Dyess bombers succeed during Combat Hammer

  • Published
  • By Airman 1st Class Charles V. Rivezzo
  • 7th Bomb Wing Public Affairs
DYESS AIR FORCE BASE, Texas --  The 9th Bomb Squadron successfully dropped Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missiles Oct. 25 during a Combat Hammer weapons system evaluation at White Sands Missile Range, N.M.

The goal of the exercise, managed by the 86th Fighter Weapons Squadron at Eglin Air Force Base, Fla., is to evaluate the effectiveness, maintainability, suitability, and accuracy of precision guided munitions and other advanced air-to-ground weapons. The entire process of weapons handling is evaluated from start to finish during Combat Hammer.

"This test has been done before with test squadrons, but this was a first for any operational squadron," said Lt. Col. Alejandro Gomez, 9th Bomb Squadron director of operations. "Most B-1 aircrews will go their entire career without shooting an actual AGM-158. That said, we regularly train on JASSM employment in B-1 simulators."

"Every lesson we learn from realistic scenarios provided during exercises like Combat Hammer is vital to our aircrew's success while engaging in overseas contingencies," added Gomez.

The sole purpose of the mission was to evaluate how a JASSM would react if its GPS signal was jammed by enemy forces.

"The Air Force has GPS in everything we do," said Capt. Alex Datzman, 9 BS Weapons and Tactics officer. "We drop bombs and missiles that use GPS to help guide it and the natural thing our enemies are going to do is try and take away from us because it's so useful. It was a big thing to see that when we put GPS jammers out there, the missile was able to successfully get to its designated target."

The AGM-158 JASSM is a 2,000-pound conventional, precision, standoff missile with a lethal penetrator/blast fragmentation warhead. JASSMs cruise autonomously in adverse weather, day or night, using a state-of-the-art infrared seeker and anti-jam global positioning satellite-aided technology to find a specific point on a target.

Currently the weapon is employed on several aircraft to include the B-1 Bomber, B-52 Stratofortress, B-2 Spirit, F-16 Fighting Falcon and F-18 Super Hornet. However, the B-1 proves itself a front-runner when it comes to JASSM employment, due to its ability to carry 24 missiles; compared to 16 by the B-2, 12 by the B-52 and only two by fighters.

"I don't need to tell you how important this test was to validate that we can provide this new capability to combatant commanders" said Col. Mark Bennett, 7th Operations Group commander. "The flexibility and versatility the B-1 posses, along with the payload it can deliver, make the B-1 a favorite in the bomber community."