TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/020491/02049914.000

Text File | 1992-08-28 | 10.2 KB | 212 lines

                                                                                THE GULF WAR, Page 46

THE WEAPONS

Inside the High-Tech Arsenal


"Smart" bombs, fast planes and sharp-eyed satellites have made
U.S. weapons into stars, but precision engineering can cut
both ways

By PHILIP ELMER-DEWITT -- Reported by Sue Butler/Cocoa Beach,
Jerry Hannifin/Washington and Lara Marlowe/Dhahran


    For years, American military hardware has been the butt of
bitter jokes, taxpayer complaints and congressional
investigations. To judge by the cost overruns and testing
mishaps, the U.S. arsenal seemed to consist of planes that spun
out of control, tanks too cumbersome to maneuver and spare
parts with Tiffany price tags. What a difference a war makes.
Now that U.S. Patriots are chasing down Scuds and laser-guided
bombs are nailing targets in Iraq, the once derided weaponry
has become the star of the war. Suddenly, everybody is a
weapons buff.

    For military planners, the apparent success of their
high-tech equipment in the early weeks of the battle is sweet
vindication. Though Operation Desert Storm still relies in part
on armaments of Vietnam War and even World War II vintage, the
Pentagon has staked its reputation on its state-of-the-art
showpieces. For 40 years, it has pursued a sometimes
controversial doctrine that says the best way to counter a
potential adversary's superior numbers is with superior
technology. Now military experts are watching the payoff with
excitement but also apprehension. The high-speed electronics
and precision engineering that make the new weapons so
effective also make them vulnerable.

    The most visible symbol of the U.S.'s technological edge --
those pinpoint strikes on Iraqi targets -- actually represents
some fairly straightforward bombing. The key technology is a
simple laser detector on the nose of a glide bomb that is
electronically linked to adjustable fins in the bomb's tail.
All the pilot has to do is point a pencil-thin laser beam at
his target and push a button. A stabilizing computer keeps the
beam locked in place, freeing the pilot to pitch and roll as
necessary to evade enemy fire while the bomb rides along the
beam's reflection, flying into the target like a moth to a
flame.

    The real technological marvels in the U.S. missile array are
the sea-launched Tomahawk cruise missiles that smashed Iraqi
air-defense systems early in the war. Packed with advanced
electronics and several different guidance systems, they are
essentially flying computers capable of sailing through the
goalposts on a football field from a range of several hundred
miles. They can also perform dizzying acrobatics, as witnessed
by U.S. reporters who, before they were ousted from Iraq,
watched with amazement as a Tomahawk streaked below their hotel
windows and made a pair of swooping 90 degrees turns to avoid
the Al Rasheed in downtown Baghdad.

    The secret of the Tomahawk's precision flying is a two-step
guidance system. First, a radar altimeter compares the
topography of key landmarks along the missile's flight path
with detailed contour maps stored in its computer memory. Then,
as the Tomahawk approaches its target, a small digital camera,
acting as an electronic eye, compares the view from the nose
cone with a library of images prepared from satellite photos.
If the missile sees that it is even slightly off course, it
makes adjustments.

    One of the biggest uncertainties before the war started was
how the Patriot system would fare. The antimissile missile is
guided by a sophisticated phased-array radar consisting of more
than 5,000 radar antenna elements that can detect and track 100
targets at a time and follow any given one far more rapidly
than the rotating cone of conventional radar. But the system
had never been tested against a Scud.

    During the first week of the war, the Patriot performed
better than had been expected, hitting 95% of its targets as
opposed to the 60% experts had predicted. But the system, which
was designed as an antiaircraft weapon and later modified to
shoot down missiles, is not infallible. Many of the Scuds that
got through last week were actually struck by Patriots but not
destroyed. Investigators say part of the problem seems to be
that Scuds tend to break up as they re-enter the atmosphere. In
at least one case, a Patriot struck the tail end of a
disintegrating Scud, leaving the warhead intact to complete its
mission.

    Another surprise for the allied command is how well its
pilots -- and equipment -- are performing at night. One concern
had been the efficacy of night-vision goggles, which had been
blamed for dozens of crashes over the past decade. These
goggles, which are standard issue for ground forces, rely on
the same light-gathering technology used in video camcorders
to amplify ambient light up to 60,000 times. But pilots flying
over Kuwait and Iraq had another window into the darkness.
Affixed to F-16s, F-15Es and other attack aircraft is an
imaging system called LANTIRN (low-altitude navigation and
targeting infrared system for night), which illuminates objects
with infrared beams. This system projects the view on a
phosphorus screen in the cockpit. Objects appear as
yellow-green shapes in an image that resembles a photographic
negative.

    Should the ground war start, the biggest technological
question mark may be the Army's M1 and M1A1 Abrams tanks, the
most advanced armored vehicles ever built. The M1 features a
120-mm gun that can fire accurately even while the tank is
running over rough terrain, thanks to a built-in ballistic
computer and sophisticated stabilizers. Both models carry a
chemical fire-suppression system that can put out a flame in a
quarter of a second and are shielded by armor plates
containing nonradioactive uranium 2 1/2 times as dense as
steel. But some specialists fear that the tanks, which rely on
computerized controls and finicky electronics, could be undone
by desert dust. Another worry: that their gas-guzzling turbine
engines could run dry in mid-battle.

    Working behind the scenes and above the war zone is the
largest fleet of spy satellites ever arrayed. There are at
least seven different types of "birds" passing over the gulf,
ranging from sharp-eyed Keyhole photo-reconnaissance
satellites, which can spot an object the size of a football
from 500 miles, to the eavesdropping Magnum, which monitors
enemy radio communications using antennas the size of baseball
diamonds.

    At least one early-warning satellite is parked over the
Indian Ocean at all times, using its infrared eye to scour
Iraqi territory every 12 seconds for the hot flare of a missile
launch. Upon detection, an astonishing split-second relay of
signals is set into motion. First, the satellite sends its data
simultaneously to an Air Force ground station in Woomera,
Australia, and to the U.S. Space Command's Missile Warning
Center near Colorado Springs. Computers in Colorado instantly
sort through the information, identify individual missiles,
project target areas and flash the results by satellite back to
the gulf. All this happens in time for air-raid sirens to sound
four to five minutes before the missiles complete their
seven-minute journey. A new, more direct route may increase the
odds of intercepting the Scuds. According to this week's issue
of Aviation Week & Space Technology, Patriot batteries are
receiving unprocessed alerts directly from the early-warning
satellites.

    None of this would work were it not for the intricate
communication network that now crisscrosses the gulf. This
elaborate command-and-control system enables allied generals
to coordinate not only the American land, sea and air forces
but also those of its coalition partners. The brains of the
operation are housed in a government building in Riyadh, where
an encrypted book of flight schedules and bombing targets is
generated every 24 hours and is broadcast to individual
commanders by satellite, microwave and secure telephone lines.

    How do the generals keep straight the tens of thousands of
details involved in organizing up to 3,000 missions a day? "We
have a lot of computers," says Lieut. General Charles Horner,
the allied air commander. The exact number of machines is
unknown, but a Texas supply house reports that Central Command
gave it a rush order last month for 1,300 desktop computers,
1,300 laser printers, 350 laptops, 10 local-area networks and
an assortment of peripheral equipment (including dust covers
and cleaning kits) with a delivery date of "no later than Jan.
14."

    The danger with any endeavor so dependent on advanced
electronics and jewel-like engineering is that when such
systems encounter unexpected trouble they usually do not just
slow down; they crash. The Pentagon has not shown any TV
pictures of "smart" bombs flying a perfect path into the side
of a camel. But as the Scud hits have demonstrated, mistakes
do happen. One aircraft expert says the desert sand has wreaked
havoc with the British Tornado jets, lodging in the turbine
engine blades and melting into glass. If blades on U.S. jets are
faring better, it may be because enginemakers imported tons
of Saudi sand for tests several years ago and modified their
equipment accordingly.

    Another natural phenomenon that might cause trouble is
electromagnetic radiation from the sun. Heightened solar-flare
activity, expected over the next few months, could disrupt
military communications and satellite traffic. Air Force
officials have called this issue "too sensitive for comment."

    It is still too early to say whether the Pentagon's grand
doctrine of fighting superior numbers with superior technology
will ultimately prevail. It may yet be possible to foil the
world's most sophisticated -- and expensive -- weapons with
countermeasures, some of which are literally dirt cheap. They
include burning smoke pots to deflect heat-seeking missiles,
draping targets with pictures of bomb craters to discourage
further attack, and hunkering down in caves and sand dunes to
wait out the blitz. In the end, no electronic marvel is going
to liberate Kuwait. That is a job that will probably fall to
the ultimate biological weapon: the G.I.