Patriot SAM Developments


Months of devastating Russian air attacks suggest Moscow has succeeded in altering its missiles to evade Ukraine’s air defences, according to Ukrainian and western officials.
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Russia was likely to have modified its Iskander-M mobile system, which launches missiles with an estimated range of up to 500km, as well as Kinzhal air-launched ballistic missiles, which can fly up to 480km, they added.
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The missiles now follow a typical trajectory before diverting and plunging into a steep terminal dive or executing manoeuvres that “confuse and avoid” Patriot interceptors.
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Ukraine’s ballistic missile interception rate improved over the summer, reaching 37 per cent in August, but it plummeted to 6 per cent in September, despite fewer launches, according to public Ukrainian air force data compiled by the London-based Centre for Information Resilience and analysed by the Financial Times.
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A western official briefed on Patriot performance data said the first indication of an upgrade to the Russian missiles was a marked drop in interception rates.
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They said a “pattern” had emerged in which incoming missiles behaved differently in their “terminal phase”, veering from their previously established engagement settings.
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The official’s assessment is supported by a report compiled by the US Defense Intelligence Agency’s special inspector general that covers the period of April 1 to June 30.
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Well both those figures and the figures above come from the same place, which is the only source.
 
Scott Kenny said:
We need to be able to make more like 7500 seekers a year, maybe more.
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Identify the components of the seeker that have long lead times then determine if there are ways to shorten the component's manufacturing time and also set up multiple production lines for these long-lead components.
 
Scott Kenny said:
750 seekers a year.

We need to be able to make more like 7500 seekers a year, maybe more.
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It's a good start, at least. I've estimated that a production rate of 698-1696 would be needed to fulfill the indicated needs of all the various customers.

7500 AURs per year would cost about $22B per year. It's not impossible, but it's certainly a big-boy "we're at war and there is no defense budget" number. Yet, if you wait until wartime, I'm doubtful the supply chain will be robust enough to support such a high level of exquisite production, what with China having a monopoly of processing for certain rare earths.
 
joshjosh said:
It's a good start, at least. I've estimated that a production rate of 698-1696 would be needed to fulfill the indicated needs of all the various customers.

7500 AURs per year would cost about $22B per year. It's not impossible, but it's certainly a big-boy "we're at war and there is no defense budget" number. Yet, if you wait until wartime, I'm doubtful the supply chain will be robust enough to support such a high level of exquisite production, what with China having a monopoly of processing for certain rare earths.
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Well, I'd expect that the costs would drop significantly due to the order of magnitude increase in production rate.

But yes, it would not be cheap to actually produce that many rounds. I'd want contractual production volumes reserved to be able to increase by an order of magnitude or more. If that means stockpiling a large mass of the various rare earths, even under shell companies if China wants to be stupid, and using much larger base wafers at the chip-fabs than the actual contract needs, so be it.

And yes, this means that the low production rate would be likely MUCH MORE expensive due to keeping large capacity reserved.
 

Lockheed, Germany’s Diehl sign PAC-3 MSE pact to boost supply chain resilience​

breakingdefense.com

Lockheed, Germany’s Diehl sign PAC-3 MSE pact to boost supply chain resilience - Breaking Defense

The Memorandum of Understanding, inked here on the floor of the annual AUSA exposition, puts in motion a push to build out greater supply chain resilience for the in demand weapon system.
breakingdefense.com breakingdefense.com

Raytheon expands Massachusetts plant for LTAMDS radar production​

www.defensenews.com

Raytheon expands Massachusetts plant for LTAMDS radar production

Raytheon broke ground on a facility that will help produce the new modernized air-and-missile defense sensor for the Army.
www.defensenews.com www.defensenews.com
 
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25 must be roughly the size of the U.S. force? Are not there a half dozen ish battalions with four fire batteries?
 
Patriot will also probably be getting upgraded to deal with the latest Russian ballistic missile mods:

"Since the spring, analysts and operators have noticed that some Iskander missiles launches have shown a higher probability of penetrating Patriot system engagement envelopes. Until recently, there was no clear technical explanation for what exactly the russians altered."

See:

en.defence-ua.com

SAMP/T Beats Patriot System in the Iskander Fight and What That Reveals About russia's Ballistic Missile Upgrades | Defense Express

Reports that France's SAMP/T outperforms the Patriot system against russia's Iskander ballistic missiles help explain what Moscow may have changed in those weapons, and also suggest that Patriots can be rapidly retuned in response
en.defence-ua.com en.defence-ua.com
 
dumpster4 said:
Patriot will also probably be getting upgraded to deal with the latest Russian ballistic missile mods:

"Since the spring, analysts and operators have noticed that some Iskander missiles launches have shown a higher probability of penetrating Patriot system engagement envelopes. Until recently, there was no clear technical explanation for what exactly the russians altered."

See:

en.defence-ua.com

SAMP/T Beats Patriot System in the Iskander Fight and What That Reveals About russia's Ballistic Missile Upgrades | Defense Express

Reports that France's SAMP/T outperforms the Patriot system against russia's Iskander ballistic missiles help explain what Moscow may have changed in those weapons, and also suggest that Patriots can be rapidly retuned in response
en.defence-ua.com en.defence-ua.com
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The problem might be the lack of a vertical patriot launcher (except ship VLS). SAMP/T has vertical launchers.
 
Forest Green said:
The problem might be the lack of a vertical patriot launcher (except ship VLS). SAMP/T has vertical launchers.
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I am not sure if every single PATRIOT battery in Ukraine is MSE enabled. If not that's a huge problem as PAC-2 is not really optimized for high performing TBM defeat. Even if the PATRIOT had vertical launchers, it does not have a 360 degree radar so there's no possibility of engaging beyond what the organic radar can see. Ultimately, for sectors that it is covering, the set up when equipped with MSE is superior by a considerable margin. This is true based on ukraine's experience.
 
I think PAC3 was absolutely tailored to TBMs, though MSE is superior. The old Patriot radars do limit the system in general, and I think someone on this thread specifically said they limit the performance of MSE.
 
Grey Havoc said:
But a lot less than are needed.
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The US doesn't need a huge number of Patriot batteries, not really.

Guam needs a couple batteries (to have 2-3 sets of radars), Hawaii arguably could have a couple as well. And the bases in Alaska.

But the rest of the country doesn't really need any. Patriots are for deployed forces.
 
Th US does deploy a lot of batteries globally, and in particular a noticeable lapse was the Iranian attack post Sulamanie assassination. There used to be a battery at that airbase (and I believe even an aerostat radar was observed on commercial sat footage) , but I believe it was moved to the KSA post Iran attack on that country’s oil refineries by Iran. It could be argued the U.S. suffered a hundred brain damaged US personnel as a result of that shortfall.

Worth noting Ukraine had probably 2-4 times as many S300 as the U.S. had MIM-104 globally when it started its conflict.
 
Mods thought the pic was offtopic but I really do think this could be an opening for Stunner which is already integrated and has a very attractive price point.
 
Big_Zukini said:
Mods thought the pic was offtopic but I really do think this could be an opening for Stunner which is already integrated and has a very attractive price point.
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Stunner has been on offer to PATRIOT users for a number of years. Yet, it has so far secured no sales. A standard PATRIOT battery upgraded to launch Stunner seems the most cost effective and integration solution as IAMD integration will be quite a bit more costly for private companies to self fund.The cost of integrating the capability with US Army launchers, IAMD-BCS, RIG-360 (does Stunner even utilize dual X/C band data links?) is not trivial.

US Army on the other hand has requirements for a new interceptor that sits on top of MSE in terms of capability and performance so is in fact looking at something even more exquisite sort of squeezing out the budget space for something that sits below the MSE price point. Stunner made some sense for the US Army when PATRIOT was the only game in town and a lower cost interceptor could really go after magazine depth. With IFPC being fielded in large quantities, it is now the 'mass' in the A-IAMD network so those budget dollars will go towards that second interceptor there while PATRIOT investments focus on the higher end threats.
 
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Aegrotare said:
They should just integrate ,Iris-T SL its the best missle for the Job anyway, and make Meads come full circle.
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Best for what job? For TBM defeat? How so? For large cruise missile defense magazine? Can you integrate 18 missiles in a standard IFPC launcher?
 
bring_it_on said:
Stunner has been on offer to PATRIOT users for a number of years. Yet, it has so far secured no sales. A standard PATRIOT battery upgraded to launch Stunner seems the most cost effective and integration solution as IAMD integration will be quite a bit more costly for private companies to self fund.The cost of integrating the capability with US Army launchers, IAMD-BCS, RIG-360 (does Stunner even utilize dual X/C band data links?) is not trivial.

US Army on the other hand has requirements for a new interceptor that sits on top of MSE in terms of capability and performance so is in fact looking at something even more exquisite sort of squeezing out the budget space for something that sits below the MSE price point. Stunner made some sense for the US Army when PATRIOT was the only game in town and a lower cost interceptor could really go after magazine depth. With IFPC being fielded in large quantities, it is now the 'mass' in the A-IAMD network so those budget dollars will go towards that second interceptor there while PATRIOT investments focus on the higher end threats.
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Do we know for sure the US wants a more exquisite even if more expensive alternative to the MSE? Or is it more of an interpretation?
Because the Stunner seems to do ABM up to MRBMs, dabbles in ABT, mass manufactured and used by multiple partners, and Raytheon should in theory at least be able to modify it to specific US needs.
 
Big_Zukini said:
Do we know for sure the US wants a more exquisite even if more expensive alternative to the MSE?
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Yes we do know that. As explained by the program office at numerous ADA events in the past years, and as reflected in budget docs, the lower tier future interceptor will be faster, and capable of defeating threats at significantly improved altitudes (to improve PATRTIOT's keep out range) over the MSE. So you are looking at envelope expansion and the ability to defeat longer range TBMs and maneuvering threats. Given the MSE already covers a significant part of the MRBM threat space this is going well beyond that. The ability to bridge the altitude gap between the MSE and THAAD has always been something the Army has looked to field as part of its future magazine..Until now they really couldn't do that because of sensor and network limitations. IBCS and LTAMDS fixes that which is why LT-FI was always expected to follow those modernization programs.

Big_Zukini said:
Because the Stunner seems to do ABM up to MRBMs, dabbles in ABT, mass manufactured and used by multiple partners, and Raytheon should in theory at least be able to modify it to specific US needs.
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Raytheon is free to demonstrate how Stunner's envelope compares to the MSE. The US Army / MDA already know it but good to show I suppose. The rest needs to be demonstrated as well. A Dual band (X/C) data-link to be able to talk to both LTAMDs and RIG-360 (and TPY-2) and full integration with IAMD-BCS. Given Raytheon was unable to do this on Tamir, I would argue that its not as easy as you may think. Both technically, and from a transfer of technology / data rights perspective.

There is also a qualitative element that gets lost with generalized statements like "Stunner seems to do ABM up to MRBM". Because if you are looking at improving your keep out range, what really matters is how high you can defeat those threats. Since greater keep out range requires higher altitude engagement. And for that you need a missile that flies faster, goes higher..and with higher altitude manuevering threats you need quite a bit of improved agility at those altitudes. Basically, LT-FI will have to blend elements of MSE and GPI somehow avoiding the $10 Million plus price tag of the latter.
 

Lockheed Martin, Pentagon strike deal to triple PAC-3 missile production​

Lockheed Martin, Pentagon strike deal to triple PAC-3 missile production | InsideDefense.com

Lockheed Martin said it has reached a landmark framework agreement with the Defense Department that would more than triple production of its Patriot Advanced Capability-3 Missile Segment Enhancement interceptor, highlighting how surging demand for air and missile defense is driving a rethink of...
insidedefense.com insidedefense.com

https://twitter.com/x/status/2008599240948232555
View: https://x.com/sentdefender/status/2008599240948232555?s=20
 
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