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Reprinted with permission
JANE'S INTERNATIONAL
DEFENSE REVIEW (IDR)
December 1, 2003 v.036 no. 012
Low-rate initial production is due to begin
in 2004 of Spider, a hand-emplaced man-in-the-loop munitions
system under development by ATK and Textron Systems as a replacement
for anti-personnel landmines. The two companies were jointly
awarded a US$53.8million contract to complete Spider development
by the US Army Armament Research, Development and Engineering
Center in November 2002.
The basis of Spider is its munitions control
unit (MCU), a pedestal which embodies a communications module
linked to the six lethal or non-lethal munitions that it supports.
On command from the operator's remote control unit (RCU, a
rugged laptop computer such as the Tadiran Tacter-31A), the
MCU launches its web of tripwires, aligned with the direction
of aim of each of the six munitions ports. The latter may
be charged with grenades of various kinds, or fitted with
an adaptor allowing command-detonation of a Claymore mine
or other offset munition. If the wires are pulled, a signal
is automatically sent to the RCU for the operator to decide
a response. The operator is able to control a number of MCUs
from a single RCU, the communications module in each MCU allowing
the latter to be remoted up to 1.5km, or further if a repeater
unit is deployed. Spider is designed for recovery and reuse,
the MCU battery (which has a life of more than 30 days) being
replaced as necessary after a deployment, along with the expended
tripwire container and any munitions that may have been discharged.
Meanwhile Textron is engaged on a US$34.9million
three-year contract to develop technology for Increment 1
of the Intelligent Munition System (IMS), one of two unattended
munitions programs included in the US Army Future Combat Systems
(FCS) unmanned systems (Annex E) program. Incorporating a
networked communications system, IMS is expected to include
anti-vehicle, anti-personnel, urban, and non-lethal weapons
variants. A parallel US$31.5million IMS Increment 1 technology
development contract has been awarded to General Dynamics
Advanced Information Systems (GD AIS; see IDR 6/2003, p8).
Unattended sensors are also covered by FCS
Annex E. In this field Textron Systems has been appointed
prime contractor for the FCS Urban and FCS Tactical unattended
ground sensors (UGS), for which it received a three-year US$30million
development contract in August 2003. The company has also
won a US$19.2million sole development contract for the US
Air Force's Advanced Remote Ground Unattended Sensor (ARGUS)
and the similar Advanced Air Delivered Sensor (AADS) for the
US Marine Corps (see IDR 9/2003, p12). ARGUS is intended to
detect, track, identify and report time-sensitive ground targets
to an Air Operations Center in near-real time, using an air-delivered
or hand-emplaced store containing sensors, communications,
other electronics and power supplies. AADS will use similar
means to detect, identify and report enemy activity in a named
area of interest. The program runs until September 2009.
A third UGS activity area for Textron is
the MDUGS (Massively Deployed UGS) program in which it is
once again engaged in competitive study against GD AIS (see
IDR 10/2002, p20). For this program Textron is understood
to be developing a new multimode (seismic/acoustic/magnetic)
mini-sensor, able to generate azimuth information. MDUGS functionality
includes ground and air vehicle detection, classification,
identification and tracking; personnel detection and classification;
and artillery detection, classification and location. ITT
is one of Textron's communications systems collaborators on
MDUGS, downselection for the development and demonstration
phase of which is expected in January 2004, with a view to
delivering a 10-node demonstrator later that year.
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