U.S President Donald Trump had said on 19
July that the USS Boxer downed an Iranian
drone.
As per him, the drone came within 1,000 yards
of the U.S Navy ship and ignored "multiple
calls to stand down”.
Mr. Trump Speaking at the White House, said
the drone was "threatening the safety of the
ship and the ship's crew" in the Strait of
Hormuz and was "immediately destroyed.”
Trump added, "This is the latest of many provocative
and hostile actions by Iran against vessels
operating in international waters.
The United States reserves the right to defend
our personnel, our facilities and interest
and calls upon all nations to condemn Iran's
attempts to disrupt freedom of navigation
and global commerce.”
The Pentagon had released a statement about
this at that time.
Jonathan Hoffman, Chief Pentagon spokesman
wrote,
"At approximately 10 a.m. local time, the
amphibious ship USS Boxer was in international
waters conducting a planned inbound transit
of the Strait of Hormuz.
A fixed wing unmanned aerial system (UAS)
approached Boxer and closed within a threatening
range.
The ship took defensive action against the
UAS to ensure the safety of the ship and its
crew,”
As per reports, the drone was destroyed using
Electronic Warfare (EW) though specific details
were not disclosed at that time.
But new insights have emerged since then.
In this video, Defense Updates analyzes how
USS Boxer downed the Iranian drone?
Let’s get started.
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Tensions in the region escalated after the
U.S government under President Trump unilaterally
withdrew from Iran nuclear deal and imposed
stringent sanctions against Iran.
The deal offered Iran relief from sanctions
in exchange for limits on its nuclear program.
Trump administration is of the view that Iran
is misusing the deal.
Recent months have seen multiple spikes in
hostilities which include U.S accusing Iran
for a series of attacks on commercial ships
and Iran downing of American RQ-4A Global
Hawk drone.
As per reports, Khordad-3 surface-to-air missile
was used to bring down the drone over the
Strait of Hormuz.
Iranian officials claimed that the drone violated
their airspace, while U.S. representatives
claimed that the drone was in international
airspace.
After the downing of the Global Hawk, President
Trump called off a retaliatory strike on Iran
at the very last moment citing the proposition
of too many casualties.
Britain moved into the crisis when it's Royal
Marines captured the Iranian tanker Grace
1 off the coast of Gibraltar.
Although the United Kingdom has not imposed
sanctions on Iran, but it along with EU members
have sanctions that prohibit selling oil to
Iran’s ally Syria.
A senior Iranian military commander had threatened
Britain and the United States by saying that
they would regret detaining the vessel.
Iran has recently seized two oil tankers – one
registered in the UK, the other in Liberia
– in the Strait of Hormuz.
This incident has further aggravated the already
volatile situation in the Gulf.
USS Boxer (LHD-4) is a Wasp-class amphibious
assault ship of the United States Navy.
It was constructed at Ingalls Shipbuilding
in.
Mississippi.
Boxer was launched on 13 August 1993 and commissioned
on 11 February 1995.
The Wasp class is a class of Landing Helicopter
Dock (LHD) amphibious assault ships operated
by the United States Navy.
Wasp-class is an upgrade of the Tarawa class
and is designed to operate more advanced aircraft
and landing craft.
A Wasp class vessel like USS Boxer is capable
of carrying an almost the full strength of
a United States Marine Corps Marine Expeditionary
Unit (MEU) and landing them in hostile territory
by landing craft or helicopters.
USS Boxer has a displacement of around 40,000
tons & has a length of 844 ft or 257 m.
Wasp's two steam propulsion plants generate
a total of 400 tons of steam per hour.
The propulsion system develops 70,000 shaft
horsepower (52 MW), powering the ship to speeds
in excess of 22 knots or 41 km/h.
It has many sensors, the main once are AN/SPS-49
2-D Air Search Radar, AN/SPS-48 3-D Air Search
Radar and AN/SPS-67 Surface Search Radar.
It has a crew of over 1,000 officers and sailors
and can embark around 2,200 Marines.
Apart from amphibious assault crafts, it carries
around 31 aircraft, including F-35Bs, AV-8B
Harrier IIs, MH-60S Knighthawk helicopters,
AH-1Z Viper helicopters, and MV-22 Osprey
tiltrotor aircraft.
USS Boxer also features an enhanced combat
system including upgrades to the MK 2 Ship
Self Defense System, SPQ-9B horizon search
radar.
Defensive weaponry includes MK 57 NATO Sea
Sparrow Missile System, RIM-116 Rolling Airframe
Missile, Three 20 mm Phalanx CIWS systems
and multiple machine gun systems.
Marine Air Defense Integrated System or MADIS
is the new weapon developed to protect against
threats of cheap and lethal unmanned aerial
vehicles.
As per reports, the new system was deployed
starting June 2018.
There are different variants of the system
some can be attached to all-terrain vehicles
while others are meant to be operated from
warships.
The system present in USS boxer is the LMADIS
or Light MADIS.
All drones need to have a comminution line
with the operator so that it can receive commands.
Also, the sensors in the drones need to receive
signals like from Global Positioning Satellites.
MADIS exploits this vulnerability.
It uses radar and cameras to scan the sky.
Once it detects the drone, it examines if
it is friendly or hostile - Identification
of Friend or Foe (IFF).
If it is a hostile drone, the MADIS is commanded
by the operator to initiate jamming.
It uses several types of Electronic Warfare
techniques like radio frequencies jamming
to block the communication system of the drone.
Once the communication is blocked, the drone
cannot function and is forced to crash.
The same procedure has also been against the
Iranian done.
Some reports indicate that MADIS is also capable
of shooting at drones, but there is no evidence
that this capability was employed against
the Iranian drone.
According to the Department of Defense, US
Marines units are trained to use maneuverable,
ground-based jamming systems "that can detect,
identify and defeat drones with electronic
attack," .
Low-altitude defense officers and gunners
with Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 163,
which is currently deployed in USS Boxer with
the 11th MEU ( Marine Corps Marine Expeditionary
Unit) are trained to operate LMADIS.
It is also to be noted that 11th MEU is not
the first Marine unit to use LMADIS aboard
a Navy ship, 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit
used it on the amphibious assault ship Kearsarge
when it was navigating through the Suez Canal.
Members of the 13th MEU also used it during
a training exercise in Djibouti.
The advent of drone both simple and sophisticated,
pose a new kind of challenge.
The most important point to note is that drones
don't have pilots and hence they can be used
much more aggressively as there is no fear
of losing human life.
Keeping this in view U.S military has been
developing counters, MADIS is one of them.
An Electronic Warfare jamming system like
MADIS is a cost-effective means of defense.
For example, some time back General David
Perkins, the commander of the US Army Training
and Doctrine Command (TRADOC) had disclosed
that a US ally used a Patriot missile that
costs $3 million to shoot down a $200 drone.
Phalanx Close-in Weapons Systems available
to USS Boxer could have also been used but
it would not have been as efficient as the
MADIS.
It natural that the U.S Navy has started to
equip its warships with a wide range of non-kinetic
systems like MADIS and is also training personnel
to operate them.
As for MADIS, it has proved its worth in the
very first combat scenario its faced.
