The view from above: how the Royal Air Force provided a strategic vision for operational intelligence during the Malayan Emergency

It has long been held that the Federation of Malaya’s counter-insurgency campaign during the First Malayan Emergency (1948–60) was determined by the use of intelligence. Special Branch — the Federation’s primary intelligence agency — dominates the prevailing paradigm of how the insurgent threat was tackled. Conversely, the role of the Royal Air Force (RAF) within this paradigm is very limited. Most observers simply dismiss the role of photoreconnaissance or airstrikes as being largely inconsequential to the counter-insurgency effort. This is perhaps understandable: the Emergency was after all a ‘policing action’ and the insurgents were largely hidden under Malaya’s jungle canopy and amongst the Chinese community. However, further scrutiny reveals that the RAF made a much more significant contribution to the intelligence element of the counter-insurgency campaign than previously realised. First, the RAF decided to locate their Advanced Headquarters with the Army’s General Headquarters. This led to the creation of the Land/Air Operations Room, through which intelligence, tasking and resources were coordinated. Moreover, the RAF put its intelligence teams into the field to provide a practical link between local units and theatre-level assets. Second, with the support of the Army, the RAF established at the beginning of the Emergency the Joint Air Photographic Intelligence Board (Far East). This coordinated all photographic intelligence requirements throughout the Emergency, which was then delivered via the Joint Air Photographic Centre (Far East). Hence, via Joint Operations Centre and JAPIB (FE), the RAF provided both the practical means for effective joint intelligence operations at theatre level throughout the Emergency.     

非致命防暴动能弹作战效能评估

提出了非致命防暴动能弹作战效能的评估法,分析了非致命防暴动能弹的技术性能,建立了以非致命性为核心指标的防暴动能弹效能指标体系。采用定性分析与定量分析相结合,将集对分析法应用到了非致命防暴动能弹的效能评估中,对3种防暴动能弹进行了效能评估。为非致命防暴动能弹的研发生产提供了重要的理论支撑。     

‘Fighting for peace’

In Africa, most of the present conflicts are civil, intra-state wars where belligerent groups use guerrilla tactics to achieve various political, economic or ideological objectives. The atrocities and the effect of these on-going wars on innocent civilians, human suffering, poverty and development are beyond comprehension. Not surprisingly, the majority of current peace operations are in Africa, with more than 70 countries contributing forces to these conflict zones. On the continent, South Africa has come to assume a leading role in peace operations and is now a major troop-contributing country to UN and AU missions. In the past 11 years, the South African National Defence Force (SANDF) has taken part in no fewer than 14 peace missions. This article provides a brief background of the conflicts in Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Sudan, the different United Nations (UN) and African Union (AU) mandates under which peacekeepers had to operate as well as their objectives, and the extent of South Africa's involvement in the various missions. In the last section, the major challenges, that these operations have posed are highlighted.     

Globalisation in the defence industry: An exploration of the paradigm for us and European defence firms and the implications for being global players

This paper explores some of the key issues associated with the restructuring of the defence industry. A comparison is made between the US and the European Defence Industrial Bases in terms of the drivers for change and the paradigms within which change has taken place. Having shown that some very important differences exist, the paper then explores the approaches that have been adopted for industry consolidation and references them to the academic literature on mergers and acquisitions (M&As) and strategic alliances (SAs). Given that most of the key defence players recognise the need to be global players, the paper presents an argument that the European firms’ experience of operating with a wide range of forms of corporate alliance will serve them in good stead for operating on a global defence scale. US firms, in contrast, have focused largely on M&A activity.     

ADVANCED US CONVENTIONAL WEAPONS AND NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT

The Obama administration has made a great effort to increase the role of advanced conventional weaponry in US national security thinking and practice, in part to help reinvigorate the global nuclear disarmament agenda by reducing the role played by nuclear weapons in the US defense posture. However, such a strategy is fundamentally flawed because increases in US conventional superiority will exacerbate US relative strength vis-à-vis other powers, and therefore make the prospect of a nuclear weapon-free world seem less attractive to Washington's current and potential nuclear rivals. Consequently, it is highly likely that the impact of efforts to increase US advanced conventional superiority through ballistic missile defense and a conventional “prompt global strike” program will ensure that the Obama administration is adopting a pathway to nuclear abolition on which it is the sole traveler for the foreseeable future.     

U.S. SPACE WEAPONS

Under the administration of President George W. Bush, Pentagon rhetoric has increasingly articulated a more robust vision of space as a future battlefield. This analysis details some of the ongoing spending for research and development programs identified in current U.S. Air Force, Missile Defense Agency (MDA), and Defense Advanced Research and Planning Agency (DARPA) planning and budget documents related to “space control” and “space force projection.” This analysis finds that current support for “space superiority” and “space control” systems remains largely rhetorical—with little actual budgetary support. Unclassified technology development programs included in the six-year Future Years Defense Plan are a decade or more away from deployment. Programs related to offensive counterspace, space-based missile defense interceptors, and space-based strike total slightly less than $300 million in FY 2006 funding. We conclude significantly higher expenditures in research and development would be required to develop and deploy killer micro satellites, space-based missile defense interceptors, and military space planes.     

准则权重信息不完全的证据推理多属性决策算法

针对准则权重信息不完全情况下的多属性决策问题,提出了一种新的证据推理多属性决策算法,它通过建立基于证据信息熵的决策模型来求解准则的最优权重系数,利用求解得到的权重系数和递归ER算法求出各方案的效用值,进而得到各方案的优劣次序。最后,通过算例分析验证了该方法的有效性和合理性。     

飞航导弹故障飞行落点概率计算方法

针对飞航导弹故障飞行落点概率难以准确计算的问题,通过分析导弹的各个分系统的故障机理重新提出五种故障模式,依据逐系统串联的原理建立了故障模式的概率分配计算模型;在对发射、飞行和故障后坠落等阶段进行分析的基础上建立各故障模式的仿真模型;最后应用蒙特卡洛方法对某型导弹故障飞行落点的概率分布进行了仿真计算。     

C~3I 系统中基于多目标决策理论的对空攻击任务分配决策问题研究

根据多目标决策理论,从系统的角度出发,提出了防御权系数问题,并在此基础上研究对空攻击任务的分配策略,给出了效度最大攻击任务分配策略和重点防护目标优先攻击任务分配策略,并引入攻击强度阀值概念,对这两种分配策略进行了改进,最后给出了具体算法。     

A trajectory for homeland ballistic missile defense

The Ground-based Midcourse Defense system is intended to protect the US homeland against limited attacks from intermediate- and long-range ballistic missiles. It has succeeded in intercepting target missiles and can engage a threat launched from North Korea or the Middle East, targeting any point in the USA. Nevertheless, high-profile struggles and program changes related to homeland ballistic missile defense (BMD) continue to make headlines. The most significant struggle has been a string of three straight intercept test failures over five years, followed by the recent successful intercept test in June 2014. This article first briefly reviews the current threats of concern. It then examines homeland BMD policy objectives, followed by the current major technical issues in supporting these objectives and, then, the likelihood of negating a warhead. Finally, it highlights major considerations that should be part of the trajectory the US government takes moving forward.