Overview

The Armament Directorate seeks innovative technologies that support Digital Engineering, Reach, Affordable Mass, Autonomous Collaboration, Non-Kinetic Effects, and Sensing and Communications – our Innovation Targets. Cost reducing technologies are critical, so inventories are successfully built and maintained.

“WE HAVE A CLEAR PRIORITY ON THE
WEAPONS we need to win,
but we can't win
without all of our mission partners.”

Brigadier General

Jason Bartolomei

Program Executive Officer

for Weapons

A CLEAR FOCUS ON WEAPONS

The SIx Innovation Targets

department of the air force's Operational Imperatives

Setting the target for the Armament Directorate’s mission to harvest, mature, demonstrate, and transition the best and most innovative ideas into disruptive national munitions capabilities.

The Directorate is focused on four of the seven imperatives:

Tactical Air Dominance

Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) requires a family-of-systems approach. A full family of innovative platforms and weapons systems must come together for our Air Force to dominate the skies.

Moving Target Engagement

The ability to identify, track, and engage numerous targets simultaneously, requires a mix of air- and space-based capabilities.

Readiness to Deploy and Fight

A wide range of supporting information systems and facilities are utilized in both the continental U.S. and overseas, to mobilize, deploy and support our forces in a major conflict. All of these can be targeted by a wide variety of threats, including cyber and kinetic threats.

Global Strike

Identifying the components of a B-21 family-of-systems, including uncrewed combat aircraft.

Click here to learn more about the Operational Imperatives.

“The Department of the Air Force’s
Operational Imperatives
have put a
clear focus on weapons.”

Brigadier General

Jason Bartolomei

Program Executive Officer

for Weapons

For more information on the Air Force's Operational Imperatives, visit this link

DISRUPTIVE FUTURES OPERATIONAL FRAMEWORK

the digital
trinity

“We’re doubling down on Digital, Agile, and Open.”

Brigadier General

Jason Bartolomei

Delivering capabilities at the speed of relevance for our future force is the use of integrated digital ecosystems to design, test, and modernize systems.

The elements of this integrated digital ecosystem, or "digital trinity," includes digital engineering, agile software, and open systems architecture.

By leveraging these tools, weapons will benefit from rapid prototyping and flexibility to incorporate advanced technologies and upgrades.

The Armament Directorate is looking to partner with innovative industry partners that embody these concepts as we accelerate the future of weapons development.

digital

CREATE BEFORE YOU AVIATE
‍
Digital acquisition is not the “status quo” but rather, “the status next.” In the digital world, there is an opportunity to design, build, and test countless models before building it in the physical world.

It is where future wars will be won or lost. Full digital threading is foundational to the ‘trinity’ for industry partners, lowering costs and time for production through digital designs with real-world problems applied, maximizing optimization and automation, and lowering risk through modeling first.

Agile

Warp from tech stack to edge effortlessly
‍
Deployment of software technologies to the edge, an operational system in near real-time speed is the goal.

Technology stack layers must be fully containerized to simplify integration challenges across platforms-it should be available enterprise-wide, bases on an enterprise reference architecture, with all tools necessary for program success.

open

Own, share, and furnish the tech stack
‍
Open architecture lays out the guidelines for the data, models and software, or the technology stack that make a program’s digital lifecycle.

Architecture components should be open for the future system modernization and sustainment competition. Open architecture consolidates common resources, decreases risk, reuses software, enhances maintenance abilities, reduces costs, and increases tactical options.

commonality

Emerging technologies across the six Innovation Targets must address commonality. The Armament Directorate will develop and share these concepts to meet recurrent challenges, swapping subsystems and microservices across the munitions portfolio.

Air delivered armaments share similar “architectural domains” such as guidance, navigation, and control systems, warheads, propulsion systems, seekers, etc. We require highly modular and software defined capabilities, with the ability to reuse software and hardware architectures across services and mission areas and insist on a challenge-based acquisitions approach to maximize competition for system subcomponents.

Of interest are common, small form factor, hardware architectures that fit within a 5” tube, use of commercial heterogeneous System on Chip (SoC), System on Module (SoM) or System in Package (SiP) to reduce Size/Weight/Power/Cost and unclassified Weapons Open System Architecture (WOSA) implementation models leveraging the Systems Modeling Language (SysML).

Modularity and commonality must also address efficient design by leveraging advanced artificial intelligence (AI) methods like generative design to eliminate parasitic weapon weight, increasing battery efficiency (Wh/kg) and solid rocket motor efficiency (Isp).

The Directorate seeks the ability to evolve toward a common software centric development organization. As our weapons become modular and software defined, it is critical that we adopt and develop methods for agile embedded software design and acquisition.
‍

the goal of commonality

Ultimately, the goal is to enable the adoption and establishment of modular software architectures and frameworks, executing best practices to expedite system upgrades, repurposing these architectures and frameworks; therefore, encouraging collaboration across services and mission areas.

digital engineering

The Armament Directorate is investigating concepts to employ emerging technologies faster. Implementation of digital engineering across the weapons enterprise will grow and accelerate the transition of advanced technologies. We seek digital solutions to utilize Weapons Open System Architecture (WOSA) at its maximum extent.

Use of the Systems Modeling Language (SysML) is a critical enabler of WOSA and the catalyst for modular weapons. Process and network modeling ensure an early understanding of tactical, operational, and strategic weapons system implications.

The Directorate is exploring the use of the Advanced Framework for Simulation, Integration and Modeling (AFSIM) tool for all integrated flight simulations, lethality validity models, autonomy implementations and collaborative weapons system effects.

SPECIFIC DIGITAL ENGINEERING
AREAS OF FOCUS INCLUDE:

Model-Based Systems Engineering

Data mining/optimization tools

Armament unique modeling and simulation

Multi-security level solutions

reach

First look. First kill. The Armament Directorate is searching for concepts with increased standoff range and reach outside of threat range. These concepts must allow Blue aircraft to effectively prosecute targets in the air and on the ground. Intended targets include fighters, soft stationary ground targets, hardened targets, moving ground targets, and maritime targets.

Increased standoff ranges will provide aircraft and flight crews increased safety against IADs or air-to-air attack.

WEAPON CLASSES OF INTEREST INCLUDE:

Cruise missiles

High loft missiles

Air-to-air missiles

Hypersonic weapons

Air-launched, “truck” vehicles

Industry partners should examine extended range solutions that do not exceed the procurement cost of current weapons to permit inventories to be created and maintained within current budgets, projected budgets, and anticipated budgets

SPECIFIC TECHNOLOGIES UNDER ANALYSIS FOR AIR ARMAMENTS INCLUDE:

Propulsion technologies

Ramjets/scramjetsGas
gas turbine engines
Rockets

New lightweight and/or high
temperature materials for use in
armament propulsion systems

Warhead technologies and design
concepts

Communications and datalink
technologies/concepts

autonomous collaboration

The Armament Directorate is pursuing ideas that permit Blue Forces to command various collaborative weapons to employ coordinated tactics to ensure success. A fluid battlespace requires automated, adaptive weapons systems, and cooperative tactics. The Directorate must deliver massed weapon waves that adapt to that battlespace, maximizing outcomes in situations that would likely overwhelm human decision-makers.

Anticipated benefits include providing more assured target prosecution in a complex battlespace and nearly infinite tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTP) modification and application toward creating new and world unique capabilities.

WEAPON CLASSES OF INTEREST INCLUDE:

Ranged air-to-ground weapons

Decoys

SPECIFIC TECHNOLOGIES UNDER ANALYSIS INCLUDE:

Artificial intelligence algorithms with “dialable” human influence

Target identification schema
schemaTarget prioritization algorithm

Collaborative weapons playbook scripts

Datalink technologies and theories

Miniaturized, reliable electronics

Electronic warfare concepts and capabilities

non-kinetic effects

The Armament Directorate seeks concepts with non-kinetic effects that are either interchangeable with kinetic weapons or connected to them. These concepts should increase Blue Forces’ magazine depth and present new armament delivered capabilities to the battlefield.

Many non-kinetic weapons are electric power derived and afford the potential of multiple “shots” per weapon engagement versus a traditional kinetic weapon. Other non-kinetic effects provide different effects than kinetic weapons that may be as effective in the battle space as a kinetic weapon with lower cost and /or in a smaller package.

WEAPON CLASSES OF INTEREST THAT COULD POTENTIALLY EMPLOY SUCH EFFECTS INCLUDE:

Cruise missiles

loft missiles

Air-to-air missiles

Hypersonic weapons

Air-launched, “truck” vehicles

Several potential targets and applicable technologies exist to support this lane; unfortunately, security considerations drive the discussion of many to levels unable to be addressed herein.

SPECIFIC TECHNOLOGIES UNDER ANALYSIS FOR AIR ARMAMENTS INCLUDE:

Lasers

EM/RF sources

Cyber packages and delivery technologies

Disposable or re-usable “dispenser” vehicles

High-density power sources

Sensing and communications

The Armament Directorate is pursuing concepts focused on enabling Blue Forces to utilize weapons as major contributors to multi-domain command and control [MDC2] space. Weapons employed in mass provide the opportunity for use as communication nodes and/or sensors.

As communication nodes, weapons could be used to pass along targeting information (piggybacked) forward over large distances or used to report back sensor information from extreme incursions.

As sensors, seeker input could provide better battlespace intelligence regarding other classifiable targets along the weapon’s path as well as be used to confirm target destruction.

In mass, diverse sensor data from different weapons integrated together provide Blue Forces with additional layers of intelligence as the battlespace unfolds.

WEAPON CLASSES OF INTEREST INCLUDE:

Cruise missiles

High loft missiles

Air-to-air missiles

Hypersonic weapons

Air-launched, “truck” vehicles

SPECIFIC TECHNOLOGIES UNDER ANALYSIS INCLUDE:

Low-cost, multi spectral seekers

Datalinks technologies/concepts

Data transmission and evaluation software/algorithms

Disposable or re-usable “dispenser” vehicles

High-density power sources

affordable mass

The Armament Directorate is probing concepts that permit Blue Forces to leverage large numbers of relatively low-cost weapons systems simultaneously.

ANTICIPATED BENEFITS INCLUDE:

01.

Driving costs on the adversary,

02.

Depleting adversary defensive weapons inventories,

03.

Clearing the way (during reloading or empty magazine periods) for premier Blue systems to pass.

THESE INNOVATIVE TECHNOLOGIES COULD HAVE THE FOLLOWING:

Low-cost materials and manufacturing processes

Low-cost propulsion systems

Modular open-system payload architectures

Disposable or re-usable dispenser vehicles

Miniaturized, reliable electronics to include flight controls, mission computers, seekers, etc.

Electronic warfare concepts and armament-based transmission capabilities

An example of a specific capability would be an expedited and affordable gas-turbine engine prototype enabled by advanced manufacturing.

TARGETS OF INTEREST INCLUDE:

Soft stationary ground targets (fixed and mobile)

Moving ground targets

Maritime targets

Surrogate Test Vehicle Weapon Government Reference Architecture (GRA) Instantiation

The Armament Directorate is investigating applying the Weapon GRA to an inventory weapon as a surrogate implementation. This ensures the GRA is robust enough to model current weapons and allow changes; therefore, improving the GRA in an agile manner. A specific area of interest is model-based systems engineering.