October 2000 Newsletter - Naval Postgraduate School

RESEARCH OVERVIEW
MISSILE DEFENSE RESEARCH, continued from page 39
provide good estimates of optical turbulence and laser propagation
conditions in the atmosphere. To accomplish this they
had to modify the turbulence closure assumptions in the
COAMPS model so it could work correctly in the free
atmosphere and stratosphere, and develop an optical turbulence
parameterization scheme.
Running the COAMPS mesoscale weather model on the
High Performance Computing Machines located at the Naval
Oceanographic Office, Stennis Space Center, Mississippi, and
the U.S. Army Engineer Research Center Laboratories,
Vicksburg, Mississippi, they are able to predict atmospheric
AN INVESTIGATION INTO ALTERNATIVE NATIONAL MISSILE DEFENSE SCHEMES
LT James Kalowsky, USN
LT Victor Lake, USN
LT Stephen Meade, USN
LT Robert Thompson, USN
Ballistic missile defense is an important and controversial
topic with no standard operational procedures in place today
that could neutralize a ballistic missile threat. The issue of
how to defend against an inbound, rouge state, nuclear
ballistic missile was studied with focus on the two leading kill
NMD Engagement CONOPS
turbulence conditions 6-12 hours beyond the initial starting
conditions. These predictions agree well with aircraft and
balloon measurements of turbulence collected by NPS in
CONUS and the U.S. Air Force in potential threat areas.
NPS model results were included as a significant new
capability during a critical program review presented by the
ABL SPO to Dr. Hans Mark, Director of Defense Research
and Engineering during the spring of this year. Because of
the NPS success, the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory has
initiated their own effort to model optical turbulence within
the atmosphere.
mechanism options: nuclear and hit-to-kill. National
Missile Defense (NMD) plans of the past and future were
reviewed. Logistics and timeline problems were investigated
and resulted in a likely engagement scenario. The hitto-kill
option is a precision problem that is presently being
worked on by the DoD, however it is still in the early stages
of development. The nuclear option was investigated as to
whether it could meet the requirements of ensuring destruction
of an inter-continental ballistic missile in the near
future. At the higher latitudes expected for the engagement,
the effects of
a nuclear environment
in the exoatmosphere
were
studied, as well as
the effects on
spacecraft and
satellite electronics.
Also, the short-term
degradation or
blackout of sensor
systems was studied,
with particular
interest given to
early warning
systems. Conclusions
were drawn
from the comparison
between the hitto-kill
approach and
the nuclear option.
NPS Research page 40
October 2000