This is truly the big surprise of the start of the week. By unveiling the Low Observable UAV Testbed (LOUT), a stealth aircraft demonstrator, classified and initiated a decade earlier, Airbus is coming out of the woodwork and de facto establishing itself as a player that will now have to be counted on in terms of stealth.
A TEST BENCH TO MASTER THE RADAR SIGNATURE
Based on a “Skunk Works” type approach – like the Lockheed Martin's legendary engineering and design department which notably worked on the SR-71 and the F-117 – the LOUT was until then a classified program and concerned with the development of a stealth platform. It was the manager of the Future Air Combat System (FCAS) program at Airbus, Mario Hertzog, who revealed that the company had been working on the project since 2007. It accelerated at the start of the 2010s following the notification of a contract with the German Ministry of Defense for a Very Low Observable (VLO) ground testbed, with the idea of experimenting with the reduction of radar, infrared and acoustic waves. However, he did not specify whether the German government was interested in a complete development program for a UCAV based on this demonstrator.
According to Flightglobal, the model appearing in the images provided by Airbus would have a wingspan of 12 meters wide by 12 meters long, for a weight of 4 tonnes, and would be used for tests in an anechoic chamber. According to Aviation Week, this test model would in reality be a subscale representation of a model around 20 tonnes. Said aircraft would exhibit significantly reduced infrared, acoustic and radar signatures, and would be capable of deploying electronic countermeasures while controlling electromagnetic emissions from its onboard sensors. It is presented as an unmanned drone (UAV) although we can distinguish the presence of a dome in photos published by Airbus, suggesting a manned version. In the current state of the project, the LOUT has never taken flight and mainly serves as a test bed for the development of technologies relating to stealth.
A LEVER IN THE FRAMEWORK OF FCAS
There is no doubt that this project is part of Franco-German-Spanish cooperation and could serve as a technological base for the FCAS because it sheds new light on the company's capabilities to design a stealth platform. Obviously, Airbus wants to prove that it already masters one of the key technological building blocks for the FCAS, namely stealth. In this regard, the LOUT exhibits typical characteristics for an aircraft optimized for low radar detectability since all areas of stealth technology – from air intakes to reactor exhaust to wave-reducing coating – have been integrated into the design of the LOUT.
For the moment, we do not know anything about the budget allocated to this program but it is already part of the same logic as that of nEUROn1 of Dassault: the latter mainly aimed to conceptualize the different capabilities of the FCAS and to lay the foundations for their definition and future industrialization, with a view to a complete operational capacity by 2040. Just like the nEUROn, the LOUT remains a program research on stealth and reduction of the risks of detection, with the big difference that it has never taken to the air and remains in the state of a model. Nevertheless, there is no doubt that the lessons learned from this program will support current efforts on the FCAS, which aims to deploy a family of air combat systems, namely a combat fighter accompanied by remote effectors and various types of unmanned drones. (“Remote carrier” or “Loyal Wingman”).
In addition to the contribution in technological terms, this revelation inevitably has a strongly industrial connotation. Indeed, it is common knowledge that the FCAS program has been hostage for several months to divergent industrial and political interests between France, Germany and Spain. In this regard, the LOUT could rebalance the balance by challenging Dassault for project management on the future stealth fighter. However, LOUT is also a program that could benefit remote effectors such as “remote carriers” and which would accompany the fighter of the future on missions. Note that the stealth combat drone track – mentioned a few days ago by General Lavigne during a parliamentary hearing – should not be ruled out either. Note that Airbus has informed Dassault of the existence of its stealth aircraft program.
ON THE RELEVANCE OF STEALTH
Finally, Mario Hertzog took the opportunity of this presentation to reaffirm his belief in the operational effectiveness of la stealth and that she “ is and will remain a factor of survival ". It is true that in a context of updating access denial and zone interdiction strategies (Anti-access/Area denial) and their proliferation, the FCAS must provide a solution in the third dimension and stealth constitutes an element of response in its own right. It therefore seems legitimate for Airbus to acquire technological bricks in terms of stealth, a major characteristic of so-called 5 aircraft.e generation and 6e generation.
However, it should be emphasized that the comparative advantage delivered by stealth remains relative. In addition to being expensive, it is today threatened by a number of new technologies currently being developed and deployed, like passive detection radars and quantum radars, thus directly questioning its operational and capability relevance. Nevertheless, it is clear that the “race” for stealth remains and with this announcement, Europe aims to establish some significant milestones.
Axel Trinquier – European defense issues