General

The art of air-to-air cbt and air-to-ground atk was born in the smoke and flames of WW I battlefields, when low-flying ftr plts used MG's to strafe en trps in the trenches or to fire at en acft. Later on some kind of gunsight was installed on the ftrs to ensure the accuracy of aim and bomb racks were fitted so that they could atk any "tgts of opportunity" spotted on the gnd. And then came a never-ending succession of other devices to make them more formidable.

Today, cockpit video displays, navigation rdos, sensors, on-board computers, ground-mapping rdr, forward-looking infrared (FLIR) systems, inertial navigation sets, integrated tactical ECM devices, and programmable armt con sets are std equip aboard modern acft such as USAF's F-15E. These enable the ftr plt strike a tgt with precision. In many cases, they can employ certain types of ordnance without having to fly over a heavily defended tgt.

Using the two-pod Low-Altitude Navigation and Targeting Infrared for Night (LANTIRN) system, a two-man F-15E crew can take off from a blacked-out airfield and fly a moonless night atk msn only 100 feet above rough terrain, traveling at airspeeds greater than 500 knots. The IR picture, which the plt sees through the head-up display (HUD) in his windscreen, "reads" heat emissions to show him the terrain ahead, which shows up almost as bright as in daylight.

The terrain-following equip enables the plt to stay below en rdr acquisition horizons. Once in the atk area, the aircrew can "see" the tgt, using ground-mapping rdr or IR return data displayed on one or more of their cockpit multifunction displays (MFDs), and atk it before the defenders know they are threatened.

Staying beneath en rdr, the plt uses gnd clutter to fool any searching acft that might be equipped with look-down/ shoot-down rdr systems.

The glass cockpit is one more crucial innovation. Several cathode-ray tubes replace most of old round "steam gauge" dials familiar to generations of plts. These screens display all the info the plt needs to fly the plane and use it as a fighting machine. Whatever info the plt needs at any moment can be projected onto his HUD, so it appears to be floating out in space, where his eyes focused in his search for en planes.

Coupled with the programmable rdr and the glass cockpit is the hands on throttle and stick, or HOTAS, system. With all the critical con switches on the stick or throttle, the plt never has to let go of the controls to fly or fight.

Once the plt drops his bombs, he immediately switches his rdr and all his wpn systems from air-to-gnd to air-to-air with a slight movement of the thumb of his right hand where it rests on the con stick to prepare to deal with en ftrs. In the past, if he could do it at all, it took the plt many seconds to reconfigure the plane as a ftr and in a dogfight he had to estimate the distance to his tgt and then use his gunsight to calculate how far in front of the other plane to aim so the bullets would arrive at the right moment. At present the plane's rdr measures the distance to the other plane and the computers do all the calculations with much more precision than the plt could do them in his own mind.

When the rdr is locked on to the en plane and it is within range of the gun or one of the msls, a strobe light on the HUD flashes "SHOOT ... SHOOT ... SHOOT". If the plt presses the trigger on the stick, a hit is almost certain.

So the term "aircraft armament system" covers a wide variety of equip and comps designed to carry, arm, release, and maintain overall control of the various explosive items of ordnance which are frequently referred to as "stores" for brevity. According to the stores used and the method of their employment the aircraft armament may be classified as guns, bombs, rkts and GM's, mines, torpedoes and depth charges, and special purpose wpn systems.