The United States has conducted its sixth successful test of a new Long-Range Anti Ship
Missile or LRASM On March 19, Lockheed Martin released a press
statement saying that the U.S. Air Force had successfully tested Lockheed’s Long-Range
Anti-Ship Missile off the coast of California.
“During the test, a B-1B from the 337th Test Squadron at Dyess Air Force Base, Texas,
launched a LRASM over the Sea Range at Point Mugu, Calif., successfully impacting the maritime
target and meeting test objectives,” the press release said.
David Helsel, the LRASM program director at Lockheed, was quoted in the press release
as saying; “LRASM has now proven itself in 6 consecutive flight missions.
The reliability and outstanding capability of LRASM will provide an unmatched weapon
to our warfighter in their quest for sea control in contested environment.”
In this video, Defense Updates analyzes WHY THE US’S LRASM WILL BE POTENT THREAT TO
RUSSIA & CHINA?
The ant ship firepower is badly needed, as the U.S. Navy has allowed its capabilities
in this area to deteriorate in recent decades.
For a long time, America’s naval ships relied on the increasingly archaic Harpoon missile
to fight against adversaries’ surface fleets.
That missile, which was first deployed in the 1970s, only has a range of 70 to 150 miles,
depending on the variant.
This put the U.S. Navy at a disadvantage compared to countries like Russia and China.
Russia has deployed Brahmos.
The Brahmos cruise missile is produced by India-based Brahmas Aerospace, set up in 1998,
and is a joint venture between India’s Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO)
and Russia's NPO Mashinostroyenia.
Brahmos is one of the fastest cruise missile in operation, and travels at speeds of Mach
2.8 to 3.0.
India and Russia has recently decided to extend the range of Brahmas missile to 800 km from
the current 300 km.
Russia has also successfully tested a hypersonic cruise missile.
The Kinzhal or Dagger was one of the weapons the Russian president unveiled in his state
of the nation address.
Kinzhal reportedly has a range of approximately 1,250 miles or 2000 km and a top speed of
more than 10 times the speed of sound.
According to the Russian president, units in the country’s Southern Military District,
which borders Ukraine and the Black Sea, have deployed the missiles operationally.
China deploys the YJ-18.
The YJ-18 is a Chinese family of anti-ship and land attack cruise missiles.
Western analysts believe the YJ-18 is a copy of the Russian Kalibr 3M-54E, with a cruising
range of 180 km or 110 mi at Mach 0.8 and a sprint range of 40 km or 25 mi at
Mach 2.5 to 3.0.
Chinese media has recently published never-before-seen footage of its DF-10 nuclear cruise missiles
capable of reaching US military bases in Japan and South Korea.
Carrying nuclear warheads weighing up to 500 kilos, the DF-10 “Long Sword” missiles,
with a range of 930 miles, can be mounted on missile trucks, submarines or warships.
Some variations also feature stealth technology and supersonic speeds.
LRASM is a DARPA and U.S. Navy-funded program meant to provide the U.S. Navy and Air Force
with an offensive antisurface weapon (OASuW) to counter the growing threats from antiaccess/area-denial
(A2/AD) doctrines.
The program begun under DARPA in 2009 and leverages existing technology from the Joint
Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile Extended Range (JASSM-ER) program.
Its development was fast tracked under the Pentagon Better Buying Power 3.0 program,
with the expectation that it would serve as a stopgap solution to compensate for the Navy’s
aging Harpoon antiship missiles.
In 2016, the Pentagon began modifying the SM-6 Standard Missile, which is usually used
for antimissile and air-defense missions, to serve as an immediate stopgap capability.
In its antiship variant, the SM-6 has a range of over 200 miles but an extremely small warhead
relative to the Harpoon.
LRASM will combine the best of both worlds: a missile with a long range and massive warhead,
on top of its ability to operate in electronic-warfare environments.
LRASM has a reported range of 500 nautical miles, and carries a 1000 pound penetrator
and blast-fragmentation warhead.
LRASM is primarily designed to provide the U.S. Navy and Air Force with a precision-guided
long-range standoff capability that can survive in aggressive electronic-warfare environments.
To achieve this, it uses onboard sensors and a semiautonomous guidance system to reduce
its dependence on intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) platforms, network
links and GPS navigation.
It also employs “innovative terminal survivability approaches and precision lethality” to avoid
advanced enemy countermeasures while still reaching its intended target.
The LRASM tackles two problems the US Navy has.
It has a longer range and it is more survivable due to its electronics and stealth.
The one thing it still lacks compared to Russian, Indian and Chinese counterparts is speed.
The LRASM is subsonic, meaning that the CIWS i.e Close in Weapon Systems of enemy ships
have quite a long time to shoot at it.
It basically trades speed for range and will rely on stealth to defeat medium range defense systems.
While it will someday be on ships, LRASM will initially be operated by the U.S. Air Force
from its B1-B bombers and the U.S. Navy from the F/A-18E/F, which operates from
aircraft carriers.
The initial LRASMs are expected to be operational in 2018.
The US Navy will hold a competition for the Offensive Anti-Surface Warfare (OASuW) Increment
2 anti-ship missile as a follow-on to LRASM to enter service in 2024.
The OASuW Increment 2 competition will be completely open.
It is expected the LRASM will compete against the joint Kongsberg/Raytheon offering of the
Joint Strike Missile (JSM) for air-launch needs and an upgraded Raytheon Tomahawk cruise
missile for surface-launch needs.
Sweden has publicly expressed interest in the LRASM in response to concerns of Russian
actions in Eastern Europe.
The United Kingdom, and Canada have also expressed interest in the missile.