[Defense Column] What Are the Air Defense Capabilities of the UK Elizabeth Aircraft Carrier?

[Monthly Defense Times Editor-in-Chief An Seung-beom] Attention is gathering on the Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carrier of the British Royal Navy visiting Korea this summer. The UK Ministry of Defence announced that the cruising training fleet will be sent to Northeast Asia.

The fleet composition is known to include one Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carrier, one Type 45 Daring-class air-defense destroyer, and two Type 23 frigates. While the Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carrier and its carrier-based F-35B aircraft have received much coverage, there has been little introduction regarding the Type 45 Daring-class air-defense destroyer.

The Type 45 Daring-class air-defense destroyer is known as a state-of-the-art warship with excellent air defense capabilities. The integrated mast housing the Sampson (SAMPSON) AESA radar of the Royal Navy’s Type 45 Daring-class destroyer is characterized by its heavy load and forward-leaning appearance.

Although the AESA radar mast of the Daring-class destroyer carries a heavy load, various fins and stabilizers operate to maintain balance considering the weight characteristics caused by this mast installation, enabling stable navigation even in very high sea level conditions. Stable navigation is made possible by a digital steering system that calculates stabilizer control information according to the ship’s posture and center of gravity.

Additionally, the D-band S1850M radar located at the rear (a system of the same family as the SMART-L installed on the Republic of Korea Navy’s Dokdo-class) is also a large system, and since this system’s sector also carries significant weight, the center of gravity is not excessively shifted forward.

The French Navy’s Forbin-class frigate and the Italian Navy’s Andrea Doria-class frigate, both Horizon-class air-defense ships originating from the same lineage as the Royal Navy’s Type 45 Daring-class destroyer, have successfully conducted supersonic anti-ship missile tracking and interception tests using G-band (4 GHz ~ 6 GHz) AESA radars.

The Royal Navy’s Daring-class destroyer’s PAAMS system has also conducted supersonic anti-ship missile interception tests and training. Separate from the PAAMS systems of the French and Italian Horizon frigates, the UK’s own PAAMS also possesses algorithms necessary for supersonic anti-ship missile interception.

The Daring-class destroyer has already undergone supersonic flying object tracking and interception tests. Of course, in this case, the French and Italian Horizon frigates using G-band AESA (EMPAR radar) would be capable of more precise tracking.

However, the Royal Navy’s Daring-class destroyer’s Sampson (SAMPSON AESA) radar is a system where multiple signals with different forming vectors/phases can contact individual targets in short time intervals to avoid interference. Early phased array radars lacked beam stabilization.

But by the time AESA radar systems like Sampson (SAMPSON) and EMPAR were developed, this issue was resolved, and combined with the high beam steering capability of phased array radars, they achieved excellent beam stability. This significantly shortened the signal refresh time unit when tracking multiple targets. The difference between S-band and G-band for supersonic anti-ship missiles is not perceived as a major gap by the Royal Navy.

Unlike the French and Italian Horizon-class frigates that mainly operate in the Mediterranean, the UK’s Daring-class destroyers frequently operate in the foggy North Sea, so the S-band, which experiences less attenuation in signal transmission, is likely more suitable than the G-band.

It will be interesting to see what the British aircraft carrier and Type 45 Daring-class destroyer visiting Korea this summer will demonstrate to the Republic of Korea Navy and related industries.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.