Achieving Persistent Surveillance Through the Use of Lighter-Than-Air Vehicles as Theater Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance Assets

摘要

Lighter-than-air vehicles (LTAVs) have the potential to offer great utility as joint intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) platforms by virtue of their capability to provide persistent surveillance, through long- dwell coverage over areas of interest at relatively low cost. The Department of Defense is at a crossroad in terms of exploring ways to conduct ISR in support of future battles. Existing space surveillance assets are aging and follow-on systems are plagued by cost overruns and cancellations. Furthermore current airborne ISR platforms, both manned and unmanned, do not offer a truly persistent surveillance. A solution to compensate for these current and anticipated deficiencies may be with LTAVs, which can stay aloft for weeks or months at a time to provide long-dwell coverage to support the collection of signals and imagery intelligence. LTAVs, such as, aerostats, airships, or hybrids, if properly developed and integrated into the operational commander's bag of tools, could prove to be a complementary ISR asset by providing persistent ISR coverage at relatively low cost.