NASHUA, N.H. – Autonomous technologies and unmanned systems are set to play a leading role in how U.S. Marines operating on invasion beaches defend themselves from enemy warships that seek to thwart Marine Corps footholds in captured territory.
It comes down to the role of armed unmanned vehicles in the future Navy/Marine Expeditionary Ship Interdiction System (NMESIS), which aims to use shore-based long-range anti-ship missiles and unmanned vehicles to defend Marines from attacks by enemy surface warships.
The anti-ship weapons will be the Raytheon Naval Strike Missile (NSM), which has an imaging infrared seeker, an onboard target database, and navigates by Global Positioning System (GPS), inertial sensors, and terrain-reference systems.
The NSM can detect, recognize, and discriminate among targets independently, and is designed to strike enemy ships at or near the water line to inflict maximum structural damage. Raytheon is building the NSM in partnership with Kongsberg Gruppen in Kongsberg, Norway.
Unmanned systems and machine autonomy come into the picture with how the Marine Corps will deploy and operate the NSM once Marines fight their way ashore and get organized.
NMESIS will provide Marine Corps High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) battalions with NSM anti-ship capabilities. Launchers for the NSM anti-ship weapons will be unmanned remotely operated versions of the Oshkosh Defense Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV), each which will carry two NSMs.
The combination of the unmanned JLTV missile launchers and NSM anti-ship weapons will be called the Remotely Operated Ground Unit for Expeditionary Fires (ROGUE-Fires). Oshkosh Defense won a $23.7 million Marine Corps Systems command contract earlier this month to provide the ROGUE-Fires unmanned JLTV launchers. The NSM is a modernized version of the Norwegian Penguin anti-ship missile.
The remotely operated ROGUE-Fires vehicles will make the most of machine automation and unmanned systems technologies once they hit the beaches with the Marines.
Invasion beaches are busy places, where Marines are concerned primarily with fighting-off enemy attempts to throw them back into the sea, setting up communications and command posts, placing the Northrop Grumman Ground/Air Task-Oriented Radar (G/ATOR) for air defense, and supplying Marine infantry with ammunition, fuel, food, and other supplies.
Each time a system like a ROGUE-Fires vehicle can operate unmanned frees a Marine from driving vehicles, and helps the Marine take-on more important responsibilities. To make ROGUE-Fires and NMESIS operations even more efficient, one Marine can operate several unmanned missile launchers to help hold enemy ships at bay.
The ROGUE Fires version of the JLTV lacks a crew cab and body, and is integrated with sensors and cameras, with a launcher mounted on top of the vehicle.
Experts from the Marine Corps and Raytheon tested the NMESIS off the coast of California in April 2021. The ROGUE Fires vehicle is remotely operated using the teleoperator or leader-follower modes. It was built for the Marines to support anti-ship operations from the ground.
Using unmanned remotely operated vehicles as anti-ship missile launchers could be only the beginning. As this concept gains credibility, undoubtedly similar systems will evolve quickly from drivers to remote operation.
There are many possibilities for battlefield unmanned vehicles, ranging from logistics and warfighter resupply, to mobile communications center setup and relocation, to combat vehicle refueling, to battery recharging.
With unmanned applications like those in place, it's just a matter of time before combat functions start relying on machine automation technologies for efficiency on the leading edge of the battlefield.
Future applications won't involve just remote operation, either. We're on the cusp of a new era when artificial intelligence, machine learning, and other autonomous technologies start to take their places beside warfighters in the heat of battle.
