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Russia Declassifies "Stealth" Warship
krez writes "Today's RFE/RL Newsline states The Russian Navy has declassified Project 20380, a warship designed with stealth technology. The ship has a range of 4000km, clips along at 30 knots (55 km/h). The ship has both offensive and defensive roles, and comes armed with the supersonic Yakhont first strike missiles, and the Medvedka 400mm anti-submarine missiles. This is a big step in Russia's attempt to re-establish itself as a world naval super-power, after a decade of budget cuts." Technical details are very very scant on here - if you know more, please post below.
... cos the fucking thing's invisible.
We cannot afford a stealth warship gap!
I'm not supposed to tell anyone about this, but I heard that it runs Linux.
The point of this ship must be that it doesn't show up on radar-but does sonar still work on it, or did the Russians manage to quiet the noise of the ship enough? If they didn't, then they're idiots. Even if this did happen, the ship is still dumb. Unless the ship can somehow cloak itself (impossible) satellites will be able to pick it up. The ship won't be able to move fast enough to avoid detection by satellites, rendering the ship's main function useless.
Colin Winters
I remember seeing footage and video of the Sea Shadow stealth ship. I'd be intersted in seeing photos of this one; does it look as wedgy as our own stealth ships do? Or does it look similar to "regular" naval vessels with some minor reshaping that ends up having a major effect on the radar cross-section?
i am a soviet space shuttle
I'd assume that Russia's intent with this craft is not to launch a war against the U.S., but to give them the ability to approach other radar-equipped ships at sea without raising the alarm, with the side benefit of being impervious to radar-guided weaponry. Very useful for drug interdiction, coastal patrol, and generally dealing with seafaring baddies who don't have minute-by-minute satellite imagery at their disposal. I think that includes 95% of the world (and most of the U.S. fleet as well.)
Just because the combined intelligence resources of the West could be brought to bear to track one of these things doesn't mean it's useless. Our carriers are pretty easy to spot, and look how handy they've been lately.
Let me see....
USA
Stealth bombers, w/ laser guided bombs.
Russia
Stealth ships, with supersonic torpedoes
Australia
Collins Class Submarine, with extremely noisy engines.
Something tells me we (AU) wouldnt win a war.
Let's just hope the US government doesn't resort to Slashdot as an intelligence source... ;-)
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Then 'Stealth' means it looks like a duct-tape bound pile of junk, similiar to what is usually found in my redneck neighbor's driveway.
Frankly, I'm surprised that the Russian government has money to spend on Military R&D when they just recently resorted to renting out the Russian segments of the ISS/Alpha as a tourist trap. Perhaps this practice is paying off?
Whatever is the case, I hope that this signals that the Russians are able to start competing in terms of scientific and technological advances again. Competition is good, and competition between superpowers-- so long as they're not openly hostile about it-- can result in some pretty impressive things.... The Apollo Program for example.
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
Of course, our Navy won't talk about it. I've a friend in the Singapore navy, though, and he says that the American Navy is very arrogant, and likes to show off by steaming close by, but being completely invisible on radar.
The article says this is the first ship of its kind in the world, but they note the distinguishing factor is that it is a stealth ship armed with supersonic anti-ship missiles.
Even Slashdot wants to hide some things
can be found here and here
Imperium et libertas
Autocracy and freedom
This is really interesting- could it happen to be a coincidence that this is announced the same day that Bush announced the U.S. withdrawl from the missile treaty even though Putin said it was a bad idea? On a side note, there seems to be hardly anything about this on all the top news sites, but it was on the front page of my newspaper this morning. How could something so significant be ignored so quickly?
The future isn't what it used to be.
First guess, this is a small(er) combatant, not a major fleet unit. (Based on previous Russian naval philosophy.) It could either be the centerpiece of a frigate navy, or the building block of a real navy. Given Russia's ongoing economic problems, don't bet on it being much more than vaporware for a decade at least.
From the submission:"This is a big step in Russia's attempt to re-establish itself as a world naval super-power, after a decade of budget cuts."
Well I wouldn't exactly say that Russia isn't a navy super-power. They countinue to produce the best submarines in the world. Right now their first fourth generation (Borey class) strategic missile sub is being built, and they're making a new attack sub also.
This Corvette is not just Russia's idea. Smaller ships with more powerful weapons are simply a better idea then putting personal and resources into a valuable, highly concentrated target. There are about 200 Corvettes in the world right now, and the production of them is a billion dollar a year industry. Russia uses these things for sub detection, coastal patrol, and escorting. They've got first rate anti-sub and ant-ship missiles, a helicopter, surface to air missiles, and a 55 million dollar price tag.
check out the Bellona foundation's page : their Northern Fleet page is superbly detailed and they have tons of technical details about Russia's subs and surface ships. They even have some information about projects such as the Severodvinsk-class 4th-generation submarine class that got canned when the Berlin wall collapsed, or never got finished due to lack of funding.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
"It's not a war on drugs, it's a war on personal freedom. Keep that in mind at all times." Bill Hicks
http://www.rusarm.ru/exprod.htm
I've always wanted to know where I could pick up a battle tank. That and enough equipment to equip an infantry company or two. I wonder if they take VISA.....
Per Ardua Ad Astra
They appear to be not allowing direct linkage to the information on the Yakhont and Medvenka missile systems. You can still get to the info though - from the homepage click on Export Products, then click on Navy. Halfway down are links to the Yakhont and Medvenka.
Think outside the... Hey, where'd the friggin' box go?
http://www.janes.com/defence/naval_forces/news/jdw /jdw010417_3_n.shtml
Here's the tidbit of interest: "The admiral also told reporters that the navy was launching the construction of the new Project 20380 corvettes, which will be used for coastal patrol, escort and antisubmarine warfare operations. The first of class is scheduled to be laid down at the Severnaya Verf shipyard in St Petersburg later this year. The design of this 1,900t stealthy corvette was developed by the Almaz Central Marine Design bureau."
Note that this article uses the term "stealthy corvette," which I suspect may have a different connotation from the 'stealth' technology we're generally used to.
Bon Voyage, destination: Taiwan
pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.
Do you have any idea how much it costs to develop something like this? It isn't being done for drug interdiction!!
Moreover, presumably all the ships in the US fleet are in constant communication therefore satelite imagery should be availible to all our ships...and in general to most of the first world nations. Those nations without satelite imagery availible probably don't have a navy large enough to really justify this sort of construction. Iraq had one of the larger armies in the world, border on ocean, and yet we didn't even hear a peep about their naval capabilities during gulf war.
Finally I doubt it is really impervious to radar guided weaponry. Stealth only works so well, once they get close enough they should be able to pick it up...satelite images should accomplish this.
If you liked this thought maybe you would find my blog nice too:
A strategic advantage this ship's instrumentation has over US seacraft:
On the bridge are numerous PCs, which (amongst other things) allow the ship's manuals to be read in Adobe e-Book format *and* PDF format.
-- In the beginning was the WORD, and the WORD was UNSIGNED, and the main(){} was without form and void...
In other news. Russia announced today their "Hacker Protection Program" loosely modeled after the US Witness Protection Plan.
The plan is designed to protect intelligent Russian Software Engineers like Dimitry Sklyarov.
When asked for comment, Directory of Foreign Technological Relations, Boris Imatrov said "The US is quickly becoming a very oppressive government. In order to protect out technological interest we created Project 20380".
The plan is to man the vessel with the top 200 "hackers" living in Russia. In exchange for near total protection from US persecution (the ship is armed to the teeth and invisible to radar), the geeks will be responsible for making sure she is always patched with the latest Linux kernel and is resistant to all but the most coordinated DDOS attacks.
From the story:
"Using Windows NT, which is known to have some failure modes, on a warship is similar to hoping that luck will be in our favor," DiGiorgio said.
Bush's education improvements were
On the bridge are numerous PCs, which (amongst other things) allow the ship's manuals to be read in Adobe e-Book format *and* PDF format.
This is mearly to assist the *blind* crewmen. (whether legitametely blind, OR blinded by vodka and glasnost)
.sig wanted: Must be concise, funny, and display my cleverness.
"Ya khont" is the most offensive sounding missile I've ever heard of.
"Ask me about Loom"
...when can I buy one to cruise around my local lake in? Those supersonic missles sound nice...
"I don't trust goats," --To Catch a Spy
Whatever you think about the treaty, you have to give the Bush administration credit for their ability to manipulate the media and divert attention away from the important issues.
The first thing is that when the ship is travelling it will leave a wake behind it. Also I believe that the wake will disturb the organisms in the ocean that emit light. Getting a satellite to find the wake wouldn't be too hard.
Also a moving ship will have a thermal signature from the exhausting of heat/smoke through the smoke stack. Again visible on satellites. But could be reduced by cooling the exhaust.
To make the ship invisible visually there's always the old dazzle paint jobs from WWII (look at an old photo of a warship from that era) that works by disrupting the visual signature of the ship.
I believe that also the lastest method is to "fog" the air around the ship by spraying seawater into a fine mist.
Any other ideas?
"He who controls The Information, Controls The World"
Check here for more info (in norwegian only, sorry) on the Skjold-class MTBs. I'm not sure when they will be ready though. The boats are propelled by water jets which means they can turn really really fast. The swedish navy is also getting stealthy boats, and they got water jets too.
Bush uplls out of the ABM treaty with Russia & Co. and now they declassify a project to send the point that they haven't been sitting idly for the last few years. This craft is hardly anything to worry about. As others have said, its uses are limited and it is still detectable by some craft. But it is a sign that the Russian R&D is still going strong. And that's even more scary than anything else, because Russian military tech becomes global tech quicker than nothing. Russia is not likely to just ignore Bush's slap, but they wouldn't dare actually increasing their nuclear armaments so they're probably going to begin a more conventional arms race. And since China has the money, they'll be the sole beneficiaries from this race.
Pax Digitalia
Rick,
Actually, Western navies have been developing low-observable ships since the late 1980's.
For example, the current destroyers and the new DD-21 class destroyers for the US Navy sport a lot of features that were pioneered by Lockheed's Sea Shadow project, which was designed to drastically reduce the radar signature of surface ships. And the British are introducing new destroyers based on this research, too.
Note that these new ships' superstructures look like a bunch of pyramids. This drastically reduces the radar cross-section of the ship, and the addition of IR shielding on the engine exhaust stack reduces the observability of these new ships even further.
I took a little Russian in college (or rather, I took 13 credit hours worth and remember little ;^) ). "Medved" (prounounced a little more lik Myedvyed) is "bear", so "medvedka" is a diminutive form, i.e. a cute nickname* like "cute little bear". Check out this nifty online dictionary for things like this (type in "medved", hit "transliterate input", and away you go (if your machine and browser can handle cyrillic anyway).
*similarly "vod" is water, so "vodka" is "little water that we all know and love" ;^) [not to single out the Russians as heavy drinkers, iirc whiskey (the english mangling of the original gaelic anyway) meant "water of life"]
News for Geeks in Austin, TX
So what if Russia has a "stealth" ship being designed. Do not forget, no other nation has ever proven stealth technology other than the US.
And we are already building a fleet of stealth ships. DD-21 is our program to build new stealth ships. Our ships seem to have all the capabilities plus more. The difference is that we are very far in the development of the ships. The site has lots of cool PDFs include some cool artist renditions. The program was originally going to just create one class of ships but very recently was changed to create a whole new fleet of ships. The overall design goal is to increase lateral capabilities (ability to assist ground war by approaching shore and traveling down rivers). The program has recently been renamed to DD-X to reflect this goal.
As far as not being able to stop their missiles, that again is just not true. Aegis ships - a program I'm proud to be a part of - have been working on TBMD (Theatre Ballistic Missile Defense) for quite some time. This is different from NTW (National Theatre Wide) or what is common referred to as national missile defense. TBMD is not effected at all by the ABM treaty so that has been being developed for quite some time.
There are a lot of posts about Norway having stealth ships or other countries having stealth ships. The greatest part of the Norwegian Navy is their new frigates which runs Aegis. We sell alot of our technologies to other countries. Our Naval program is just so much better than any other countries. That's one of the benefits of having so many warm water ports.
This article is not even Russian government hype but just some newspaper trying to make a story that's just not there.
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We've had it for a while
Of course, our Navy won't talk about it.
We've had it for a while and talked about it quite a bit. And decided it was silly.
A large stealth vessel was part of the original stealth project, and is well documented. (It was a very fast powered twin-hull, which gave them an opportunity to absorb or redirect the microwaves that got into the space UNDER the main body of the craft.)
The problem was that it DID work.
But the rough surface of the sea also reflects radar. The stealth craft blocked this. The net result was a dark streak on the radar background, with the stealth ship exactly at the end of the streak closest to the radar antenna.
Effectively it was a big, black arrowhead on a dim green background, pointing exactly at the stealth vessel. The only thing missing was a label saying "Stealth ship HERE".
To solve this you'd need to deliberately transmit a fake of a surface reflection behind you - which means that you need active ECM for EVERY radar that shines on you. Then you risk showing up as a spotlight on PASSIVE radar.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Should of preview'd! It's http://www.dd21.com.
That's actually the page of the Blue Team (Lockheed Martin & Bathe Iron Works). The Gold Team has a page too http://www.dd21goldteam.com which is composed of Raytheon and Ingels Shipyard.
Two teams are designing ships in order to produce the best one. It's pretty late in the phase though and the contract was actually supposed to be awarded a while ago. Who knows what will happen know since 9/11 though and Bush's plans to restructure everything.
int func(int a);
func((b += 3, b));
heh, you mean Jonathan Pryce in Tomorrow never dies.
The details of the Stealth Ship in the movie are here.
Re cently in the US Naval Institute's Proceedings, their monthly magazine, there was a great article describing how the amount of money that the Air Force recieves as a whole is staying the same, but their weapons of choice (F-22, B-2) are horrifically expensive. For instance, originally a force of 500-700 F-22s was envisioned by the Air Force when they decided to use the Lockheed variant of the F-22/23. However, due to budget overruns and contraints put on the program by the Air Force, that number has now shrunk to 150-250 aircraft. An analogous situation is happening with the B-2 - originally there were to be 200 of the long-range bombers. However, with current projections of $2B+ for each bomber, the number that the Air Force has for their force of B-2s is around 60, with very few of those bombers ever seeing combat, because who wants to risk a $2B bomber on a conventional bombing mission?
The overall effect of these expensive programs is to reduce the overall force structure of the Air Force. Even with the best technology in the world, a small number of planes can still be overrun by a larger number of planes. It has been suggested that the Air Force use something like the "high/low mix" that the Navy currently uses - the "high" being the multi-billion dollar carrier, with its power projection (read: ability to launch aircraft from anywhere), and the low being the much less costly guided missile frigate, with its land attack (Tomahawk), anti-surface and anti-submarine warfare capabilities. In the end, however, Congress will most likely end up giving more money to the Air Force.
Actually it doesn't cost much -- in rubles, that is. The Russia's legacy military-industrial complex is self-sufficient, as it does not require the services of private contractors. This gives them an opportunity to gain some share in the world's arms market. In 2000 the US held over 50% of the worldwide arms market with over $18 billion in sales. The next closest competitors were Russia with $7.7 billion, and France with sales valued at $4.1 billion.
The ship is in the Skjold class, and is developed in Norway. The US Navy is thinking about buying, several of these. Take a look at
http://www.knmskjold.org/
And yes, some of the test systems are running Linux (because I, together with others, developed one of them.) We used RealTime Linux and Qt to make a distributed failsafe system for analyzing payload from optical sensors on the hull.
-- ess
Planes can take territory, but they can't HOLD territory, hence the requirement for Infantry and other ground pounders to go in and sit in the mud. Well, planes can damage shipping, but they can't stop shipping. Sometimes, you just need to park a big steel hull of ten on a Sea Line Of Communication and start sinking transports. And lets face it, that Aegis crusier or three in your convoy is going to pretty much prevent bombers from touching you. 4 million watts of RF energy means never having to say 'I'm sorry.'
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
Think about it: you're looking for something that's a fixed shape and a fixed size (well, relatively fixed -- you can calculate by what angle the satelite is looking from) against a background that's usually pretty free from noise images.
'course, then there's always infrared. These nuke-yoo-lar suckers tend to run pretty hot.
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
:)
hawk
"... Sure boats have been usefull in the past.. but really I dont feel that they can keep up with the pace with stealth bombers capable of coming in, wiping out an area and getting out undetected. ..."
Naval force is invaluable in modern warfare; there are numerous examples but an obvious one is the current action in Afganistan, a landlocked nation. Without the current cooperation from previously hostile nations, naval air power could have still done the job.
Stealth aircraft are neither undetectable nor invulnerable to intercept by missiles. Serbian forces were able to shoot down 2 stealth fighters in action against the former Yugoslavia. Conventional radar has extreme difficulty detecting them but there are currently 2 different methods to track them; both systems are well known to US and Soviet military and have been tested by both nations (and no doubt others).
Radar bounced off the sea from space can detect a ship's wake, which happens to point right at the ship. The process used is similar to decryption, where the natural ocean waves are the random noise and the wake is the message. Navigation radar and radio transmissions can be detected and triangulated. Infrared detectors in space can not only see plume from the smokestack, they can also see the wake from a large ship from space when cooler water is churned up to the surface.
Below the water, the US has very sensitive listening stations scattered about to detect submarines. US submarines can track a ship from quite a distance due to noise alone. Even when not underway, waves slapping up against the side of a ship make a distinctive noise (a problem submarines don't have). I suspect those "secret" ships have been followed by US submarines wherever they went for quite some time.
"Stealth ships" are a blue-water navy idea. But there hasn't been a major blue-water naval engagement in years. Today, the U.S. Navy is mostly used to project power onshore. Stealth isn't the primary criterion for that role. Armor matters more.
There's a good argument for heavily armored battleships for shore bombardment, but the old ones took thousands of people to run, and the Navy is short on people. The U.S. Navy had an "arsenal ship" concept in the early 1990s, but never built any.
Secondly, if your reasoning were to be applied to, for instance, the United States then all Anglos, Africans, Asians and their decendants should be exiled from North America because it belongs to the Native Americans who were here "several THOUSAND years ago" and who built great nations that were destroyed by European immigrants and settlers only a few hundred years ago. Does this illustrate the wrong-headedness of your and many other Jewish/Israeli defenses against their eviction of the Palestinians over that past several decades.
In the past all over the world there were very few checks on the powerful who wished to sieze more power or more land and influence. The peoples of the world were connected by fewer and weaker economic and social bonds. Cultural, geographic and technologoical diferences betwwen peoples allowed dominance of some nations or empires over others and the net destabilization of the invasion was low.
Today the world's cultures, nations and economies are much more interconnected and dependant upon eachother. Destabilization in one sphere has greater a destabilizing effect on the rest of the world than in times past. Additionally, liberal ideas and values have spread across the world. Subversion and subjugation of one people by another is no longer socially acceptable.
The Jewish reentrance to Palestine has come at a time when there is no longer popular acceptance of the kinds of suppression that the Jewish/Israeli people exert over the less powerful Palestinians. Popular sentiment against Israeli policy and condemning Israel's actions against the Palestinians was expressed clearly by the majority in the recent world conference against racism in Durban, South Africa.
The horrible and toughtless violence perpetrated by both sides in the Israeli conflict is damnable. It is true that the U.S. policy strongly supports Israel. However, this policy is clearly for net political and military/economic advantage. In an interconnected world, net advantages and disadvantages are more important than specific political issues. The U.S. must hold good standing in Israeli and Saudi relations in order to maintain military safeguards for the American economic assets in the Middle East region. Also, The historical U.S. support for Israel carries significance in that policy changes must not be made too quickly in order to maintain the credibility of the U.S. leaders, the policy that they execute and the regional stablity. To a lesser extent the democratic system in Israel must be supported as the expansion of democratic rule is a long term U.S. policy goal. The cultural differences between Israel and the U.S. are smaller than those between the U.S. leaders and the Arab and Musolem people. These factors are primary in the relationship with Israel and they weigh heavier than the plight of the Palestinian people. The Jewish Israeli's have taken advantage of this skillfully and caused great harm.
Personally, I find it highly embarrasing to live in a nation that supports the extermination of the Palestinian people. The onus for negotiating peace and combined prosperity in Israel lies with the Israel which has far greater wealth, power and political influence than the people they seem to blindly subjugate.
At this point the Israelis are fighting against a starving, and desperate enemy. Suicide bombing that is the mainstay of the Palestinian offensive is the extreme of desperation and implies a lack of rational thought. The Palestinian people have demonstrated that they are disorganized and without effective leadership. Therefore it must be Isreal's task to find a peaceful and equitable resolution. Assuredly, there will be no outcome but further terror and the eventual annihilation of the Palestinians without thoughtful peacemaking leadership on the part of the Isrealis.
The Kursk sank on a training mission, and according to a revealing and meticulously researched print article in the October, 2001 issue of Men's Journal, the two primary reasons for the tragic death of the entire crew were: 1) faulty cheaper torpedoes, and 2) a Russian fleet chain of command that put covering their asses before the welfare of their sailors.
The Russian Navy is in dire straits. Submarine crews spend much of their time foraging for food. Their morale is terrible, training quality is low, and discipline is not what it should be.
Having the best equipment in the world is no substitute for having well-trained, motivated, sailors. Until the Russians can completely overhaul their Cold War-oriented, top-heavy, political-appointee command structure, and start spending money on training and sailors rather than on huge new weapons programs, they'll continue their rapid descent into military irrelevance.
Further reading about the Russian military from sources around the world:
BBC
India
Russia
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
Eh, don't forget we in Sweden also are working on a stealth ship..
/Gathers
http://www.naval-technology.com/projects/visby/
Two Soviet tank commanders meet in Paris. The first one asks "so, who won the air war?"
"The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than that of whether a submarine can swim" -EWD
This is complete bullshit. The fact that they own their suppliers is really irrelevant. Someone is paying lots of trained people to build shit. These people consume real resources such as food and electricity. The only way it could be self sustaining is if it was entierly paid for by foriegn arms sales.
Your right thats possible. Maybe they will sell it to drug smugllers...they are the ppl with the most to gain from a stealth ship
If you liked this thought maybe you would find my blog nice too:
This is the core reason the United States no longer sees Russia as a key adversary and also why it won't let Russia into NATO - there is a clear realization that Russia continues to teeter on economic oblivion, and the US doesn't want to have to support Russia when the inevitable Sino-Russian war explodes (the Russians took Chinese territory decades back, and China has always contended that the property would once again be part of China).
Russia is an interesting place - it has interesting technology but teeters on the brink of becoming a third world nation.
You don't need supersonic missiles to take out drug smugglers.
This is a weapon which threatens enemy battlegroups, or at least it would if the idea of a stealth ship was viable.
Ships can be tracked from space, and the US has researched this. A stealth ship isn't going to be able to conceal it's position from the USA, maybe it'll help confuse a few French missiles right before the US alters it's radar profile permanently.
What is really interesting here is that Russia is releasing this information. It suggests to me that the motivation was domestic politics. Putin is hoping to benefit politically from the announcement, perhaps in the wake of concerns over ABM treaty and arms reductions. It is very interesting that the Russian leadership has to play similar games as US politicians and seek political gain from unveiling secret projects that during the Soviet era would not have been discussed.
Putin is trying to project the image that Russia is still strong and able to take a lead to a domestic audience.
I know you slashdotters are gonna love this one
Not that it's of substance, but you are quite right, I simply confused the two.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
The Hebrews just invaded it
Anyway that's all ancient history
I think perhaps that comment was more on target than you meant it to be (no pun intended). If RADAR wasn't still the dominant means of seaborne tracking, people wouldn't have been spending the vast sums they have on Aegis technology, and rolling it out onto the fleet as fast as they can. They also wouldn't be nearly so concerned at suggestions that foreign intelligence groups have nicked the stuff, and might get it onto their ships, too.
On a side note, didn't the US recently decline to give Taiwan Aegis-equipped vessels as part of the military support they're providing, and give the "it's too powerful" argument as justification? (This is a genuine question; I have a vague memory but can't recall the details.)
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
You can't target something using satellite imaging. To hit this will require eyeball guidance, or laser illumination from a targetting device. Either a plane will have to have a continuous view of it to guide the missile in, or a ship will have to be within eyeball range and guide the fire in by eye. Makes it pretty difficult to hit.
And this is only going to be a proof-of-concept, remember. You reckon every last thing that Lckheed's Skunk Works comes up with is going into production? They'll try out lots of different stuff to see what works and learn lessons from that b4 they build one for real.
Also, please note that world politics have changed since 1950. The Russians are no longer automatically the enemies of the US. It's not necessary to have the strongest army in the world, you only need a stronger army than the person you think is most likely to attack you.
Grab.
I know. Well... that's not entirely true. Right now development is on Windows for the POC. It's all java though so I imagine they will port it to something else when it becomes tactical. It's very political right now.
It's not uncommon for things to be prototyped on one system and then ported to another system for the tactical environment. There is some pretty harsh requirements for tactical equipment. It's a hardware thing so there's not many choices for tactical platforms.
They obviously aren't going to put a dell laptop on the ship but it's a hell of a lot cheaper to develop on 2k dell laptops than it is to go out and get a bunch of HP workstations.
int func(int a);
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