GLSDB showed little effectiveness, but the Pentagon knew about this even before the transfer, - Defense Express

When satellite navigation is suppressed, bombs show a decrease in accuracy.

American GLSDB cruise bombs, in conditions of active electronic warfare, demonstrated little effectiveness at the front in Ukraine. The States are not worried about this, which cannot be said about the countries that ordered weapons from them.

According to Defense Express , although GLSDB were supposed to allow the Ukrainian Armed Forces to attack targets at a distance of 150 km, their actual practical use on the battlefield showed little effectiveness. When satellite navigation is suppressed, bombs show a decrease in accuracy. This does not mean that the ammunition does not hit anywhere at all, but the deviation from the target becomes greater and is no longer measured at 1-3 meters, but at 30-50.

“This situation should actually be of maximum interest to the Pentagon, and not just lead to an admission that the GLSDB does not work as it should. Because although the GLSDB has not been adopted by the United States, it is a hybrid of the M26 rocket engine for HIMARS and GBU-39 /B Small Diameter Bomb, which is used by the US Air Force. And the problem is that this bomb as a whole weighs only 93 kg, of which the warhead accounts for 36 kg (for the SDB I GBU-39/B version). we are not even talking about an analogue of the FAB-100, but about the FAB-50. And it can indeed be an effective ammunition, but only when it hits the target with its standard accuracy of 1-3 meters, experts note.

This accuracy is provided by satellite and inertial navigation, and there is also an SDB I version with the addition of LSDB semi-active laser guidance. However, when we are talking about a distance of 150 km, the option of illuminating the target with a laser becomes problematic. At the same time, the Pentagon is clearly not very concerned that this could somehow affect the combat use of SDB by aviation.

According to experts, the United States hopes that tactics and doctrine will compensate for this shortcoming. In particular, the doctrine is that the US armed forces must achieve decisive total air superiority. After this, the task of aviation becomes the methodical bombing of the enemy, which is already a tactic when electronic warfare systems are the primary target.

“In addition, the US actually understands that satellite navigation alone cannot be a unique solution. And this can also be clearly seen in the example of the GBU-39/B from Boeing and the GBU-53/B from Raytheon, both of which are Small Diameter Bombs , but are designated as SDB I and SDB II. The second version has a similar weight of 93 kg and a not very large warhead of 48 kg, as well as a similar sharpening range from aircraft to a distance of up to 110 km. And the main difference between them is. that the GBU-53/B has four high-precision guidance systems at once: an active radar head, a thermal imaging head and a semi-active laser head, and an inertial one with a satellite one is used only as a means of navigation on the cruising section, and they began to develop it back in 2006, only 4 years later. SDB I,” explains Defense Express.

Thus, the GBU-53/B SDB II does not care about the presence of satellite navigation at all, because it will fly to the target area using an inertial system. Smoke and aerosol screens will also not work because it has an active radar head that can distinguish ground targets. This system is the main one, while thermal imaging and semi-active laser are auxiliary.

And it was the GBU-53/B from Raytheon called StormBreaker that was selected by the Pentagon and in 2015 its limited production and delivery to the US Air Force began. At the same time, the GBU-39/B from Boeing has been supplied since 2006 and already at the 2012 level was called a temporary solution until the appearance of the GBU-53.

What is known about GLSDB

Earlier, UNIAN wrote that in February the Ukrainian Armed Forces began using American GLSDB winged bombs against the invaders at the front, but Russia has already found a way to counter it .

OSINT researcher John Ridge also wrote that the American GLSDB ammunition performed very poorly during the war in Ukraine.

(C)UNIAN 2024