The Soldier’s Radar: Infusing LTAMDS With Advanced Capabilities

It’s been one year since the U.S. Army awarded Raytheon Missiles & Defense a $384 million contract to deliver six Lower Tier Air & Missile Defense Sensor (LTAMDS) radar under an Other Transactional Authority (OTA) agreement. LTAMDS is a 360-degree active electronically scanned array radar powered by gallium nitride, a circuit material that strengthens the radar signal and enhances its sensitivity.
In this Q&A, Bob Kelley, Raytheon Missiles & Defense’s director of U.S. Requirements and Capabilities for Land Warfare & Air Defense, discusses the progress made on the program to this point.

Breaking Defense: Let’s talk about the threats that LTAMDS is designed to counter.

Kelley: Threats continue to evolve at a rapid pace and include ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, manned and unmanned aircraft, helicopters, rockets, artillery, and mortars. We’re seeing these fly farther, faster, and with more accuracy. When people ask me, ‘What’s the threat that you’re focused on?’ I respond that the threat doesn’t yet exist. The modern day Patriot system is very capable against today’s and tomorrow’s threats. LTAMDS is designed for the day after tomorrow’s threats.

One way that LTAMDS does that is through a 360 degree capability. With Patriot, for example, we know where the enemy is and the system faces in their direction. LTAMDS recognizes the fact that we’re not sure where the enemy is or how the enemy is going to fly at us. So we’ve given the system the ability to sense in all directions. We’ve also increased the battle space that we can protect because threats will come in from longer ranges and higher velocities. There are blind spots with a sectored radar. LTAMDS looks in every direction at all times so there are no blind spots.

In addition, LTAMDS can make use of not only the interceptors that are out there today—the PAC-2 and the PAC-3 Patriot interceptors—but will also be capable of handling any interceptor that the army decides to develop in the future. When it comes down to an air defense system, you’re really talking about three major components. What we’ve built into LTAMDS is the ability to over-match the threat that’s there today, and defeat the threats of the future.

Breaking Defense: Where does the program stand today?

Kelley: The contract was signed on October 16th, 2019, which was the last day of AUSA last year. In June of this year, only about eight months after contract award, we brought the first full-scale radar to our Pelham, New Hampshire, open air testing facility. We’ve been radiating and sensing with an LTAMDS radar since then. Last month in September, we had about a dozen Army soldiers come up to Pelham for what was called a ‘soldier touchpoint day.’ They got a full tour of the radar, interior and exterior, and saw how everything was laid out. We discussed with them about how the radar will be moved, transported, and emplaced, and also talked through radar operations and maintenance.

The point was not to give them an early lesson on the radar. It was to get their feedback and to understand from them whether we are on the right track and what we could do better. That served to be a great asset to us. We intend to continue doing these on a routine basis as we deliver LTAMDS.

The first radars are planned to be operational in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2022. So in three years from contract award we expect to have fielded six operational radars. Right now we are on or ahead of schedule in every area. I attribute a lot of that to the way this program is being run as a Section 804 Middle Tier Acquisition program. That facilitates tremendous collaboration between the U.S. government and industry, and makes it possible for us to be nimble and go fast.

And that’s what we’ve been doing. Again, eight months from contract award we have a radar sensing in Pelham, and 11 months from contract award we had Army soldiers crawling on it, touching it, operating it, kicking the tires. It’s been the cooperation and collaboration with the U.S. government team that has enabled us to go as fast as we are.

Breaking Defense: I understand that manufacturing automation has played an important role in you being able to roll quickly on this contract.

Kelley: About three years ago, we converted and fully automated our radar factory in Andover, Massachusetts. This radar is being built by robots. What that does is to give you confidence that each radar is built exactly the same way and to the same specifications with the required reliability. The amount of touch labor that goes into a Patriot radar is significant; not so with the LTAMDS.

Breaking Defense: You’re also working with a new generation of gallium nitride materials. What is the advantage of that?

Kelley: We have been working on GaN for about the past 20 years, and have our own U.S. government-certified GaN foundry. We produce what we’re calling third-generation GaN. This material is incredibly efficient and allows you to convert more of the input power to your radar into output power. That’s what radars are all about, right? How much output power can I get? That’s going to tell you a couple of things: how accurate I can be and how far I can see, which are important things for radars to do—see far and see accurately. What the gallium nitride does, and it’s not on the margins, is significantly raise the percentage of input power that can be translated into output power. It’s also a lot easier to cool, so you can take in a lot more input power. It is a leap forward, not just a step forward in radar technology.

Breaking Defense: For you personally, what’s cool about the program?

Kelley: As a former soldier, one of the things that is cool to me is that this radar is being designed and built with the soldier in mind. We’re not building a radar and then asking soldiers to figure out how to use it. We’re building it the way soldiers want it. That’s evident in the way that we’re approaching training and maintaining the radar. Beyond the fact that it is such a revolutionary capability for the mission, it is also built for the soldiers that are going to perform this mission.

Breaking Defense: What are your takeaways?

Kelley: Number One, we are delivering this radar at the ‘speed of relevance,’ a phrase coined by former Secretary of Defense James Mattis. Number Two is the collaboration and cooperation between us and the U.S. Army. This is really what’s facilitating the rapid pace of this program. And Number Three, the involvement of soldiers from very early on in the program throughout the development timeline is making it possible for us to design, build, and deliver a superior radar.