CSBA in the News

“The Navy’s plan has been to replace the EP-3 mostly with the MQ-4 Triton,” says Bryan Clark, defense analyst for the Center of Strategic and Budgetary Assessment. “There are some situations, however, where the need for immediate processing and response requires a human analyst to be monitoring the data in real time. An MQ-4 could be equipped to gather much the same information, but would have to send it home to be processed and analyzed. On a manned aircraft, the analyst can be on board and listen to the incoming signals. This may enable the operator to change the sensor settings to get different information, or recommend a course of action to commanders.” Also, he says, “The MQ-4 may not have enough payload capacity to carry all the sensors an EP-3 can carry, which may require multiple MQ-4s to cover the same mission, or may limit the kinds of data that could be gathered.”

Without the ground station, users of MUOS radios could probably still talk to each other by bouncing their messages off the satellite. They could also use one of these MUOS-equipped ships or aircraft as a ground station, but this would significantly reduce the bandwidth of the system, said Bryan Clark, naval analyst Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments (CSBA)

In contrast to traditional systems designed to operate in a narrow range of frequencies against known threats, “SEWIP Block 3 brings active electronic attack across a wider frequency range…with digital processing that will facilitate new ‘intelligent’ EW processing that will enable the system to react to signals it has never seen before,” said retired Navy commander Bryan Clark, now with the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. “SEWIP Block 3’s AESA array enables it to be a passive sensor, communication array, or a radar,” he added. “It could also confuse or obscure aircraft and ship radars” as part of the Navy’s new “electromagnetic maneuver warfare” concept.

A draft of the so-called 30-year shipbuilding plan, finalized by the Navy on Friday and obtained by USNI News on Monday, holds firm to the Navy’s goal of reaching a 308-ship navy over the next five years. But that battle force total is likely to increase, Bryan Clark, naval analyst Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments (CSBA) and former special assistant to past Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Jonathan Greenert, told USNI News on Monday.