McDONNELL DOUGLAS (MDC) has modified its stand-off-missile proposal to the Royal Air Force to provide a weapon offering fire-and-forget and man-in-the loop guidance modes.
The US defence contractor is now offering an advanced imaging infra-red seeker from GEC-Marconi Radar and Defence Systems and Loral, alongside an automatic target-recognition system it has developed itself for use with both attack modes.
MDC, teamed with Hunting for the UK bid, initially used its Grand SLAM development of the stand-off land attack missile (SLAM) with a man-in-loop system only.
In addition to providing the seeker, GEC companies now have a major part to play in the bid, with GEC-Marconi Avionics supplying the missile's Spartan terrain-reference navigation system and carrying out cockpit integration. GEC is also bidding independently with its Pegasus missile.
MDC had been reluctant to offer an autonomous capability, believing that the solutions available "off-the-shelf" incurred unacceptable risks and operational drawbacks.
The company has been, however, developing its own automatic target-recognition system to provide an autonomous-attack capability. The system was test-flown in the UK earlier this month.
The Grand SLAM is one of seven missiles being offered to meet Staff Requirement (Air) 1236 for a conventional stand-off missile to equip RAF Panavia Tornado GR4s, British Aerospace GR7/T10s and Eurofighter EF2000s from 1999. A decision is expected by mid-year on the £800 million ($1.2 billion) programme to give the RAF a capability to destroy heavily protected targets at ranges of up to 300km (160nm).
As it is now configured, the Grand SLAM will offer three operating modes: fully autonomous attack using automatic target recognition (ATR); ATR with a man-in-the-loop override; and man-in-the-loop only.
Despite its size (the Grand SLAM is 5.3m long), MDC is confident that the weapon will be capable of being carried by the Harrier GR7.
MDC could, however, also offer either the SLAM-ER for the GR7, or its SLAM-based Joint Air-to-Surface Stand-off Missile (JASSM) proposal for the USAF.
Source: Flight International
