Assalammualaikum warahmatullahi wabarakkatuh.

Berikut ini ane persembahkan sebuah artikel singkat yang ane tulis sendiri.. sebagai jurnal untuk galeri Deviant art ane yang dapat dilihat disini :

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Artikel ane ini bertujuan untuk sedikit membahas mengenai teknologi jammer radar/komunikasi masa depan atau lebih kerennya "NGJ" atau Next Generation Jammer.

Bahasa pengantar artikel adalah bahasa inggris karena mohon maaf di Deviant art bahasa pengantar yang digunakan juga bahasa inggris.

Adapun bilamana diharapkan bahasa Indonesia akan ane sertakan dalam bahasan ane yang terdahulu (belum sempat ane lanjutkan karena pencarian sejarah perang elektronik)

Artikel ini ane tulis sebagai pengisi menunggu waktu download sebuah anime:



Jadi let's start :



Greetings to all readers and passerbys

As i promised some days ago that future journal would feature other than my miserably failed life and my turtle like advancements in art respect. Today i'm about to share a bit concern on so called "NGJ" or Next Generation Jammer.

As we know today's electronic warfare field is about to enter new era of digitization, field and of course new generation of radar counter-countermeasure. Naturally it will also spawn a new requirements of new form of countermeasure to even the game. United States in this respect stepped in to the game by declaring so called "NGJ" or Next Generation Jammer to replace their legacy AN/ALQ-99 "TactJam" that served uncle sam's electronic black magician girl since 1970's.

The details related on what's this new jammers even what's look alike are still unknown. Several companies namely Northrop Grumman and Boeing already outlined their concepts although no "official fanart" released yet. Capabilities are also unknown but from the wiki and some google-fu based on the jammer requirement by NAVAIR it would be the following :

-Complete Spectrum Coverage (All radar or communication frequencies)
-More ERP (Effective Radiated Power)
-More Jammer Modulation options
-Polarization control
-More EA Asset (meaning cheaper jammer)

And lastly the most vaunted capability referred as "Cyber attack" capability of planting computer virus to enemy IADS network

furthermore US Navy and Marines.. those who will mostly use the jammer (afterall they're the elements of the US gunboat diplomacy for so long) Requires that the architecture would be open and modular as well as integration to the already existing platform without need to make a specialized black magician girl to do the wizarding job. Stealth is also one of the requirement because the F-35 which will carry the jammer is stealth and it simply can't store the jammer internally.

Then how to achieve abovementioned requirements ? Of course i'm not the insider nor the jammer's designer however from what i seen and read so far it's pretty much the same like trend in radar development namely Phased Array (especially active one as it's more reliable and potentially higher power then passive ESA) and COTS (Commercial Take Off Shelves) based computing technology.

The active phased array will provide the increased ERP achieved by utilization of new Gallium Nitride module which can crank radio frequency output much higher than legacy Gallium Arsenide module which is quite limited due to its lower breakdown voltage. With increased ERP it would be possible for the jammer to jam more radars and to reduce the potential of the radar "burn through" the jammer's emission.

Furthermore by Active Phased Array module's capability of agile beam steering and emission control it would reduce the suspectibility of the jammer platform being engaged by Home On Jam or Passive Anti Radiation Homing (WARNING : Home on Jam is Different animal to the Passive Anti Radiation Homing) Weapon without reducing the jammer effectiveness as it can virtually focus its beam to intended area with precision being determined by the jammer platform's ESM capability of Direction Finding.

Stealth requirements..although it might seems be contradictory can also be fullfilled by above mentioned phased array, along with some sort of smart scheduling system which will only run the jammer as necessary and carefully fusing result from the aircraft or external source's data to evaluate the situation.

My expectation on the architecture of the jammer to achieve "stealthiness" it would be similar to that of modern fighter radar that there would be some sort of frequency selective and polarization screen ahead of the antenna or embedded in the radome to block unintended enemy radar signal that might just be illuminating the antenna. Pod shaping may also be considered for this respect, main tradeoff for pod shaping would be required "stealthtiness" Vs required space for achieving necessary antenna gain for the jammer. It is however something that i haven't figured on how to achieve it.

One requirements namely the spectrum coverage for the jammer is complex which usual phased array radar using typical modules will have difficulty to achieve even with transmit modules able to emit at several frequencies band...usual phased array approach by using slotted radiator will only able to provide required gain in quite narrow frequency band and will start losing gain at lower frequencies (L-Band, upper S-band and to say nothing to two meter VHF Band) One possible scheme to work around this is using so called "Frequency Independent" antenna like spiral antenna type similar to what RHAWS (or readers might be more familiar with RWR-Radar Warning Receiver) use to achieve wideband coverage. However it would not be a complete remedy as spiral antenna also lose gain in VHF band which is now one of the most aggressively..by the Russians and Chinese at least developed frequency for Radar application. Some of these VHF radars may have required precision to guide SAM's or fighter jets to the stealth bird and large size is their only weaknesses.

Legacy AN/ALQ-99 have capability to jam in VHF Band BUT only in communications and by using separate pod that contain the VHF Jammer. Will NGJ provide better performance ? In my view of current antenna technology.. it might not be possible.. so the VHF part of the NGJ may still need a specialized jammer aircraft in the manner of WWII British Mandrel VHF jammer which carried by bomber that can have space to carry required antenna to defeat VHF Radar.

Having defined the possible antenna layout for the jammer design..it's now time to move to the "Brain" of the jammer. Although this subject might be complex with many technical diagrams.. electronic blueprints etc..like what i read in Electronic Countermeasure Design Book by Westinghouse Corporation. Basic jammer block diagram only consist with four simple parts namely :

-Antenna
-Transmitter
-Technique Generator
-Operator's console

And there could be the fifth part namely the ESM which will receive the enemy signal, demodulates it and sample it for technique generator.

Legacy jammer may have these parts separated in huge blocks occupying some meter cubic of fuselage volume especially the latter three with one example is B-52 Electronic defense operator with over 500 switches and displays around the operators which they have to learn how to use and interpret the result.. otherwise S-75 Dvina would be happy to turn the B-52 into a fireball.

The NGJ in other hand.. thanks to miniaturization of computing technology and transmitters would have smaller and more compact equipment size compared to legacy jammer and with the current higher COTS computing technology processing power it is now possible to have the technique generator to be software based which increased flexibility, reliability and ability to re-program jamming technique or even creates a new one with only operator input without hardware changes.

Another software based advantage is that it may allow the platform's own Radar (say.. JSF's AN/APG-81 or F/A-18E's APG-79) to emit the very same waveform as the jammer though limited to only high frequency (X-band say...) This however may require complex programming and very robust structure and intensive testing to prevent nasty bug from occuring or preventing the software to interact with inconvenient way to the hardware.. which may cost life.

It is also possible that the jammer pod may not contain the technique generator but the technique generator itself already programmed to the aircraft's avionics. United States pioneering this model with the F-22's PAVE PILLAR program where the whole avionics software is no longer federated and interact to each other using MIL-1553 Databus but instead integrated in one common Avionics cabinet and let the software do the calculation works send it to display control. If it is the case then another advantage arise namely further reduction of volume and weight and make stealth designers happier perhaps as he/she will only contend with Stealthtiness Vs Antenna Space tradeoff, and cost of the new jammer can be possibly reduced.