HUNTSVILLE, Alabama—The U.S. Army has validated requirements for two types of uncrewed, high-altitude aircraft—balloons and solar-powered fixed wing—with the goal of using them not only for surveillance, but also targeting, navigation and kinetic strikes.
The service validated its capability document last year, looking at fielding systems that operate in the stratosphere between 60,000 and 100,000 ft., says Col. Dave Mulack, the Army capability manager for space and high altitude at the service’s Space and Missile Defense Command (SMDC).
The Army wants multiple types of platforms of both types that can be deployed and connected in a “daisy chain” to see beyond where its long-range systems can fire, such as the upcoming Long-Range Hypersonic Weapon (LRHW) and Mid-Range Capability. While the first push has been for long-range targeting, there are also annexes to the original capability document that are in various stages that call for active electronic warfare payloads, cyber operations, network extension, advanced precision navigation and targeting, and “launched effects,” Mulack said during the Space and Missile Defense Symposium here Aug. 8.
Operating in the stratosphere with such a low radar-cross-section system provides a dependable, organic capability to in-theater forces, Mulack says.
While high-altitude balloons have received greater public interest this year because of a Chinese balloon traversing the continental U.S. and Canada earlier this year before being publicly shot down, the Army has long been researching and deploying the systems.
SMDC’s Space and Missile Defense Center of Excellence actively works across the Pentagon to find high-altitude platforms, payloads and command-and-control capabilities for the service. This includes small, tactical balloons for payloads such as extended-range communications up to large, stratospheric balloons, according to a command fact sheet. In April 2022, for example, U.S. Army soldiers launched a Thunderhead High-Altitude Balloon System during exercise Balikatan 22 in the Philippines.
Also in 2022, the Army and Airbus flew the high-altitude solar-powered Zephyr aircraft for 64 days in a trial for the service’s Assured Positioning, Navigation and Timing/Cross Functional Team. An investigation found that high-altitude turbulence caused the aircraft to break up and crash on Aug. 18.
