Graham Warwick/ATLANTA
THE US NAVY IS seeking approval to install the cancelled ITT/Westinghouse ALQ-165 airborne self-protection jammer (ASPJ) in 12 US Marine Corps McDonnell Douglas F-18s in operation over Bosnia. The move follows the shooting down on 2 June of a US Air Force Lockheed Martin F-16 by Serbian forces, using a modified variant of the ZKR-SD Kub (SA-6 Gainful) surface-to-air missile.
Although the Kub has been in service since 1970, upgrade programmes have continued throughout its service life. One of the latest thought to be implemented was to improve considerably the missile's resistance to electronic counter-measures. Some missiles, with the latest modifications, are believed to have been supplied, to the former Yugoslavia.
US Defence Secretary William Perry was to decide on 7 July whether 24 systems could be released from storage to equip the F-18s based at Aviano AB in Italy. Since the shooting-down, the US Navy has flight-tested the ASPJ against the SA-6 and the system is believed to have proved more effective, than the F-18's existing Lockheed Sanders ALQ-126B jamming system.
The USAF has also been talking to the Pentagon about acquiring some of the stored ASPJs for its F-16s being operated over Bosnia. The aircraft shot down was equipped with a Westinghouse ALQ-131 jamming pod, but whether it was switched on, or functioned properly, is not clear.
The ASPJ programme was cancelled in 1992 after a controversial operational evaluation in the F-18, which critics claim, showed the system to be ineffective.
The manufacturers dispute the claim, but point out that the system recently tested by the USN, featured improvements developed as a result of the operational evaluation.
The USN has more than 90 systems in storage, and still plans to use these to equip some 40 Northrop Grumman F-14Ds.
Source: Flight International
