Lockheed unveils hybrid cruise missile/UAV plans

Manufacturer also highlights development of strike weapon and new guided bomb


Manufacturer also highlights development of strike weapon and new guided bomb

Lockheed Martin has unveiled plans to demonstrate a “persistent surveillance” hybrid cruise missile/unmanned air vehicle next year. Named Top Cover, the air-launched, forward-swept-wing design will have an endurance of over 24h at altitudes around 5,000ft (1,500m) and is intended to operate as a cruise missile, lethal UAV or disposable surveillance UAV.



This looks very impressive, any thoughts????


Mod edit to correct link distorting the page layout.

[edit on 12-7-2005 by Seekerof]

wow! That missile looks amazing!! Nice find !
With the plethora of weapons available to the US will this really be needed? With Lockheeds renowned price tag I amsure this comes at a heafty price!

[edit on 12-7-2005 by IAF101]

They wouldnt need alot of these. Imagine parking these things in the skies above the mountains in Afghanistan and let them loiter about. Osama couldnt move, he would have no idea if these things saw him or not. And if they start to shoot at them, well then they just gave away thier positions. This is a fantastic option for high value targets in hard to reah places.

WOW i like that! lol

i think we could use a few dozen of em

hey and look at it; it looks like a missle with sissors on it lmao

the enemy will be saying "are they going to blow us up or cut us in half?"
hehehe

hey whats the price tag on this baby anyways?
ill make a guess
hmmm lets say 15 to 25 million$a piece
lets see how close my estimate is

hey whats the price tag on this baby anyways?
ill make a guess
hmmm lets say 15 to 25 million$a piece
lets see how close my estimate is

With Lockheeds renowned price tag I amsure this comes at a heafty price!

and is intended to operate as a cruise missile, lethal UAV or disposable surveillance UAV.

Let's hope your price estimates are very wrong!!!

Actually, we already use many UAVs, so the real question is what does this offer that other existing ones don't????

That looks a very smart piece of kit, it also strikes me as a very good extension of the way the BAE ALARM missile works, with its (obviously far more limited) loiter capability.

The article stated how much these things cost. Doesnt anybody read?

It will be powered by a single turbofan engine. Its planned unit cost of around $200,000 will allow it to be treated as expendable, says Jim Pappafotis, director of advanced programmes at Lockheed Martin Missiles & Fire Control.

Originally posted by Kidfinger
The article stated how much these things cost. Doesnt anybody read?

It will be powered by a single turbofan engine. Its planned unit cost of around $200,000 will allow it to be treated as expendable, says Jim Pappafotis, director of advanced programmes at Lockheed Martin Missiles & Fire Control.

whew thank god i was way off
i took a good look at the article but i didnt see it thanks for pointing it out dude

gazrok"so the real question is what does this offer that other existing ones don't????"

lol it offers futuristic sissors to cut our enemys in half
lol i dont know really

This is actually nothing new, the new tactical Tomahawks should have similar capabilities too. I don't know how good their optical sensors are, though.

Maybe the ups to it are that it seconds as a big badda bomb, see terrorist, blow terrorist inot tiny bits. Lush, but I doubt theyre going to use them on Osama, they dont want to blow up the White House now do they?!! Just joking.

I had never thought that the targeting systems on those things was that cheap. to make it for 200 000 with all of those systems. what im thinking too is that its goin to need the same type or simaler FBW system to make the weapon stable so it can cruise around enemy territory.

well the tech has become cheap and will change the battlefield once agian

I like this system this could allows forces on the ground to contact one of these loitering cruise missiles/UAV’s and give them info where to strike. Like the SEAL’s that were stuck in Afghanistan they could have used a couple of these to hit the enemy positions they were fighting, and when the chopper that was supposed to back them up when down hwy not hit the taliban with cruise missiles that would be readily available in the area.

Awesome product and you could field thousands of them.

I'd be curious how they think B-2s are going to be carrying these things externally.

Yes, external carriage on a B-2 does seem like a rather bizarre concept, but they did seem quite specific.

Great stuff for fighting hordes of Soviet armour, but pretty useless in Afghanistan or Iraq because of the usual problem of target recognition. But you can always call people 'terrorists' after you've blown them up.

Noet that the Boeing version of the Air Dominator was announced a while back and similarly has long persistence (48+hours) and operates in swarms. Their main problem will be AA artillery in the short term; in the longer term I think they will fall prey to other UAVs which will be cheap and plentiful.

Originally posted by Wembley

Yes, external carriage on a B-2 does seem like a rather bizarre concept, but they did seem quite specific.

They were in fact specific

The option exists to carry them externally, but it is unlikely for that to happen since they may be carried internally.

If fielded, the XR cruise missile would be carried by the USAF’s Northrop B-2 and Boeing B-52 bombers, which, respectively, could carry up to eight and four weapons internally and two and eight weapons externally.

So the B-2 can carry up to 8 internally, and 2 externally. I doubt that they would ever need the B-2 to carry more then 8, especially if they could simply use a B-52, which can carry 2 more of these things, is a fraction of the cost, and isn't predicated on stealth to begin with.

I dont know how to explain it but does anyone else think that these things could be used for missile defense?