Preface

Balancing weapon and sensor system performance is important for achieving air and missile defense performance requirements against a target in an optimal sense. In today’s environment, this means meeting performance requirements while minimizing design, development, and operational costs over the lifecycle of a combat system. This book outlines a physics-based systems engineering approach for the design and development of a balanced air and missile defense system given a fixed set of target requirements. The inherent architecture of weapon and sensor systems plays a significant role in achieving a balanced approach for negating a target in both natural and electronic attack environments.

This book represents a synthesis of knowledge that we have developed over many years of engineering experience, including interaction with a number of members from the technical community, and thus builds on the foundation of the works of many others. In this sense, the book is a progression of an evolving process that is constantly looking to new technologies and innovative architectures to ensure that air missile defense systems stay one step ahead of the target. Even as we complete this effort, the focus is shifting to networked systems of weapons and sensors to increasing air and missile defense capabilities at lower costs, which are mandated by a combination of constrained budgets and a growing competitive business environment.

We express our appreciation to several colleagues who have taken time from their busy schedules to review the draft material and provide insightful feedback. We are grateful for the comments and critique provided by Glenna Miller and Elena Zaitsev. We thank the staff at CRC Press/Taylor & Francis for their patience during the development of the material for this book.