https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/inside- ... ip-1223971
Akash is automated as well.
So here an AI, or an algorithm (AI is far more complex and learns) if you prefer, uses a bunch of weapons and systems effectively, in a very timely fashion and humans intervene only if it makes some egregious error.But at the moment, the Commander of the ship and his First Officer, monitoring all of the ship's sensors and systems from their station in the middle of the Ops Centre, had a more immediate concern.
Ellora, the Electronic Warfare suite, had picked up emissions from the same area where the Kochi's surface search radar had earlier detected a contact. And the news was getting worse. Ellora had classified the threat. It was indeed a Chinese Type-052 D destroyer, a ship of the same class as the Kochi and the pride of the Chinese Navy.
Seconds later, a loud buzzer sounded. "Incoming missile!" shouted 'SAMs' - the Officer manning the Surface to Air Missile console. Far above him, electronic beams from the Israeli built MF-STAR (Multi-Function Surveillance, Track And Guidance Radar) had homed into a clear and present threat.
The Chinese destroyer had fired a long range YJ-18 'Eagle Strike' missile directly at the Kochi. "Second missile incoming!" shouted SAMs, as the radar began tracking a second and then a third Chinese subsonic missile headed straight in Kochi's direction.
But INS Kochi had an answer - the Barak-8 LR-SAM, a long range Surface to Air Missile system jointly developed by Israel and India.
Kochi had 32 missiles onboard, missiles designed to deal with exactly this threat.
"Another missile inbound. That makes it four missiles inbound!" - this was a worst case scenario - a saturation attack. The fate of the 390 Officers and Men on the Kochi was now effectively in the hands of a highly-automated weapon system.
Now in full-auto mode, the first Indian Barak 8 blasted off its vertical launcher ahead of the bridge of the destroyer. Accelerating quickly to four times the speed of sound, the missile shot straight up before arching in a parabola in the direction of the enemy missile it was assigned to intercept. The missile was not flying blind.
Critical data indicating the direction, speed and location of the incoming Chinese anti-ship missile was being fed to the Barak, enabling it to lock on to the first Chinese missile precisely.
In the final few seconds of its flight, the Barak, now being directed by data from its own radar, dove down towards the Chinese missile. In moments, its warhead would detonate, activated by a proximity fuse triggered when the distance between the Barak and the incoming enemy missile was no more than a few feet. The first Chinese Eagle Strike missile had been destroyed more than 70 kilometres away from the Kochi.
But with the Chinese destroyer launching its missiles in quick succession, the second, third and fourth Eagle Strike missiles, some flying different trajectories than the first, closed in on the Kochi.
The Kochi kept firing as the incoming missiles closed in, the automatic system assigning two missiles each to the final two missiles.
The Kochi's RBU-6000 anti-submarine rocket launcher, Barak missile silos and main gun visible from the Bridge of the Kochi.
Inside the Ops Centre, the Commander of the Kochi focussed straight ahead at a large LCD screen that dominated the Ops Centre. On it, critical data from 'SAM's' console was now being shown. And as they tried their best to focus on their individual systems, different officers manning other systems would glance up at the big screen to get an idea of what was happening. They all knew that this was life or death. And they all knew there was nothing really left for them to do. Unless they chose to deliberately intervene, the system was completely automated - Barak 8 surface to air missiles would keeping shooting off the fore and aft deck of the Kochi until every last incoming missile was destroyed. Or every last Barak missile had been fired.
And if the Eagle Strike missiles weren't intercepted, Kochi would still keep fighting. Two of four Russian-designed AK-630 anti-missile guns onboard the Kochi would collectively spew out 10,000 rounds per minute, creating a wall of lead between the Eagle Strike and the Kochi. The incoming missiles, it was hoped, would be obliterated as they tried to pierce this wall. And even as the missiles approached, there were other defensive systems on board the Kochi.
Ellora, the Electronic Counter Measures system would try and jam the radars of the incoming Eagle-Strike while 'Kavach', an indigenous system would fire aluminium chaff in the area to confuse the sensors of the Eagle Strike and make the missile veer away harmlessly from the ship.
Note how the system automatically assigns two missiles to the closer target.
Now as the automation improves EVEN further, the warfighters with the better overall system have an advantage.
Much like the Rafale with sensor fusion (an algorithm taking away the clutter and deconflicting targets) has a huge advantage over say a Su-27 which too might detect targets via IRST/radar and RWR but they are grouped on different screens and the pilot has to manually decide which targets to engage, which targets to jam, and while doing all this has to focus on somehow not messing up his flying.