Hi, I'm just curious about the SM-2MR Block III/IIIA performance against SSCMs. I'm not looking for classified data here, but I have been searching around for anything that might give an idea (ballpark) how successfully the SM-2MR can engage sea-skimming supersonic cruise missiles like the SS-N-19/22. I'm thinking that performance would be "good" - that is, the Ticos (let's not consider Burkes for now) in a CVBG would be able to reliably defend against an attack by a Russian SAG shooting SS-N-12/19s, by themselves without help from friendly fighters.

On paper, the Block III/IIIA looks good. But it's perplexing because every sim the Aegis/Tico has ever been in it's been shown to be unable to handle Russian SSCMs.

Does anyone have any thoughts to share on this? I'm not looking for precise figures or concrete numbers - just a ballpark idea of whether the Aegis system can reliably protect the CVBG in case of war between the two superpowers. I know there are missiles like RAM and ESSM now, but I'm specifically curious about the SM-2MR.

Something tells me for gameplay purposes the SM performance is undermodelled. While I do believe some SSCMs would get thru in real life, I think far too many get thru in these games.



The Jedi Master

Well, obviously some missiles would get through given enough SSCMs to saturate Aegis. What I don't get though is why is USN surface power consistently modelled as inferior to the Soviet's?

Everything I've read suggests that Aegis is not something aircraft want to mess with. But is it good enough to say that it is a more reliable defense against enemy cruise missiles than soft-kill mechanisms?

I thought Aegis was developed to fight cruise missiles in the first place, not just planes. I think it's the best defense in service today, if you're talking about a self-contained system, that is.

Obviously one of the problems is most games are incapable of presenting enough cruise missiles at once, so they scale it way back. I think it was RSR where they mentioned the Aegis firing all its 90+ missiles in the space of a minute or something to try and knock down the incoming?



The Jedi Master

Well, the standard answer is "it depends". But the ability to engage cruise missiles (which are essentially non-manuvering targets) is going to have alot to do with the capabilities of the engagement radar, and the Aegis system is one of the most versatile and capable in the world. What is more, it is not as if the USN had never heard of the concept of sea skimming missiles prior to the deployment of the Aegis, and while dumber things have happened, I would find it unlikely that the USN completely ignored that threat when developing the system. Finally, it is my opinion that the Russians tend to (grossly) exagerate the capabilities of alot of their weapons systems, while the US military tends to understate technical specifications of its own weapons (look at the layman predictions for the result of the Persian Gulf War air campaign verses the actual results). So I would say the Aegis with SM-2 should be able to engage Russian sea skimming missiles with some success, more than is indicated by most computer games.

The SM-2MR block III and IIIA are very capable against small and maneuverable targets, most modern ASM's like the Harpoon II use radical maneuvering, like "S" maneuvers, in the attack phase of flight, in this phase (last 10-15 NMI's) the SM-2's can launch take midcourse corrections and perform the terminal homing on the targets, most of this is due to the FC radars on the ships. Even more capable is the later Block IV missile that is specifically developed for the AEGIS ships.