The Advanced Strategic Air-Launched Missile (ASALM) was a medium-range strategic missile program, developed in the late 1970s for the

United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the Aerial warfare, air military branch, service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part ...

. Intended for use in both the

air-to-surface An air-to-surface missile (ASM) or air-to-ground missile (AGM) is a missile designed to be launched from military aircraft at targets on land or sea. There are also unpowered guided glide bombs not considered missiles. The two most common prop ...

and anti- AWACS roles, the missile's development reached the stage of propulsion-system tests before being cancelled in 1980.

Design and development

Development of the Advanced Strategic Air-Launched Missile was initiated in 1976.Parsch 2003 The ASALM was intended to replace the

AGM-69 SRAM The Boeing AGM-69 SRAM (Short-Range Attack Missile) was a nuclear air-to-surface missile. It had a range of up to , and was intended to allow US Air Force strategic bombers to penetrate Soviet airspace by neutralizing surface-to-air missile de ...

in United States Air Force service, providing improved speed and range over the earlier missile, as well as improved performance against hardened targets.Gunston 1983, p.88. In addition, the requirement specified that the ASALM should be capable of operating in a secondary air-to-air mode against AWACS radar-warning aircraft. Martin Marietta and

McDonnell Douglas McDonnell Douglas was a major American aerospace manufacturing corporation and defense contractor, formed by the merger of McDonnell Aircraft and the Douglas Aircraft Company in 1967. Between then and its own merger with Boeing in 1997, it pro ...

submitted proposals for the contract, the former's design using a

Marquardt Marquardt is a surname of German origin. Notable people with the surname include: * August F. Marquardt (1850–1925), American politician *Bridget Marquardt (born 1973), American television personality, glamour model, and actress * Christel Marquar ...

propulsion system; the latter's, one developed by

United Technologies Corporation United Technologies Corporation (UTC) was an American multinational conglomerate headquartered in Farmington, Connecticut. It researched, developed, and manufactured products in numerous areas, including aircraft engines, aerospace systems ...

; the Martin Marietta design was favored by the Air Force The size of ASALM was limited by the requirement that it use the same launchers as the earlier SRAM. The missile would be steered by small fins at the tail, but lacked wings; the shape of the body combined with the high flight speed were to provide sufficient lift.Aldridge 1983, pp.150-151. Guidance was planned to be provided during mid-course flight by an

inertial navigation system An inertial navigation system (INS) is a navigation device that uses motion sensors (accelerometers), rotation sensors ( gyroscopes) and a computer to continuously calculate by dead reckoning the position, the orientation, and the velocity (dir ...

, while terminal guidance would use a dual-mode seeker. Propulsion would be provided by an integrated rocket-ramjet, which would act as a solid-fuel rocket during boost, with the rocket's casing, following exhaustion of its propellant and the ejection of the rocket nozzle and a fairing covering an air inlet, becoming a

combustion chamber A combustion chamber is part of an internal combustion engine in which the fuel/air mix is burned. For steam engines, the term has also been used for an extension of the firebox which is used to allow a more complete combustion process. Intern ...

for an air-breathing ramjet,Dornan 1978, p.222. which was planned to use Shelldyne-H fuel. The missile was expected to be carried by the B-1 bomber, or alternatively by a developed version of the

FB-111 The General Dynamics F-111 Aardvark is a retired supersonic, medium-range, multirole combat aircraft. Production variants of the F-111 had roles that included ground attack (e.g. interdiction), strategic bombing (including nuclear weapons ca ...

Operational history

Starting in October 1979, a series of flight tests of Propulsion Technology Validation missiles, using a Marquardt rocket-ramjet, were conducted. Over the course of seven test firings, a maximum speed of Mach 5.5 at an altitude of was achieved. Despite the successful testing, the ASALM program was suspended following the seventh PTV test flight in May 1980; reductions in the defense budget, combined with the development of the subsonic

AGM-86 ALCM The AGM-86 ALCM is an American subsonic air-launched cruise missile (ALCM) built by Boeing and operated by the United States Air Force. This missile was developed to increase the effectiveness and survivability of the Boeing B-52H Stratofortre ...

, led to the cancellation of the program later that year. The Martin Marietta ASALM concept was later developed into the AQM-127 SLAT

target drone A target drone is an unmanned aerial vehicle, generally remote controlled, usually used in the training of anti-aircraft crews. One of the earliest drones was the British DH.82 Queen Bee, a variant of the Tiger Moth trainer aircraft operational ...

References

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Bibliography

* * * * {{US missiles Nuclear missiles of the United States Air-to-surface missiles of the United States Air-to-air missiles of the United States Abandoned military rocket and missile projects of the United States

Design and development

Operational history

See also

References

Notes

Bibliography