CCD — Neptunus Lex

By Lex, on February 6, 2010

When I was a lieutenant on an air wing detachment to Fallon, NV, I was assigned the responsibility of striking a “terrorist training facility” with a TV-guided Walleye II glide bomb. The Walleye was a big weapon with massive effects – the star-shaped blast frag envelope had an initial velocity of Mach 10 – so whatever you hit with it was pretty much going to be flattened.

There were two ways to employ the weapon: One option was to lock it on to a larger target at range and then just let it fly autonomously to impact. For smaller targets you had to get closer, and for well-defended targets you locked on to a contrast area at long range and then refined the solution using a datalink pod carried either on your own aircraft as you turned away, or on a partner aircraft trailing behind you.

We were given target coordinates and an imagery package to familiarize ourselves with the target area, an overhead offensive counter-air sweep took care of hostile air contacts and simulated HARM launches suppressed longer range SAM defenses. I found the target on the Walleye’s camera, simulated the release and then followed the bomb glide path to target, pulling off at the last moment: Great success!

When it came to post-mission debrief and analysis, the instructors at Strike U. were thoughtful. It turned out that they had used what they considered to be a clever concealment, camouflage and deception (CCD) technique to make my unitary building look like it was two buildings by throwing a “shadow” panel over the center of my target.

“How did you recognize the target?” they asked.

“Well, it was the only target in the center of the target complex,” I answered. They hadn’t bothered to use CCD on any of the surrounding buildings or terrain, and my mind locked on to the relative position of the target within the broader complex, disregarding the shadow panel entirely.

It turns out that they did things better back in the day when the country was actually at war, and CCD might save your actual life.

Pretty impressive, if perhaps a touch paranoid.

Update: While we’re on about history recent and otherwise, here’s a good compilation of color video * from the carrier war in the Pacific.

The importance of landing without drift is emphasized. Sunscreen is not.

*04-07-18 Link changed – Ed.

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