Smart Bullet 1. (Slide) 2. The Army is struggling with the major changes which are presumed will occur as high tech weapons proliferate and information technologies are integrated into US forces. A major conclusion is that light, deployable vehicles will be needed to rapidly influence distant conflicts before the theaters become too difficult to enter. A lighter vehicle will obviously depend less on passive armor that the current front line vehicle (M1). It will likely rely on mobility, agility, and superior situational awareness, in addition to its armor and active protection. Given these substantial changes in the survivability equation for this new vehicle, it would not be surprising for the weapons requirements to change as well. Entirely new classes of weapons will be considered for this new vehicle. Laser, high powered microwaves, direct fire kinetic energy missiles, indirect fire missiles are all potential weapons. 3. This certainly does not exclude guns in some form. Guns have advantages over most missile concepts because they provide a large number of stowed kills, both for of cost and stowage reasons. A vehicle could stow hundreds of medium caliber gun rounds in the same space as ten or so missiles. Generally bullets are cheaper than missiles, so we can afford to carry these weapons and use them more freely. Guns can also provide flexible effects. We can do this by the simple expedient of adjustmenting to the number of rounds fired at the target. We can also, potentially, chose different rounds depending on the desire effect. We can do this to an extent now, but in principle we might be able to choose between an arbitrary number of types, from armor penetrating to "non-lethal". 4. A gun for a future vehicle would be a multimission system. It should be able to defeat (in some way) all or most of the armored vehicle threats. This could be through direct armor defeat or some less direct method of attack. The future vehicle will need to protect itself, and if the main gun(s) can share this job, it may greatly simplify the design of the vehicle. Active protection, however, requires certain capabilities not normally associated with vehicle main armaments, namely - very short targeting times, accurate intercept against strongly maneuvering targets, and all aspect coverage. Local air defense is another desirable task, but this too would severely stress current guns. Finally, the anti-personnel/anti-materiel function remains important, but with certain added capabilities, such as non-lethal attack or attack around barriers or terrain. To minimize logistics and maximize stowed kill, the gun should be, to the extent possible, one shot-one kill. 5. To meet these missions, future guns will have to address several "ilities". The gun will need to be agile - it will need to be able to service targets automatically in very reduced time lines. Such is the case with active protection. The gun may also need to be able to service many targets quickly, such as against personnel or air dropped submunitions. The gun will need to be flexible, that is, be able to move rapidly between its mission modes. This argues for an automated and rapid change of load-out, as well as the ammunition needed to do these missions. The gun system ought to be accurate, even when the platform or the target are moving and maneuvering. Finally, the new vehicle will be much lighter than 70 tons, so size, weight, and power burdens will be important. In fact, it may be more important to be able to carry two smaller guns than one larger, heavier system. 6. There are a number of enabling concept for this future gun system. These include smart munitions, advanced gun carriages, high speed breech mechanism to enable flexible choice of rounds, and novel propellants. While DARPA/TTO remains open to any technology which can revolutionize military capabilities, we are currently concentrating on the possibilities provided by guided and smart munitions. 7. Guided munitions and munitions with smart warheads provide several significant properties which are both important themselves and may enable other system solutions for the future gun. For example, guided rounds may allow for improved lethality by aim point selection. Perhaps against threat systems with greater armor and larger guns, the new vehicle can successfully target the systems that make the threat platform dangerous - poke out its eyes, for example. Guidance also allows a more efficient intercept of maneuvering targets. Finally, smart fusing can allow for more lethal rounds and new effects. For example, smoke and obscurants can be delivered close to the threat platform or even on the threat platform. 8. Just to highlight the potential benefit of guidance, I'll point to this diagram. The two curves to the left are the probability of kill as a function of range for moving shooter and target and for standing shooter and target. The orange area is the effective battlespace lost when things move. The addition of guidance results in something closer to the other curves, where the effective range is extended in all cases and less space is lost when things move. 9. A number of technologies are anticipated to be important in solving problems associated with smart bullets. The first problem to be addressed is the guidance approach. Laser semi-active approaches are attractive, in that they move many requirements from the bullet to the fire control system. On the other hand, imaging or other ATR based seekers are attractive but, understandably, extremely challenging in a small, robust package. Command guidance is also an option. This effort is open to these and other approaches. Also involved is the choice of spin or fin stabilized flight. Regardless of the guidance approach, significant sensor issues will need to be addressed. At a minimum, the IMU will be challenging subsystem. If the round employs a seeker, the potentially small apertures, high spin rates, small package, and short time lines make for a truly "DARPA-like" problem. The divert mechanism will be another new development. Divert thrusters can be employed either to provide delta-v or to induce aerodynamic moments. A number of other aerodynamic controls could be applied; including novel MEMs based solutions for boundary layer and flow control. Again, DARPA is open to any good solution. Finally, in a general sense, the fuse and warhead is a technology area of relevance. A substantial history in this area makes it appear less "high tech", but DARPA expects that novel, high pay-off approaches are still available. 10. In all these cases, cost is an important issue. These are, remember, just bullets. The launch environment will be challenging. High g-loading is expected. In addition, if the round is spin stabilized, there will be other loads. Oh, yes, this has to fit in the bullet. As we have considered rounds as small as .50 cal, this can be a significant constraint. 11. This is a DARPA seedling effort, which means that it is not a program - yet. Part of the process of developing a program is the identification of high payoff concepts which can motivate such an investment. We are interested in your ideas for this program. Please feel free to discuss this with us (me). There is also the opportunity to provide a white paper under an open solicitation. In the mean time, the government is carrying out a small study to assess the potential operational benefits of these concepts. The output from these studies, along with your ideas, may provide both the motivation and the content for a future DARPA system program.