Air Force may put Angry Kitten in planes for electronic warfare edge

WASHINGTON — A ferocious feline may assist remodel how the U.S. army approaches electronic warfare.

The so-called Angry Kitten, a cluster of electronic parts contained in a vaguely cat-shaped tube, has proved so profitable as a coaching instrument in simulating enemy EW actions that officers with Air Combat Command really useful at the very least 4 pods be reworked for use in precise fight, permitting fighter pilots to profit in the true world.

The Air Force has used Angry Kitten in assessments and coaching for years, outfitting aggressor squadrons with the gear to harass trainees and replicate electronic assaults. Lessons realized from utilizing the system have “dramatically shaped the direction” of the service, it mentioned Aug. 3.

During evaluations this 12 months, Angry Kitten equipment was reprogrammed in a single day to account for circumstances beforehand encountered, which means strategies used the subsequent day had been each higher knowledgeable and more practical. The fast turnarounds are a departure from the Air Force’s historically inflexible software-hardware coupling that take money and time to retool.

“The hardware and software stovepipe solutions prevalent throughout the Air Force enterprise significantly impair the Air Force’s ability to quickly adapt and defeat new emerging electromagnetic systems threats,” mentioned Keith Kirk, who manages a marketing campaign often known as AERRES, experiments aimed toward creating app-enabled EW methods.

With Angry Kitten, “software was updated within hours based on the performance they were seeing against certain threats and then was improved, and those improvements were verified during flight test the following day,” he mentioned in an announcement. “That’s really tough to do with software and tools that are not designed to open standards.”

The on-the-fly modifications had been made attainable by an open-ended design that the Air Force expects to more and more make use of in the long run.

The Angry Kitten Combat Pod was examined final 12 months on the Northern Lightning train, as effectively. The Air Force on the time mentioned groups recognized avenues to transform the pod from coach to battle-ready. Recent suggestions will inform a possible fielding determination.

The fight pod is derived from expertise developed by the Georgia Tech Research Institute, which in 2013 mentioned the venture used industrial electronics, customized {hardware} and novel machine-learning to supply “unprecedented levels” of adaptability.

Researchers referred to the matter as cognitive EW, methods that use machine studying and different refined tech to pick a method of jamming, analyze its effectiveness after which self-correct to use recognized weak spot. The observe is totally different than deploying chaff, materials used to confuse radar, or different more-common measures.

Dominating the electromagnetic spectrum will probably be crucial in a battle with China or Russia, the 2 most vital nationwide safety threats, in accordance with U.S. officers. Modern warfare depends closely on the spectrum, which is used to speak with pleasant forces, to determine and suppress opponents, and to information weapons.

Angry Kitten’s less-than-fearsome identify — a far cry from the aggressive monikers the army typically makes use of, corresponding to Reaper or Predator drones or Hellfire missiles — is a mixture of inside joke and design targets, in accordance with a 2013 Newsweek report, which famous “the system reacts with ‘the mind of a cat.’”

“Despite having an admittedly slightly silly name, Angry Kitten represents very serious technology,” Roger Dickerson, senior analysis engineer with the Sensor and Electromagnetic Applications Laboratory on the Georgia Tech Research Institute, instructed C4ISRNET in 2015. “We’ve been working hard to improve the capabilities and the readiness of the war fighters in our sponsor organizations: the Army, the Navy and especially the U.S. Air Force air combat community.”