Fire from the sea.

The post-1990 series of 'out-of-area' operations has changed the leading navies' main emphasis from 'blue water' convoy protection to littoral operations using conventional ordnance in support of ground forces. At long ranges, carrier-borne attack aircraft can now be augmented by conventionally armed cruise missiles launched from ships and submarines. The range gap between traditional naval gunfire and the cruise missile is meanwhile being filled by smaller missiles and barrel/tube-launched guided projectiles.

The leading force in the move from open ocean to littoral thinking is (unsurprisingly) the US Navy, which in 2001 abandoned its projected Zumwalt-class DD-21 destroyer concept in favour of the DD(X), designed to provide advanced land attack capability to assist the ground campaign (see the title picture which shows it firing its 155 mm United Defense Advanced Gun Systems: also note the 'tumblehome' hull form designed to reduced radar response). The new concept reflects the retirement of the last of the US Navy's battleships. which were able to produce a large volume of fire at long range, as well as the fact that the US Marine Corps now fights far beyond its traditional amphibious landing scenario.

In 2002 Northrop Grumman Ship Systems was contracted as the DD (X) design agent for Phase III, covering the design, manufacture and testing of ten engineering development models (EDM), which include the 155 mm Advanced Gun System (AGS) and its munitions. The first DD(X) is scheduled to enter service in FY2013.

To appreciate the challenge facing those developing the 155 mm AGS and its munitions, it may be useful to outline where conventional naval guns stand today. The US Navy's standard 127 mm United Defense 5-inch/54 Mk 45 has an ultimate range of 25 km firing at 47 deg elevation. A major advance is now being provided by that company's 5-inch/62 Mk 45 Mod 4 mount, designed to combine a new 62-calibre barrel, a reduced radar signature and an ammunition recognition system to suit a wide variety of rounds. For the US Navy, the Mk 45 Mod 4 gun is being installed on Arleigh Burke class DDG destroyers, and retrofitted on some Ticonderoga class CG cruisers. Denmark has purchased some of these guns, and Japan and the Republic of Korea have acquired manufacturing licences, the former for the Kongo class of Aegis DD destroyers.

The 127 mm ammunition range planned for the Mod 4 includes the Mk 172 HE-ICM cargo round, which dispenses 49 Mk 2 submunitions, derived from the US Army's M-80 DPICM (Dual-Purpose Improved Conventional Munition). Being unguided, the projectile has a CEP of approximately 335 metres at a range of 30 km. Using the improved EX-175 propellant charge, maximum range of the Mod 4 firing conventional munitions is increased to over 38 km.

The Mod 4 will also fire the GPS/INS-guided Raytheon EX-171 Extended Range Guided Munition (Ergm), which is 1.55 metres long. The Ergm has four tail fins to eliminate spin and provide directional stability, and four canard control surfaces, which are deployed just before it reaches the peak of its trajectory. It has a launch weight of 50 kg. compared to (for example) the 31.6 kg of the Mk 116 HEVT, the heaviest of the conventional rounds. The ATK Thiokol Propulsion rocket gives the Ergm a ballistic range of up to 76 km, but this can be extended to more than 115 km by gliding. The 20 kg blast-fragmentation warhead is delivered with a CEP better than 20 metres, regardless of range. Its GPS receiver is an L-3 Communications TruTrack, which is designed to withstand a launch acceleration of 15,500 G, has a high anti-jam performance and can track up to ten satellites simultaneously. Its near precision allows the use of a low-cost inertial measuring unit (IMU).

Ten Ergms can be fired by the Mk 45 Mod 4 within one minute. The Ergm makes possible a nine-projectile MRSI (multiple round simultaneous impact) in a grid pattern. Future growth options for Ergm include a larger rocket motor for increased range, a semi-active laser seeker for use against designated moving targets and a datalink for in-flight retargeting.

The Ergm is currently scheduled to enter US Navy service in 2006. However, reports indicate that its unit cost will be around $ 50,000. In late 2003 the US Navy consequently invited proposals for a lowcost alternative Extended Range Munition (ERM), stating that the contenders must demonstrate their ammunition in firings from a Mk 45 gun by the end of September 2005. The Navy gave a target unit cost of $15,000 and a maximum of $ 35,000, including the propellant charge. The proposed rounds were to have a maximum length of 1.55 metres, a maximum weight of 50 kg and a range of 76 km, with potential for 117 km. They are required to have a CEP of 20 metres regardless of GPS jamming, with the prospect of improving this figure to five metres in the absence of jamming.

In June 2002 during a test from the Nasa facility at Wallops Island, Virginia, a team led by Alliant Techsystems (ATK) fired from a 5-inch/62-calibre gun a GPS-guided Autonomous Naval Support Round (ANSR), reaching a distance of 100 km. ATK's Ballistic Trajectory Extended Range Munition II is a further development of the ANSR, and in May 2004 the company was awarded a $ 30 million US Navy contract to carry out a 16-month demonstration programme, firing this projectile from Mk 45 Mod 4 and Mod 2 guns. The ATK team includes the C S Draper Laboratory.

The range of the Mk 45 Mod 4 is evidently regarded as limited in the context of the US Navy's long-term needs, and it lacks the magazine volume and degree of automation required for sustained fire support. The United Defense 155 mm Advanced Gun System (or 155/62 AGS) for the DD(X) is a single-barrel, low-signature armament, firing twelve rounds per minute. It will have a fully automated weapon handling and storage system with up to 750 guided and ballistic munitions. Special features include a triangular, water-filled barrel envelope. The AGS will be heavy: the turret alone weighs 95 tonnes, and reports indicate that with a full magazine the system will weigh almost 300 tonnes. The first prototype was proof-fired in October 2001.

In April 2003, following a technology demonstration phase, Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control was selected to develop the Long-Range Land Attack Projectile (LRLAP) to be fired from the AGS. The company was awarded a $ 41.3 million EDM contract by United Defense, to develop a baseline design for this rocket-assisted guided projectile. This contract is to run to September 2005 and includes a 15 test rounds. The first ground-based guided flight is scheduled for September 2004. The LRLAP is expected to be around 2.13 metres long, weigh about 118 kg and provide a range of 185 km. The baseline version will rely on GPS/INS, but later variants are expected to have a variety of sensors (and warloads). A US Navy spokesman has referred to a combined development cost of $ 850 million for the AGS and LRLAP.

This Long-Range Land Attack Projectile contract marked Lockheed Martin's return to the guided projectile market, having produced almost 28,000 laser-homing Copperhead 155 mm rounds for the US Army in the 1980s. The company also developed the similarly guided Deadeye five-inch projectile for the US Navy, manufacturing 200 rounds that passed technical and operational evaluation trials before the programme was cancelled due to funding cuts.

Non-US Developments France's Giat is working on the 155 mm Pelican cargo round, which has GPS/INS guidance and the Samprass and Spacido deployable airbrakes; now developed by Giat in partnership with Thales and TDA under a French Ministry of Defence contract. The 47 kg Pelican LR (Long-Range), using base-bleed and gliding flight, will carry 63 Giat Ogre or three Bofors Defence/Giat Bonus submunitions to a range of over 60 km. The Ogre submunition (which is originally carried by the round bearing the same designation) is a 244-gram, 40 mm bomblet with a hollow charge, capable of penetrating over 90 mm of armour. The Pelican VLR (Very Long-Range) will weigh 61 kg and carry four Bonus or 77 Ogres. The combination of rocket assistance and gliding will provide a range of more than 85 km. The CEP is claimed to be better than ten metres, presumably using Galileo satellite guidance.

Britain's BAE Systems RO Defence is working with Giat to assess the Royal Navy's future fire support requirements for the Type 45 destroyer. It is envisaged that the resulting 155 mm gun will fire both standard Nato ammunition and new extended-range rounds, eventually providing a range of 100 km.

Italy's Oto Melara (a Finmeccanica company), is developing the Vulcano family of fin-stabilised 127 mm projectiles, achieving extended range by means of increased muzzle velocity, rather than rocket boost. In April 2003 the Italian and Royal Netherlands Navies signed an agreement to co-operate on a feasibility study of extended-range 127 mm rounds, with industry to be represented by Oto Melara and (on the Dutch side) Thales and the TNO Prins Maurits Laboratory.

Russia produces laser-homing projectiles with mid-course inertial guidance, but the writer (so far) has no evidence of guided rounds being used in Russian naval gunnery. Army examples include the 152 mm KBP-developed Krasnopol round, and its 155 mm Krasnopol-M derivative, which have ranges of 22 and 17 km respectively.

Naval guns marketed by Rosoboronexport include the 130 mm twin-barrel AK-130-MR-184, which has a range of over 22 km, can fire at up to 35 rd/min and has the remarkable total of 180 ready-to-fire rounds. Arsenal's turrets with reduced radar signatures include the 130 mm single-barrel A192M, which can fire 30 rd/min.

In developing extended range artillery, South Africa is one of the world leaders. Denel produces as one of its 155 mm Assegai family the V-Lap (Velocity-enhanced Long-range Projectile) M2005, which combines advanced streamlining with base-bleed and rocket assistance to give more than 40 km range from a 39-calibre barrel, and over 52 km from a 155/52. To improve lethality, further development work is being done to include pre-formed fragment (PFF) technology in the warhead. Insensitive munition (IM) technology will also be incorporated in future V-Lap rounds, A derivative, designated Pro-Ram, will use a ramjet to extend range to around 70 km.

Tube-Launched Projectiles

Since World War Two artillery rockets have played a major role in shore attack. In the Vietnam War, US Navy LSMR (Landing Ship Medium Rocket) boats fired thousands of five-inch, fin-stabilised Bomrocs (bombardment rockets). Tube-launched projectiles continue to enjoy advantages over the gun-fired variety in terms of firing rate and launcher cost. The US Navy is currently studying the use of GPS-guided rockets.

The Israel Military Industries (IMI) Navlar system uses the 160 mm LAR-160 rocket manufactured by RSD (IMI's Rocket Systems Division) to deliver a unitary warhead or 104 anti-personnel/anti-materiel (AP/AM) submunitions at up to 45 km. The Navlar is based on two 13-round launch pod containers, and can fire a salvo of 26 rockets in less than 50 seconds.

The US Navy's land attack capability will be augmented by the conversion of four Ohio class SSBNs to SSGNs (nuclear-powered guided missile submarines), the first of which is to be operational by FY2007. At least two of each submarine's Trident launch tubes will be dedicated to equipment for its special operations team, leaving up to 22 for land attack missiles. Each tube can accommodate seven Raytheon BGM-109 Tomahawk cruise missiles, giving a total of up to 154. It could alternatively house six rounds of a naval version of the Lockheed Martin Atacms (Army Tactical Missile System). For the SSGN-launched Tacms, the US Navy has funded a three-year trials programme, designated Submarine Encapsulated Launch Demonstration, using a modified SSBN.

The baseline Atacms Block 1A is a 1320 kg missile with a payload of 300 M74 AP/AM submunitions and a range of 300 km. Other proposed payload options include the 227 kg WDU-18/B blast-fragmentation warhead from the Boeing AGM-84E Slam (Stand-off Land Attack Missile), an earth-penetration warhead developed by the US Navy and Sandia National Laboratories and the Lockheed Martin Locaas (Low-Cost Autonomous Attack System) and the Northrop Grumman Bat/Viper Strike submunitions.

Earlier this year the US Navy's Strategic Systems Programs office issued a request for information on a rocket for a submarine-launched intermediate-range ballistic missile, which would propel a Navy-furnished 570 kg re-entry body housing a 410 kg conventional warhead.

Gap-Fillers

Given GPS and/or a day/night seeker. plus an automatic target recognition (ATR) facility or a datalink, most ship-to-ship guided missiles can be developed into land attack weapons.

The Boeing BGM-84 Harpoon Block II has GPS/INS navigation, and the Block II+ adds an imaging infrared (IIR) seeker and ATR. The Block III will have a three-mode seeker and a datalink. Sea Slam, a ship-launched version of the AGM-84E Slam, has been tested. The Russian equivalent of Sea Slam is the Zvezda-Strela Kh-37, derived from the Kh-35 anti-ship missile.

Under French government funding MBDA is currently developing the Exocet MM40 Block 3, which will have a turbojet engine and a range of over 180 km (compared to 50 km for its rocket-powered predecessors). The Block 3 will have INS/GPS navigation and a radar altimeter, and will provide a land attack capability. First flight and deliveries are scheduled for 2006.

Other potential land attack missiles include the Saab Bofors Dynamics RBS15 Mk 3, the Kongsberg NSM and the Taurus (Eads/Bofors) KEPD 150SLM. Eads is working with MBDA on the Polyphem missile series, which employs fibre-optic guidance, and will arm German Navy K-130 corvettes. The Triton version is being tested on the service's Type 212 submarines.

Cruise Missiles

The principal land attack cruise missile is the Raytheon Tactical Tomahawk or Block IV, which entered US Navy service in May 2004. It is 5.56 metres long and weighs 1315 kg without booster. Production is currently running at 350 per year, with 293 requested in FY2005. It is anticipated that the Navy will increase its planned total from 1300 to around 2000, to replace rounds used against Afghanistan and Iraq, and that the current vertically-launched version will be augmented by one fired from submarine torpedo tubes. Some reports suggest that maximum range, normally given as 1850 km, may actually be as high as 2800 km. A penetrator variant has been demonstrated.

MBDA is currently in a three-year demonstration and risk-reduction programme with the Scalp Naval for the French Navy. That service plans to order 250 in 2006, introduce the missile on its new frigates from 2011 and on Barracuda class submarines from 2015, In either case it is to be fired from the DCN Sylver A70 vertical launch system and have a range of 1000 km. Terminal guidance will be provided by an HR seeker with either ATR or a datalink. It is possible that the Scalp Naval will also be adopted for Britain's Type 45 destroyer and as the Italian Navy's Ulisse project.