Slashdot Mirror
250-Foot Hybrid Airship To Spy Over Afghanistan
Toe, The writes "Gizmodo details the Long Endurance Multi-intelligence Vehicle (LEMV) (based on the P-791), a spyship from US Army's Space and Missile Defense Command capable of hovering at 20,000 feet. Planned for deployment in Afghanistan, the ship can float for three weeks and carry well over a ton of payload, apparently surveillance equipment. The video on Gizmodo of the P-791 shows that these ships are a hybrid not only of both buoyancy and propulsive lift, but also of both awe and hilarity."
Well given the summary says it is meant to stay airborne for the best part of a month, I doubt ascent and descent are major worries.
I have no personal knowledge, but my impression is that our troops are getting slaughtered by roadside bombs; mainly because they don't have the manpower or surveillance assets to control even heavily travelled routes. Anything that can help that must surely be a benefit.
This sig all sigs devours
The real problem is speed, or rather the lack thereof. Air travel became as popular as it is because it's so much *faster*. People might book an airship flight once a decade for the novelty, kind of like a cruise ship trip, but they're not going to hop on the blimp whenever they need to get to the other side of the country. The trip would take too long. Jets are faster, so they win.
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
There are no hand held weapons that reach out that far. Those people talking about RPG's and sniper rifles are clueless. I'd be a little worried about stingers; Raytheon claims it can reach out that far, but not that high. I'd be more worried about medium sized howitzers - but most howitzers aren't configured for dual purpose like naval guns are. You'd have to park it on a hillside to get the elevation necessary, then it would probably fall of the hill when fired. More, we are talking about skills that "army" gunners don't have - they do not routinely track and target air/naval targets. The best bet seems to be an AA battery, but I've not seen any indication that anyone in the region has AA. Remember, when the Russians were there, the Afghans relied on our donations of stingers. I can't recall one report of AA emplacements such as Saddam Hussein had in Iraq.
Finally - anything that has a reasonable chance of hitting the damned thing is going to have radar and/or laser targeting. Since they are trying to target a surveillance craft, chances are good that as soon as they light up the electronics, it has targeted THEM!!
"Is that a train I hear? OH SHIT!! INCOMING!!"
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
While I don't know about Afghanistan specifically, it seems to me like trying to use it anywhere near a country that's not already been soundly thrashed and left defenseless, is asking for trouble.
Yes, you're not going to hit it with an AK-47, but for example a SA-2 is going to hit you from 20 to 30 miles away (depending on the exact model), and up to 66,000 ft high. IIRC, if you're a large slow and non-maneuvering target, it can actually go quite a few more miles purely inertial at the end. (Pretty much like a dart with guiding fins.) Unless you're going to pack some equally oversized missile as counter-measures, no, you're not going to get much use out of targeting it before it targeted you. Though technically you will get such an early lock, because the targeting radar will lock on you at 40 miles or so, well before the actual missile actually launches, and the early warning radar from almost 200 miles.
It's an old and cheap missile, and it's probably the most exported missile. It's all over Eastern Europe, ex-USSR, China and IIRC in a few arab countries too.
Mind you, against a fast and low flying modern airplane, it's probably useless, and against helicopters even more so, since it has a 4 miles or so minimum range. But against a blimp? That thing was designed against the early cold war idea of big bombers flying high and not being able to maneuver much. A blimp is pretty much making its day again.
And if we're talking artillery, why bother with a howitzer on a slope, when half the world got one or more of this or this or even more likely this from the Soviets. I know at least Iraq had a lot of the latter.
Yeah, fat lot of good it did them against modern airplanes, but you show up in a blimp within 3-4 miles of one of those and you'll get a lot of holes fast.
So basically, as I was saying, yeah, if you just have to patrol the skies of Afghanistan or some other county you've already thrashed and conquered, and you know you'll never face anything heavier than a RPG or AK-47, it's great. But then the old WW1 Zeppelins would be just as great. And it pretty much doesn't matter if it has its own anti-radar missiles or not, because nobody will shoot a missile that high. The missiles that go that high (like the SA-2) aren't exactly concealed-carry sized, if you get my drift.
But that's about it. If this thing shows itself anywhere else, it doesn't matter how many anti-radiation missiles you pack on it. It's a big slow target, and just asking for it.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
I agree 100% that this airship would be worthless against a decently funded opponent with access to WW2 weapons and munitions.
Regarding the targeting of ground based weapons - remember, this airship is to play the role of an AWACS. I don't expect that it is as effective as AWACS, but it doesn't sit up there unattended. It is meant to find targets for ground and/or air forces. Paint it with radar, it relays the info to a combat control center, and someone is given a strike mission. That could mean the enemy has several minutes to fire at the airship - or, it could mean they only have several seconds. A well trained gun crew only needs those seconds to kill a target, a poorly trained gun crew might never hit the target.
So many variables.
Personally, I wouldn't invest money in this airship, but it could very well prove worthwhile.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
It seems there is no intention to ever leave Afghanistan if they plan to deploy this airship in two years.