High/low mix, and production capability

[johnpjones1775]

Watching this, and hearing how digitized the jaguar is, I was thinking about Ukraine, and how fast things get chewed through. Particularly munitions.

In the modern era should militaries have lower tech fall back designs that can be built quicker and much cheaper than things like the jaguar? Have a handful in the garage for some basic familiarization before conflict, and testing, and to get production kinks worked.

Same for munitions. For every large guided rocket or HIMARS round, how many dumb rockets or round tube ammunition rounds should we be able to produce?

Ukraine has shown being outmanned and out gunned as long as you keep up fires you can still be competitive in a modern conflict. This tells me if a conflict protracts beyond the stockpiles of our high end weapons, we need to be able to produce more sure, but we won’t be able to produce them in enough numbers to make a huge difference. We will need some munitions of some sort just to keep us in the fight. That means dumb glide bombs, cannon rounds for both naval and short based artillery, and likely even ‘obsolete’ armored vehicles.

So what’s the sweet spot for production ratios between the high end and the low end?

 

[Josh_TN]

I doubt there is a one size fits all for any particular capability or requirement. Certainly the U.S. is starting to emphasize speed of production for even high end munitions, on top of prioritizing low cost munitions for less challenging targets. We have not really seen tangible results yet, but every service has explored or even bought low cost subsonic cruise missile/effectors and this effort is set to explode in the next couple years. Defense contractors have a wealth of off the shelf products for the role, so the development/purchase cycle is likely extremely contracted.

 

[bring_it_on]

The 'speed to inventory' is important and can be built up for several munition classes by designing and developing lower cost systems that enable such a move. Perfect example of this would be the the new engines Kratos and GE are building for attritable drones and cruise missiles.

GE’s chief of defence programmes Amy Gowder in 2024 said the GEK 800 would be designed for a lifespan in the hundreds of cycles, as opposed to current GE Aerospace engines which are designed to operate for 2,000 to 10,000 cycles.

Kratos to build new family of small ‘strike’ engines in Oklahoma

As part a partnership with GE Aerospace, defence manufacturer Kratos is building a new production facility in Bristow, Oklahoma to assemble a new family of small turbofan engines intended to power long-range munitions and uncrewed aircraft.

www.flightglobal.com

 

[Josh_TN]

The USAF apparently has a program/RFI (someone will correct me) for ERAM which is nominally to supply Ukraine but might translate into USAF buys. The USN had an RFI for something they call MACE. They also have a vague paper defining a desired high super sonic capability that seems like a more cost effective/reduced development time proposal for a HALO replacement called ACME. The USMC is apparently already testing something they call LRAM, which appears to be based on Redwolf. Additionally, the USAF has an RFI for low cost A2A munitions in both aim-120 and ‘half ram’ sizes, with an emphasis on cooperative targets that are incapable of hard maneuvering or acceleration.

Even on the high end, USAF has had a number of HACM contracts explicitly to increase production capacity with the Prime and its sub contractors. They are taking production rates very seriously even for high end weapons. The SiAW facility being built by NG is supposed to support 600+ plus per year.

I suspect by 2030 all three services will have adopted a low $100,000 subsonic 200mi+ munition that can be kicked out of transport aircraft and that total production will exceed 10,000 units/year across services.

 

[TinWing]

Watching this, and hearing how digitized the jaguar is, I was thinking about Ukraine, and how fast things get chewed through. Particularly munitions.

In the modern era should militaries have lower tech fall back designs that can be built quicker and much cheaper than things like the jaguar? Have a handful in the garage for some basic familiarization before conflict, and testing, and to get production kinks worked.

Same for munitions. For every large guided rocket or HIMARS round, how many dumb rockets or round tube ammunition rounds should we be able to produce?

Ukraine has shown being outmanned and out gunned as long as you keep up fires you can still be competitive in a modern conflict. This tells me if a conflict protracts beyond the stockpiles of our high end weapons, we need to be able to produce more sure, but we won’t be able to produce them in enough numbers to make a huge difference. We will need some munitions of some sort just to keep us in the fight. That means dumb glide bombs, cannon rounds for both naval and short based artillery, and likely even ‘obsolete’ armored vehicles.

So what’s the sweet spot for production ratios between the high end and the low end?

A long term stalemate in attritional warfare is essentially a slow motion defeat and there’s no such thing as a high/low mix when it comes to wasting human lives. I’d argue against immense stockpiles of high collateral damage dumb munitions in favor of stockpiles of guided munitions in sufficient quantities to enable short term and decisive maneuver warfare. And if you can’t win a conflict quickly and decisively, it isn’t worth fighting to begin with.

The current conflict is a perfect example of diplomatic, intelligence and military failure on both sides. There is nothing to be emulated but much to be avoided. Is it desirable to needlessly expend shells with inaccurate fire from worn out barrels and inept and unfit, middle-aged conscript artillery men? If anything, this conflict proves the need for guided munitions and a fit professional force that is freely recruited. In short, there is no viable “low” in a high/low mix when it comes to actual human beings.

I’m puzzled by your references to “The Jaguar.” I assume you’re referring to the wheeled ECBR Jaguar? I don’t see where it is in any way exceptional for a purpose built military fighting vehicle. There are always alternatives built off of commercial chassis, such as MRAPS. However, minimum protection standards still dictate a substantial weight and you end up with something that is more of a protected transport than a fighting vehicle. I don’t see any great value in stockpiling obsolete armored vehicles or any sort, as it takes up resources and you most likely won’t offer your valuable and irreplaceable personnel an adequate level of protection. And I suspect that in coming years any viable manned armored vehicles will require an active APS and some sort off C-UAS. Too expensive to stockpile in large numbers, so you’ll be limited to a small, fully kitted active fleet. The only alternative, supposed is to build large numbers of chassis “fitted for and not with” for reserve and domestic training and to hope that you can you obtain the APS and assorted expensive electronics in time for a major conflict or even an expeditionary deployment.

 

[Josh_TN]

You do not always get to choose your conflicts. And I would argue attritional warfare is the norm, not the exception: there are few conflicts that were one purely by positional warfare, and it generally involved a non peer or a rapid change in logistical techniques.

 

[johnpjones1775]

A long term stalemate in attritional warfare is essentially a slow motion defeat and there’s no such thing as a high/low mix when it comes to wasting human lives. I’d argue against immense stockpiles of high collateral damage dumb munitions in favor of stockpiles of guided munitions in sufficient quantities to enable short term and decisive maneuver warfare. And if you can’t win a conflict quickly and decisively, it isn’t worth fighting to begin with.

The current conflict is a perfect example of diplomatic, intelligence and military failure on both sides. There is nothing to be emulated but much to be avoided. Is it desirable to needlessly expend shells with inaccurate fire from worn out barrels and inept and unfit, middle-aged conscript artillery men? If anything, this conflict proves the need for guided munitions and a fit professional force that is freely recruited. In short, there is no viable “low” in a high/low mix when it comes to actual human beings.

I’m puzzled by your references to “The Jaguar.” I assume you’re referring to the wheeled ECBR Jaguar? I don’t see where it is in any way exceptional for a purpose built military fighting vehicle. There are always alternatives built off of commercial chassis, such as MRAPS. However, minimum protection standards still dictate a substantial weight and you end up with something that is more of a protected transport than a fighting vehicle. I don’t see any great value in stockpiling obsolete armored vehicles or any sort, as it takes up resources and you most likely won’t offer your valuable and irreplaceable personnel an adequate level of protection. And I suspect that in coming years any viable manned armored vehicles will require an active APS and some sort off C-UAS. Too expensive to stockpile in large numbers, so you’ll be limited to a small, fully kitted active fleet. The only alternative, supposed is to build large numbers of chassis “fitted for and not with” for reserve and domestic training and to hope that you can you obtain the APS and assorted expensive electronics in time for a major conflict or even an expeditionary deployment.

So your idea is if you’re attacked, and can’t win a decisive victory quickly before your smart high end platforms and weapons run out, it’s best to just give up?

Interesting take…
But forgot to paste this link.

View: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=CbR_TG5TJyg&pp=0gcJCb4JAYcqIYzv


The jaguar is an extremely high end technologically dependent platform.
I am not sure how long it takes to build one, but I imagine it’s not particularly fast.
And yes an MRAP is a cheap low tech option, but drops the fire support capability, unless someone designs a manned lower tech turret.

 

[johnpjones1775]

You do not always get to choose your conflicts. And I would argue attritional warfare is the norm, not the exception: there are few conflicts that were one purely by positional warfare, and it generally involved a non peer or a rapid change in logistical techniques.

Right? Most wars since the beginning of the gunpowder age at least, has been largely attritional, including both world wars, Korea, and Vietnam.

The only wars I can think of off the top of my head the US was involved in that weren’t attritional was naval aspect of Spanish American war, and Gulf War I.

 

[yeetmahboi]

P2P wars are either nukes tit for tat or attrition til one side gives in.

Realistically large quantities of "lows" should be avoided in peacetime. They are, by design, nowhere long-lasting as their higher end brethens. So building them en masse without a war on the horizon makes no sense. It's still valuable storage space and guard wages. Being cheap they would likely lack the margins to be rebuilt and certified for use. Produce them in token number for training and expand if necessary for shipping off to customers/LIC theaters.

They will be needed for the big conventional wars though and can be used to formulate thought exercises/SBS contracts to keep the industry working. Every 5 years ask a buncha smallish weapon builders to think up one. I think this was what JSOC was using to get new niche equipments in Iraq. Sends the TDPs to commercial weapon builders. When the big wars come you have a reliable industry to fall back on for the cheap stuff and free up the primes for big ticket items.

The middle ground though is a new category that the USG is expanding fast. There are on the market various small vendors with verified mid range cruise missiles/OWAs, mid to smallish size drones, microelectronics, PGM adapters, software packages etc. The smaller shipyards can waltz in with M-UU/SVs, and small boats.

 

[Kat Tsun]

Same for munitions. For every large guided rocket or HIMARS round, how many dumb rockets or round tube ammunition rounds should we be able to produce?

GMLRS costs less than a Javelin missile, though. They're not expensive for what they can do.