arm? Carrier Construction HMS Queen Elizabeth (R08) UK FSC or Type 26 Frigate Weapons and Systems Modular and Flexible United States of America SUMMARY APPENDIX: KEY SHIP FACTS GLOSSARY ANSWERS TO NUMERICAL QUESTIONS IMAGE SOURCES INDEX 114 114 119 128 130 132 133 134 136 136 137 138 141 142 144 146 146 147 148 149 151 151 152 158 160 167 169 170 171
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to thank the following: Mr John Mc Crae for permission to use Type 45 Destroyer HMS Daring images at various construction stages; Mr Andrew Valente, Combat Index Webmaster, LLC, Naples, Florida, USA for archive imagery access; and Mr Kjell Gthe, of Kockums Sweden, for Visby stealth corvette pictures and extensive material about the class. I would also like to thank the meticulous manuscript checking and copy editing provided by the editorial services team at MPS Limited, Chennai. I appreciate the BBC Radio 4 Material World team for letting me loose to talk live about stealth concepts before disappearing on air (24th April 2008), which rst set me on the path to this book, and the Institute of Physics and the Institute of Materials which both published early crafting of stealth ideas in 2008 and 2009. I would like to thank my family motivators and in turn encourage them: Helena for her work with the disadvantaged of Mexico City, Sam for achieving Ten Tors Gold and teaching in Tanzania, Sara-Kate for her warmth, and care in Guides, Matt for his application of talents and introducing me to football and Ben for his love of learning and stories. I thank them for the few hours of reality each day! Your values and passions add meaning to my life. I thank my parents for motivating me in the past, believing I could learn to read even when my teachers said I wouldnt! Finally, I especially thank Anne, my wife, for her patience and encouragement; you are the true love of my life. To all and one I thank you.
INTRODUCTION
The missile navigating by inertial guidance approached with swift self-assurance the end of its 200 nautical mile pre-programmed journey, and after rapid target conrmation with its passive thermal imager reaches its objective to devastating eect. The target, oblivious of its peril, until the nal moment of impact, could do nothing to counter this fatal blow. Christopher Lavers
The scenario outlined above is not ction; it is the real high-technology cutting edge of naval warfare today. For this reason, surface warships incorporated with stealth technologies take an increasingly vital role to ensure platform survival. Stealths principal aim is to make naval ships invisible to an array of increasingly smart detection systems such as sonar and radar, combining ways that lower a platforms emissions and those which eliminate reected radiation, thus reducing detection range and threat vulnerability. This book seeks to communicate the latest interesting developments in stealth technology to a wider audience and to explore the paradigm shift stealth represents in terms of warship design. It will focus on the transformational change in naval architecture, which is simplistically represented in the shape of modern warships, and dwells less on just providing lots of information or technical detail. Stealth Warship Technology will also discuss in a little detail something of the history of this subject. In this book, I will provide an opportunity to develop a better understanding of the specialist practical issues and skills required in this naval sector. Some opportunity for basic numerical analysis and problem-solving are included at the end of each chapter for the more mathematical reader. However, the book is designed for those with a limited mathematical background in mind; it is my objective to communicate the fundamental principles of the subject to the many and not to provide tricky maths problems to solve for the few. I will discuss several ongoing themes or issues throughout the book: surveillance, signature and cross section reduction as well as certain aspects of electronic warfare (EW). Surveillance entails an examination of both radar and infra-red non-imaging target detection systems as well as the latest visual and thermal imaging systems. The developments in high-resolution radar imaging cannot be underestimated in their signicance at the beginning of the twenty-rst century to future platform survivability.
Introduction xi
Signature and cross section reduction consideration will investigate the various applied techniques that have been utilised to date and those which are likely to be employed to make ship targets less visible to current (and future) generations of surveillance systems. The topic of EW elicits a double-edged response from the informed reader. EW involves the role of largely passive electronic support measures (ESM), the listening devices which need to be coordinated with further electronic countermeasures (ECM) (various active and passive techniques available), and is both our best friend and, being also used by an equally surveillant enemy, perhaps our greatest foe. The aim of this book is to uncover the unto now secret area of stealth warship design and the broader aspects of stealth technology using available public material and to stress the importance of materials used in the warships construction with information that already exists in the public domain, and how this inuences all of a modern naval platforms design parameters. Paradoxically, all the basic stealth concepts are easily accessible on the Internet, with a variety of stealth-related companies discussing their products in some detail. To a physicist or engineer who knows what they are looking for, even YouTube videos can now provide signicant intelligence on both systems and their capabilities and mode of operation, saying nothing of the ability of modern mobile phones to provide a wealth of additional information and inuence, as seen in the Arab Spring of 2011. A working title for this book was initially Electromagnetic threats to warships, but this not only fails to grasp the full extent of warship threats which encompass the traditional role of radar and visual detection, as well as nightvision devices and thermal imaging capability, but also does not address the acoustic underwater signature of the ship platform and other less well-known detection methods such as magnetic signature, bioluminescence, and wake and so on. It must be stressed from the outset that there has been a signicant paradigm shift in warship design in the past two decades, which has been rather to move away from the view that it is simply nice to incorporate stealth into warship design as something of an aordable extra if possible. Instead stealth is now seen to be the critical component around which the warship is designed, and is certainly the case for the DD(X) Zumwalt-class surface combatant. However, it is the very cost of stealth that has made the Zumwalt a victim of its own stealth success, and mitigated against the future of the programme, in favour of a more traditionally tried and tested warships. The shift in emphasis towards stealth in current platforms is evidenced through the radical transformation of platform design between the RN Type 23 frigate and the latest stealth Type 45 Destroyer HMS Daring as well as the La Fayette-class frigate and Swedish Visby stealth class corvette built by Kockums. An able reader or student should be able to describe, discuss and analyse the ways in which modern and often highly complex sensors and communications systems can
xii Introduction
have their performance degraded by hostile activities. We will consider the various design techniques which might be incorporated to negate the eects of these activities and to reduce likewise the overall probability of a ships detection. Clearly stealth is only a part of the story, as a stealth warship cannot provide the same sense of intimidating power projection o the coast of a potential enemy if they do not know that you are there, and neither can stealth ensure platform safety and integrity once the rst salvo is red. Obviously there is still a signicant role to be maintained in terms of self-protection of a platform, and the increased cost that stealth brings to the value of the ship asset is only likely to increase the required investment in ships defences, be they long- and short-range missile defence systems, a close-in weapon system (CIWS) or gun as well as various soft-kill methods at the ships disposal. Stealth can actually provide a range advantage over a variety of sensor systems, and the reduced signature provides a suciently fuzzy picture that an enemy may at best detect you but will be quite unable to classify the threat correctly. According to Merriam-Websters Online Dictionary, stealth (pronounced: stelth) is derived from the thirteenth-century Middle English stelthe; akin to Old English stelan to steal, with several related meanings. 1 a archaic: theft b obsolete: something stolen 2 the act or action of proceeding furtively, secretly, or imperceptibly the state moves by stealth to gather information Nat Hento 3 the state of being furtive or unobtrusive [and in the context we will be considering] 4 an aircraft-design characteristic consisting of oblique angular construction and avoidance of vertical surfaces that is intended to produce a very weak radar return Stealth technology is also known as low observable technology (LOT) and is a subdiscipline of ECM, which covers a range of techniques used not just with aircraft, but includes ships and missiles, in order to make them less visible (ideally invisible) to radar, infra-red and other detection methods. There are also issues presented by the class of threat that the stealth warship has been constructed to deal with, as the most likely asymmetric threats that will present themselves to warships in the near future are the small (and ironically stealthy) fast boats manned by pirates, insurgents or terrorists, like those who caused damage to the USS Cole, an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer. The USS Cole was the target of a terrorist
Introduction xiii