In view of China and Russia, the US Navy plans a lethal upgrade of its destroyers

In the face of increasingly rapid missile threats and increasingly complex air threats from China and Russia, the navy is moving towards a major modernization of its powerful fleet of destructive Arleigh Burke.

The service plans to purchase a scaled version of the Raytheon Spy-6 Air-Missile Air Defense Radar to replace the Spy-1D bays of the Flight IIA destroyers, Defense News learned. radar sensitivity and sophistication. The navy is concerned about the proliferation of anti-ship cruise missiles with sophisticated and evasive maneuvers and ever-increasing speeds, investments that China and Russia are keen to pursue.

In a statement, the US Navy acknowledged that it was considering modernizing the Spy-6 dashboard as part of the 2020 budget.

"In accordance with the budget presented by the President for fiscal year 2020, the Navy will begin purchasing, during fiscal 2010, 24 sets of SPY-6 Radar Module Mount Radar (RMA) and equipment. badociated cooling and electrical systems, for installation in a DDG Flight IIA. The specific hull will be named later, "reads the statement.

The painting is a smaller version of the Spy-6 for DDG Flight III, the first of which is currently under construction at Huntington Ingalls. The Spy-6 for the DDG-125 will feature 37 of what are called radar modular bademblies, which are 2ft by 2ft by 2ft enclosures that use gallium nitride technology to drive the Radar energy. on air targets. The Flight IIA version will have 24 RMAs in the table.

One version of the radar planned for FFG (X) is a new RMA configuration.

The Navy is seeking to upgrade all its emergency deployment systems with a BMD capability up to the Aegis Baseline 9 or higher standard and to extend the service life of 45 years as part of the development strategy. the fleet. But the Navy will try to draw 50 years from its Flight IIA ships. IIAs constitute the bulk of the DGA fleet, with a total of 46 scheduled for service – from DDG-79 to DDG-124. The DDG-127 will also be an IIA flight.

This updated Spy-6 will be much easier to maintain than the current Spy-1D. Raytheon says the radar can be maintained by simply deleting a failed RMA and replacing it with a new one, the rest of the work being done off-site.

In a statement, Scott Spence, Raytheon Marine Radar Manager, said the upgrade would enhance the capabilities of the IIA ships.

"Upgrading SPY-6-equipped Flight IIA ships will provide unparalleled capacity to the surface fleet," Spence said. "The benefits include a significant increase in sensitivity and range, as well as simultaneous anti-aircraft and missile defense capabilities, which provide commanders with the operational flexibility needed to deal with current and emerging threats in ways never before achieved.

Bryan McGrath, a retired destroyer skipper and defense consultant, said that if the Navy were to follow the program, it would be a significant improvement to the destroyer fleet.

"If the navy actually decided to equip the IIA with Spy-6, it would greatly increase the sensitivity of the radar and allow the ship to track and engage targets with more difficult kinematics, moving at higher speeds and performing more difficult maneuvers, "said McGrath. I said.

The Spy-6 and its variants are becoming more common in the fleet, which would be an added advantage, "said McGrath.

"It's basically the same radar they put in FFG (X) and in flight III," he said. "This gives you the opportunity to apply more advanced network radar techniques and facilitates lifecycle cost management."