How to counter Smart Decoys like MALD?

USAF contracts Raytheon for more MALD-J decoys
Gareth Jennings, London - IHS Jane's Defence Weekly
18 March 2015
A pair of MALD decoy test units being carried by an F-16. Both the MALD and newer MALD-J look the same, although the operational decoy is painted in the standard low-visibility grey. Source: Raytheon

The US Air Force (USAF) has awarded Raytheon a USD91.6 million contract for Lot 8 production of the ADM-160C Miniature Air Launched Decoy Jammer (MALD-J).

The contract, which was announced by the Department of Defense (DoD) on 18 March, covers 250 MALD-J decoys, and will be complete by 30 June 2017.

The MALD system is designed to mimic the radar and flight signature of a manned fighter or bomber, thereby confusing enemy air-defence systems. The MALD-J provides for an additional electronic warfare capability to actively jam enemy air defences, and is now the sole variant being delivered to the USAF.

The MALD-J has an operational range of about 900 km after launch, with its flight characteristics able to be preprogrammed to better represent a particular manned type. Its single Hamilton Sundstrand TJ-150 turbojet powers it to a surge speed of Mach 0.9 or an endurance speed of about Mach 0.6.

The decoy has been integrated on the USAF's Lockheed Martin F-16 Fighting Falcon and Boeing B-52 Stratofortress aircraft, although it can be launched from any aircraft that can carry the AIM-120 Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missile.

Raytheon has also conducted deployment tests via the 'six-pack' Cargo Aircraft Launch System, enabling it to be dropped from transport aircraft such as the Lockheed Martin C-130 Hercules and Boeing C-17 Globemaster III. Further to this, the General Atomics Aeronautical Systems MQ-9 Reaper unmanned aerial vehicle has also been earmarked for the system.

http://www.janes.com/article/50050/usaf-contracts-raytheon-for-more-mald-j-decoys

The system S-300/400 or Su-30/35 will be disabled when confronted with the aircraft equipped with this decoys ?

I think it's MALD weakness will limit the amount of missiles that F-22/35/15/16/18 carries, however, EA-18G will clearly be priorities MALD plane for SEAD missions and fool S-300/400, but for air combat, the MALD completely obstruct to F-15/16/35

video illustration

MALD only fool SAM systems, however if mixed S-300/400 + S-200/125 SAM will obviously overwhelming number of all of decoys and fighters

MALD used to disguise for F-15/16, B-52, they are the aircraft have RCS moderate or large (10-15m2 F-15, F-16 3m2, on the front).
Ground-based radar will detection be higher by obviously aspect underneath the decoys (MALD aka F-15/16), including Tomahawk missiles. Easily detected by the old radar systems, they are not equipped with ECM fixed as F-15/16, B-52, so the old system as the S-200/125/75 is upgraded to shoot down them, before the more modern systems S-300/400 goes to work

But hang on, the US is going to spend billions of dollars on stealthy F-35s, so what RCS are these drones supposed to be simulating?

The use of such drones would be to test defences and to divert attention from actual attacks or to deplete resources.

the obvious counter would be to have your own drones or UAVs to fly up and examine any incoming threats... depending upon the results of those intercepts the defence can choose a range of options to react... from UCAVs with Verba like AAMs to shoot down the drones cheaply and efficiently or to send interceptors and launch heavy SAMs... perhaps also including launching cruise missile attacks at the bases the aircraft and drones were launched from.

How to counter Smart Decoys like MALD-J, which create a bomber-like signature to confuse radar systems ?

max steel wrote:How to counter Smart Decoys like MALD-J, which create a bomber-like signature to confuse radar systems ?

Part of the reason S-350 exists is to counter saturation. But we need to remember that a decoy is just a decoy, while the USAF can launch a handful of decoys, the S-300/400/500 can also be protected by decoys, and a ground-based decoy is always going to be cheaper and easier to deploy en masse than air-based decoys.

ROFAR/Photonics will pretty much make systems like MALD, and conventional "stealth" designs obsolete anyways. KRET is aiming to introduce their new optical radars over the next two years.

max steel wrote:How to counter Smart Decoys like MALD-J, which create a bomber-like signature to confuse radar systems ?

As I read the description of this decoy it is capable to foul an old type, rotating VHF radar, a phased array radar can't be fulled by this.It is too small for that.

That can be the reason why they try to use the modified version of it as a mini tomahawk against TELs.

Singular_trafo wrote:

max steel wrote:How to counter Smart Decoys like MALD-J, which create a bomber-like signature to confuse radar systems ?

As I read the description of this decoy it is capable to foul an old type, rotating VHF radar, a phased array radar can't be fulled by this.It is too small for that.

That can be the reason why they try to use the modified version of it as a mini tomahawk against TELs.

Which modified version ? MALD-J ?

max steel wrote:

Singular_trafo wrote:

max steel wrote:How to counter Smart Decoys like MALD-J, which create a bomber-like signature to confuse radar systems ?

As I read the description of this decoy it is capable to foul an old type, rotating VHF radar, a phased array radar can't be fulled by this.It is too small for that.

That can be the reason why they try to use the modified version of it as a mini tomahawk against TELs.

Which modified version ? MALD-J ?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ADM-160_MALD


I'm talking about the experiment variants.


That showing where they wantto go.

They mention somewhere that the original motivation was the loss of an f-115.

It is easy to jamm a mechaicaly steered radar.

AlfaT8 wrote:


I though we already went through this, so ones more, simply put a Jammers effectiveness relies on 3 basic factors: Power, Size, type of jamming/ability, in the case of MALD (experimental and/or otherwise) no matter how good it's Jamming capabilities are it will be crippled by it's small power and form factor, so at long ranges the best you could hope for is it being a decoy, so don't expect AD radars of greater size and power to go blind anytime soon.

It is a bit more complicated than that.


The strenght of electromagnetic field and the distance has quadratic relationship, means if you decrease the distance to the third then you need one magnitude less power to has the same signal strenght.

So, if you have a cheap (million dollar range) jammer, then you can affor do send it next to the radar,and there the operator either shoot down the cheap drone, or they can't see part of the sky.


Other side, if a B-2 going into russia then it can carry twnety of these jammers, dispersing them on the way like candy , blinding out the radars.

The only protection against this kind of jamming (or as matter of face agains any kind of jamming) is if you use multiple radar,overlapping each others.

You need real high energy output in order to jam newer radars. Take a look how Russia tried to jam the S-300 radar systems of old. They were supposedly only ones successful in it and they used an Il-76 modified in EW mode. According to Militarov, they managed to jam themselves (aircraft) so it isn't an effective system. Ground systems have easier access to high amounts of energy over flying objects. All in all, having little missiles to jam a radar is rather stupid and expensive system over just simply sustain fire on a position with anti-radiation missiles or other guided munitions.

Well Russian AD systems are difficult to jam a miniature decoy jammer doing what you mentioned is improbable. But again B-2 has stealth and stealth is all about distance if you track B-2 at 90 km then it's all over for your AD systems. Same is the case with raptors F-22 how far you can detect them that matters. A russian radar can track f-117a at 300 km. I will tell you the name of radar later.

Basic X band radar or VHF and UHF?  Because those would see F-117 at significantly longer ranges as they operate in L band as example

detection is one thing, locking & targeting is another. This is where low frequency (LF) lacks, they've comparatively very poor resolution and low accuracy than normal (HF) radars. Thus, they're unable to provide sufficient guidance to the missiles - precision targeting can't be done like in X-band. In order to fix their resolution, the LF radar needs to be built as large as possible - i.e. only ground based. Ground based large LF radars are 'better' in detecting stealth aircrafts but their effective range of targeting stealth aircrafts (like F-22/B-2) is still "very low"(if at all), such that they can be easily targeted by F-22/35 by the time the Ground radar station could detect-lock the aircraft.

The size and high power emissions of these (LF) radars, with limited mobility, makes them much easier to detect and destroy.

Detecting the stealth aircraft isn't the problem, it's how far you can detect them & then how much time you have to get a successful shot before you're blown up by a ASM.


KBR Vostok E wins the mobility game with an 8 minute deploy and stow time, using a hydraulically folded and elevated antenna. This new VHF radar is also fully digital, solid state, and employs an innovative "Kharchenko" square ring antenna element design. Defeat of US stealth is a primary claim by its designers, who state the ability to track an F-117A at 190 nautical mile range(300 km).

sepheronx wrote:You need real high energy output in order to jam newer radars. Take a look how Russia tried to jam the S-300 radar systems of old. They were supposedly only ones successful in it and they used an Il-76 modified in EW mode. According to Militarov, they managed to jam themselves (aircraft) so it isn't an effective system. Ground systems have easier access to high amounts of energy over flying objects. All in all, having little missiles to jam a radar is rather stupid and expensive system over just simply sustain fire on a position with anti-radiation missiles or other guided munitions.

US bought 1500 of these missiles for half billion $, so they has to know what they want to do with them .


You don't need to disable the radar.All that you want to do it hide part of the sky from it.

Singular_trafo wrote:

sepheronx wrote:You need real high energy output in order to jam newer radars.  Take a look how Russia tried to jam the S-300 radar systems of old.  They were supposedly only ones successful in it and they used an Il-76 modified in EW mode. According to Militarov, they managed to jam themselves (aircraft) so it isn't an effective system.  Ground systems have easier access to high amounts of energy over flying objects.  All in all, having little missiles to jam a radar is rather stupid and expensive system over just simply sustain fire on a position with anti-radiation missiles or other guided munitions.

US bought 1500 of these missiles for half billion $, so they has to know what they want to do with them .


You don't need to disable the radar.All that you want to do it hide part of the sky from it.

And you are aware that there are ECM/ECCM and EW systems at SAM sites in Russia, right? There was a good video about it. US can invest in whatever it wants, but as we all know, usually it ends up as an expensive waste of money (F-35 is perfect example). As well, there are passive systems available that will be watching/listening and they also pose as a problem. This goes for both sides of the fence - Russia and US.

In the end, the much cheaper solution is salvo launches.

Did you guys read my post above or not I'm waiting for your responses.

What is there to read about it? There are multitude of radars and subsystems meant for detecting and tracking stealth targets. Most stealth units such as F-22 and B-2 are stealthy in X-band radar. Even then, they also release infrared signature and as well as signals like radar and communication (any kind of radiation) that sensors/subsystems/passive systems will be able to pick up at great distances and with high accuracy. Modern UHF and VHF are quite accurate with its detections and tracking. As example was the detection and tracking of Israeli launched BM.

I want to start a discussion ( maybe a new thread can be made) plus I've my own doubts also F22 could potentially be flying into Satellite denial environment. Not so sure comms are going to just work fine under enemy airspace. Again, not easy like Without GPS navigation how to fly deep strike missions( by F-22 and B-2) into opponent territory ?


Is it correct that the moment the F22 turns on her radar it is game over ?


When F-22 or B-2 opens it weapons bay can it be detected then ?

From what I see with these US programs is that they are inept at grasping the simple fact that they will not be facing S-300V/S-400/S-500 or Buk-M3 or Tor-M2 or even Sukhois and MiGs. They will be facing a combination of all of the above including Russia's own EW hardware. A layered Russian IADS is something the US currently does not have an inventory to deal with, and coming up with new proposals that deal with only single components of a huge and complex system is not an effective way for them to tackle it.

Thats the thing. Russia has multitude of systems at its disposal to deal with major threats.

Tor and Pantsir to deal with PGM's and UAV's, helicopters, and low flying planes. Buk and early S-300 systems to deal with medium range and altitude targets like planes and cruise missiles, S-400 and S-300V4 for dealing with longer range targets and high altitude like short/med range ballistic missiles and high targeted aircrafts. Then there is of course MiG-31's and Su-27/Su-35's to deal with threats too. So it will never be a 1 to 1 match, on both sides.

sepheronx wrote:Thats the thing.  Russia has multitude of systems at its disposal to deal with major threats.

Tor and Pantsir to deal with PGM's and UAV's, helicopters, and low flying planes.  Buk and early S-300 systems to deal with medium range and altitude targets like planes and cruise missiles, S-400 and S-300V4 for dealing with longer range targets and high altitude like short/med range ballistic missiles and high targeted aircrafts.  Then there is of course MiG-31's and Su-27/Su-35's to deal with threats too.  So it will never be a 1 to 1 match, on both sides.

There was an LM video recently of them demonstrating how they'd take out the S-400 system by using a combination of C-17 launched signature generating UAVs followed by a simultaneous attack of real aircraft/PGMs, hoping to overwhelm/exhaust the S-400 with fake targets while the real threats did all the work. But the issue was that  it offered an ideal situation where the S-400 was all alone with no SHORAD protection or interceptor cover, let alone Krasuha-4 or Richag-AV etc.

Given that Nebo-M can apparently track things with the RCS of a tennis ball at huge ranges I wonder how easy it would be for it to ID the C-17s and hence the drones as they were launched and subsequently task the system with ignoring them... bit of a gamble if you ask me.

EDIT: I feel like I saw the video here. Can't find it though.