Dale Brown's EB-52 Megafortress Becomes Reality

The EB-52 Megafortress played a prominant role in many of Dale Brown's novels.
Now it looks as though the airforce is poised to deploy actual EB-52's to suppress enemy radar as well fire cruise missiles with HPM warheads.

StrategyPage

July 28, 2004: The U.S. Air Force is working to introduce an electronic-warfare (EW) version of the B-52 bomber as soon as possible. Service officials are reworking current budgets to accelerate the development and fielding of an under-wing electronics pod that can precisely jam enemy radars over long distances. An initial purchase of 12 pods, along with modifying 16 B-52s to carry them, would take place in the 2005 budget, with a follow-on request the following year to buy an additional 24 pods and modify another 60 aircraft.

The new EW pod would be able to deceive enemy radars in several ways, including altering radar return signals to change a penetrating aircraft�s speed, range, and location. It would be able to produce false targets and actively generate signals to partially or completely cancel out radar returns.

I'm sure the real EB-52 will not have quite the battle capability of its fictional counterpart but the real EB-52 as described will pack a large punch opening the way for other forces.

Related ATS thread
Dale Brown, Has he got it right?

[edit on 29-7-2004 by Phoenix]

yyyyyyyyyyyyyaaaaaahhhhh now thats gona be cool.
very very nice find phoenix and nice name by the way.

Sounds like this aircraft would make the f-117, b2 spirit, etc. obsolete. But a helluva bargain, couple of eb-52's and essentially the whole usaf would have 'stealth' capability, not to mention severely cripple enemy electronic sensors. Though this aircraft would make quite a juicy target for the enemy. And also very important to point out, such a weapon has extreme potential against a conventional opponent, but in a war against 'guerillas' founded in mulitple countries, this aircraft is more useful grounded.peace

Originally posted by jrod8900
such a weapon has extreme potential against a conventional opponent, but in a war against 'guerillas' founded in mulitple countries, this aircraft is more useful grounded.peace

Crusing at about 50,000 ft most guerilla forces can do little more then run and hide when one of these fly over head. Also thats when you bring out the old school B-52s. Look what the Afghan guerillas did when those flew over head they hide or they died.

I love the B-52 B.U.F.F it has been around long before I was born and it might very well be around long after im gone. Truly a masterpiece of aircraft design.

Nice find this aircraft will make things harder for the enemy to even know where you are let alone shoot you down but I agree this Eb-52 megafortress should have escorts cuz it will be such a nice target for the enemy so I think it would be a good idea if 2 F-15 or more escorted it in a real conflict against an enemy that has a half decent air force.

I've read the majority of his books, I am not impressed by him.

His dialogue is wooden and lacks depth, the characters are way too perfect and free of flaws.

As for the technology... He takes concepts that are quite obvious and expands on them.

Nothing impressive about him, he's like Clancy but with a wilder imagination.

I have e-mailed Mr. Brown concerning questions about his insight into advanced technology and on ever response he has neither implied that what he describes is fiction or nonfiction.
It is my belief that he has insider information coming from black project sources and is intentionally leaking this information for the reader to see the new dawn on the horizon.

Originally posted by Nerdling
I've read the majority of his books, I am not impressed by him.

His dialogue is wooden and lacks depth, the characters are way too perfect and free of flaws.

As for the technology... He takes concepts that are quite obvious and expands on them.

Nothing impressive about him, he's like Clancy but with a wilder imagination.

actually i wouldnt say that thier free of flaws.
the general guy he's got marital problems. also clancy's books are good dont diss em!!
also some of the tech is obvios but thats how real weapons are made.

The EB-52 and EB-1 concepts have been around for a while now. They are both USAF ideas to replace the EA-6B Prowler currently being operated by the Navy, Marines, and Air Force. The Navy has already decided to develop an EW version of the Super Hornet called the EA-18G Growler to fulfill its need.


[edit on 29-7-2004 by aerospaceweb]

Originally posted by Nerdling
I've read the majority of his books, I am not impressed by him.

His dialogue is wooden and lacks depth, the characters are way too perfect and free of flaws.

As for the technology... He takes concepts that are quite obvious and expands on them.

Nothing impressive about him, he's like Clancy but with a wilder imagination.

clancy and brown can't do characters at all- but that's not important i guess in a techno-thriller. brown at least has accurate tactical and technological descriptions, imo. i find him better than clancy in that regard.

-koji K.

I like Clancy, but I'm not always impressed with his technical knowledge. The vague "saucer's of dreamland" or whatever they were called that he introduced to turn the tide of the story in Red Storm Rising strained credibility.

Half-serious, I also think he understates technical problems with the "prick" radio. Those really should have been the main villain in one of his books.

As for tech answers like jamming, very nice. I just hope we don't put so much faith in these things that we fail to put the funding and effort into training for busting SAM sites the hard way. In Vietnam we often refused to attack non-active SAM sites for fear of killing Russian technicians, then relied on the jamming technology of that day to get us through attack on active sites. The problem is that the Vietnamese operators actually learned how to spot an F-4 in it's jamming cloud. The moral of the story is not to rest on a technical advantage, but to train and operate in a way that offers you some depth and options for contingency.

Originally posted by jrod8900
Sounds like this aircraft would make the f-117, b2 spirit, etc. obsolete. But a helluva bargain, couple of eb-52's and essentially the whole usaf would have 'stealth' capability, not to mention severely cripple enemy electronic sensors. Though this aircraft would make quite a juicy target for the enemy. And also very important to point out, such a weapon has extreme potential against a conventional opponent, but in a war against 'guerillas' founded in mulitple countries, this aircraft is more useful grounded.peace

Not Really, both Stealth technology and EW have limitations. That is why they are often used together. Go do you own research and you will find that in the gulf war of '91 EF-111, EA-6's and F-117 often helped each other out. They complement each other, but one can't replace the other.

Tim
ATS Director of Counter-Ignorance

Anything like plane number 2?

I mean the CIA was definitely stationed at WTC, but did they have appropriate defenses and countermeasures that were nullified?

I wouldnt say that this is the eb-52 from the book, just a regular b-52 with large ew suite. In the book the b-52 was stripped down and fitteed with composite wings and a new nose, plus four more efficient enginesto replace the regular eight. Some variants carried the Joint Rivet and AWACS gear. Not to mention the awesome flighthawks carried.

The idea of electronic war fair is not new. We currently have pods that do radar jaming/false image generation... The idea of putting it on a b-52 is new. My question is why the b-52. Unless this is a new very large and heavy pod(s) why not use use a smaller, lighter, faster platform. The b-52 is over 50 years old and starting to show it's age. The b-52 is large, slow , but can carry a very large payload.

"The idea of putting it on a b-52 is new. "

Really? When I began as an Offensive Avionics (formerly Bomb-Nav) technician in 1981 there was a crew posistion on the flight deck known as an Electronic Warfare Officer. He had various RF spectrum devices that both passively monitored RF emmisions and actively jammed them.


The only issue I see being raised here is an upgrade of the avionics capabilities to give the venerable Buff a new role as an Electronic Warfare Aircraft rather than a heavy bomber.

Go figure since the aircrafts first iteration as a strategic nuclear heavy bomber in the early 1950's it has been used in roles from standoff cruise missile carrier to test bed to low-level penatrator, to conventional cruise missiles to tactical close air support. Doesn't surprise me in the least.

And it's not "Flight of the Old Dog" OK?

A solution for a useless bomber. Really. An SA-2 could Shoot it down. To say nothing of a S-300PMU1.

Uhh... necoro are you impaired or you cant read? It jams enemy radar sites and interferes with their ability to identify and know where the target is. It will be difficult to shoot down so take your PR manual somewhere else.

The only thing it's designed to jam is 30 year old STRAIGHT FLUSH radars.
The S-300PMU and the Chinese FT-2000 have Home-On-Jam capability that's gonna make mincemeat of this BUFF.

This concept was actually discussed in an AWST article. The B-52's are initally being selected for this because they have the size and power for the bulky pods. However, they eventual goal is to place these on the MALD and cruise missiles (CALCM is first) and go hunting.

Now if we can get them re-engine the BUFF"S with 4 comercial engines, it would really give alot of new life to the warhorse.