The Generous Gift from the Houthi

you can't buy training like this

Like people, computers learn things.

You need a large data sample to refine a program and make it better. “Big data” helps refine the expected and places brackets around the possible.

With weapons systems development, you can only afford so many targets and range time to refine and adjust your systems from what you thought they would do in the real world compared to what they actually do. You can only have so many different types of targets that fly so many profiles in certain types of weather.

The worst thing you can do, as our European friends have found out, is to have limited to no successful range time, or have targets that are not realistic relative to real-world targets you might face, or worse, are configured not to be missed.

Well, everyone should be exceptionally proud of the US Navy’s Surface Force and its performance in the Red Sea since last fall following the attack on Israel from Gaza.

As we’ve seen, the spirit of late Rear Admiral Wayne Eugene (Build a Little, Test a Little, Learn a Lot) Meyer, USN (PBUH) continues in the Aegis and Standard Missile program.

Iran’s proxies, the Houthi in Yemen, have thrown everything they have at ships in the Red Sea, from slow “flying lawnmower” like attack drones, to the first operational use of Anti-Ship Ballistic Missiles (ASBM).

Regardless of who the next enemy will be that decides to challenge a US Navy Aegis warship - they will have a more difficult chance for success thanks to the Houthi.

Tweaks in ship SPY radars and aircraft active electronically scanned array (AESA) radars, combined with changes in tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs), have helped US Navy (USN) forces counter Houthi unmanned threats in the Red Sea region, USN officials told Janes.

…

USN forces operating in the Red Sea also began to reach back to experts in the United States for advice and guidance on addressing the unmanned threats, Rear Admiral Marc Miguez, then commander, Carrier Strike Group 2, told Janes on 11 June during an interview aboard Eisenhower. Rear Adm Miguez has since left strike group command to become USN chief of legislative affairs in Washington, DC.

“We asked scientists and all people that work in the research and development community, ‘Hey, is there something we can refine?’ They’ve been able to refine our parametrics on our equipment out there. It makes it more successful in achieving non-kinetic or kinetic actions – in real time.”

There is a great story to be told here in detail, and I hope someone will put into book form at some point.

Either way, take a moment today to tip your hat to not just our Surface Force (with an assist by the air bubbas, I know), but to everyone who has for decades refined Aegis and our family of Standard Missiles to the point where they are today. It was not easy. It was not by accident. It wasn’t “transformational” it wasn’t an “offset.”

It was just plain long-game, hard work, superior engineering, and persistence from the Fire Controlmen on our Aegis ships born in 2005, to the third-to-fourth generation of engineers with pocket protectors ashore pouring over data.

Bravo Zulu.