With the accelerated development of intelligence, networking and other technologies, the evolution of systematic warfare is accelerating. The traditional kill chain starts gradually shifting from fixed to dynamic, from single to multi-source, and from preset to autonomous. The closure mode of the chain is more flexible, while the robustness and practical combat are enhanced to cope with the future complex adversarial environments, thus effectively expanding the range of killing and improving combat effectiveness. This article has reviewed the theory of the kill chain and analyzed the technological development of the U.S. military’s kill chain. Considering the demand for confrontation, it proposed the concept and key technical characteristics of the kill chain in beyond-visual-range air combat. From the perspective of OODA(Observe, Orient, Decide and Act), it determined the key technologies needed by the construction of the kill chain, providing a reference for the application of beyond-visual-range air combat under future system conditions.

According to the power requirements of wide-ranged aviation platforms, a new turbine-augmented combined cycle engine which balances acceleration and fuel economy was proposed in this study. The feasibility of achieving high acceleration and high specific impulse performance using a series connected configuration was initially clarified concerning both engine components and working principles. Firstly, wide-ranged performance of turbine-augmented mode and ramjet mode was assessed using the self-developed performance evaluation model. After that, three-dimensional simulations of typical flight conditions were conducted to ensure the accuracy of the self-developed model. Then, based on the calculations, the engine fueled by liquid oxygen (LO2) and liquid methane (LCH4) reached a specific impulse of approximately 800~1 000 s with a maximum specific thrust of 145 s when working with Mach 0 to 3. Besides, when working at ramjet mode with an equivalence ratio of 1.0, a specific impulse of more than 1 300 s was reached in a Ma4 flight condition and more than 1 000 s in Ma6. Secondly, a preliminary demonstration of the two-stage-to-orbit (TSTO) Astro vehicle based on the turbine-augmented combined cycle engine was carried out. The results have shown the previously mentioned engine can manage high-efficiency reusable space transportation missions with its outstanding wide-ranged acceleration performance. The combined cycle engine was also applicable in the propulsion system for wide-range airborne unmanned platforms covering subsonic to hypersonic speeds, enabling autonomous acceleration and ultra-high-speed cruise. Finally, critical technologies for engine manufacturing were sorted out and summarized.

With the increasing complexity of target-tracking scenarios, single-sensor detection systems cannot satisfy the practical requirements of target tracking. Multi-sensor data fusion technology has thus become an important solution for target tracking in complex scenarios. This paper reviewed the basic principles and research status of two key processes in multi-sensor data fusion: data association and estimating fusion. The relevant research on applying artificial intelligence technologies such as neural networks and reinforcement learning in multi-sensor data fusion was introduced. Finally, the development of multi-sensordata fusion methods in the field of target tracking was prospected.

In 2023, the global development of airborne missiles was accelerating. This paper summarized and analyzed the major events in the field of airborne missiles in the United States and Russia, including air-to-air missiles, air-to-surface missiles, hypersonic missiles and anti-radiation missiles. The United States and Russia kept improving and upgrading their air-to-air missiles and accelerating the development of new types of air-to-air missiles. The MUTANT missile project has attracted wide spread attention. The United States has developed a series of air-to-surface missiles and continued to expand its mounting platforms. The F-35 will integrate AGM-158C. Russia is promoting the practical application of airborne hypersonic weapons, and the Kinzhal missile has achieved remarkable results in the Russia-Ukraine War. Meanwhile, the United States is accelerating the development of new anti-radiation capabilities. The AGM-88G has completed multiple flight tests and will be equipped with combat aircraft such as P-8A and F-35.

Currently, the integrated air defense system has been well developed, and is forming a multi-domain network. The suppression of enemy air defense (SEAD) missions in the future will face more complex electromagnetic environments, radar equipment with upgraded capabilities, and various countermeasures. Under this background, this paper summarized the latest development status of major foreign anti-radiation missiles and analyzed the tactical evolution trend of anti-radiation missiles in performing SEAD missions. Based on the above studies, the future development directions of the anti-radiation missile including systematization, intelligent, multi-mission, low-cost, multi-mode composite guidance were prospected, giving useful reference for strengthening the construction of anti-radiation missile equipment and improving the SEAD combat capability.

The application of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) swarms in both civilian and military fields has received significant attention in recent years, and one of the key issues is the formation flight control. This study reviewed the relevant literature. First, three ways of organizing UAV formation computation and communication structures were introduced, respectively, centralized, distributed, and hybrid schemes. Then, commonly used formation flight control approaches were introduced respectively the leader-follower approach, virtual structure approach, behavior-based approach, and artificial potential field approach. Besides, these approaches were dissected and compared from different perspectives, including formation generation, formation keeping, obstacle avoidance, achievability, robustness, and computing and communication resources requirements, thus providing a convenient reference for interested readers. Finally, key difficult problems and feasible future research directions were discussed.

The future air combat will have new features such as “intelligence, unmanned, autonomy, distribution, and collaboration”. Under the support of the system and network, the combination of long-term hovering and firepower strikes will be flexible, presenting a trend of deep integration of aircraft and missiles. The existing strike chain and firepower utilization will be significantly revolutionized. This study first reviewed the development overview of aircraft-missile integration technology in the United States, proposed the concept of aircraft-missile integration firepower reconstruction, and then described the new utilization methods of aircraft-missile integration in various stages of OODA (Observe, Orient, Decide and Act) through typical scenarios involving long-range denial, medium-range air combat, active aircraft protection and aircraft-missile integration air patrol. Finally, several prospects for the development of aircraft-missile integration were presented.

In the current battlefield, the establishment of the airborne terminal active protection system is a practical way to improve the survivability of military aircraft. Acting as the final action link of the strike chain, the damage unit’s effectiveness dominates the operation efficiency of the active protection system. Considering the antagonistic principle of the airborne active protection system, this paper reviewed the development status of the airborne active protection system, proposed a general design concept of building the integrated active protection system with soft and hard cooperation, and offered ideas and suggestions for developing active protection system countermeasure technology from the perspective of soft and hard damages.

The modern air battlefield environment is increasingly showing high complexity and high confrontation, and the importance of air defense suppression operations in air control cannot be overstated. Firstly, this paper has reviewed the composition of equipment in U.S. and Russian advanced air defense systems. Based on the Observe-Orient-Decide-Act ring theory, the US military air defense suppression is decomposed and analyzed. Then, the advanced air defense suppression weapons such as anti-radiation missiles, anti-radiation UAVs and electronic warfare aircraft were elaborated. The typical combat styles and tactics were summarized by referring to the combat cases of air defense suppression in modern wars. Finally, focusing on the technical difficulties faced by air defense suppression weapons and the development trends of combat strategies, development suggestions were proposed in the aspects of weapon platform development, collaborative networking technology, and systematic operations. This study presents significant reference in the construction of China’s air defense suppression combat system.

In the three-body game scenario, it is necessary to predict the trajectory of incoming targets to enhance the interception capabilities of defensive missiles. Limited by the transmission rate of data link, the update frequency of target information is low, and the trajectory prediction method based on the Kalman filter and trajectory fitting is not applicable. Therefore, this study presents a target trajectory prediction method capable of classification under low information support. Firstly, the trajectory database of incoming targets was established based on the detection ability of airborne radar, and then the classification neural network and trajectory prediction neural network were trained using the trajectory database. The type of the target was determined online according to the target information transmitted by the data link, and after that, the optimal estimation of the initial state of the incoming target was acquired by the least square method. Finally, the trajectory prediction was realized. Simulation results show that the proposed method can successfully achieve high-precision trajectory prediction under low information support condition.

To achieve real-time and highly accurate estimation of the motion state of a hypersonic maneuvering target, a hypersonic maneuvering target state estimation algorithm based on recurrent neural network was proposed in the study. Firstly, the aerodynamic parameters were introduced into the hypersonic vehicle motion model in the half-speed system as a slow variable, allowing the state estimation model of the hypersonic maneuvering target to be established and the ground radar measurement model to be determined. Then, considering that the model uncertainty caused by the strategic maneuvering of the hypersonic target would exceed the processing ability of the conventional filtering method, the target maneuvering behavior data set was created based on the hypersonic vehicle motion model and the motion behavior that may occur in the actual combat operations was simulated. After that, the multi-filter joint estimation algorithm was designed by combining multi-model filtering with recurrent neural networks. Finally, the proposed algorithm was simulated and verified under different simulation conditions. The simulation results show that the proposed hypersonic maneuvering target state estimation algorithm can successfully achieve rapid response to hypersonic target maneuvering changes, which are smooth, highly precise, and beneficial to subsequent prediction.

With battlefields becoming more complex, timely and accurate information acquisition is crucial for decision-making. Traditional unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) reconnaissance path planning methods can no longer adapt to dynamic and complex environments effectively. This study proposed a reconnaissance path planning technique for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) using the optimization of Bézier curves, which can accurately construct flight paths adapted to complex environments by utilizing the flexibility and geometric properties of Bézier curves and combining with the secondary optimization algorithm. The execution efficiency and safety of this path-planning technique were verified in actual flight tests conducted in a simulated battlefield environment. Comparative experiment results show that the proposed technique significantly enhances the efficiency and accuracy of UAV reconnaissance, allowing rapid decision-making and action in battlefields, proving its feasibility and effectiveness in practical applications.

With the evolution of modern military and security challenges, the variety and direction of ground targets increase. Traditional target detection algorithms are facing numerous limitations in complex and dynamic aerial environments, and the complexity of neural networks challenges their application on mobile devices. Therefore, to enhance the accuracy and efficiency of detecting ground targets from any direction during flight, a lightweight aerial rotated object detection algorithm (LRODA) was proposed in this study. Firstly, the Ghost module was employed to enhance the original convolutional neural network and generated more feature maps with fewer small filters, thus reducing computational costs. Secondly, the improved convolutional network was used to generate high-quality proposals from the feature pyramid network at five different levels. Finally, the detection head harvested the generated proposals as input and ultimately used for classification and regression. Experimental results prove that the proposed rotated object detection algorithm can locate ground targets accurately and reduce model complexity effectively.

Via injecting the false deviation information into the formation control protocol, a false deviation deception method was proposed against the distributed UAV swarms with switching topologies. By implementing the deception, the UAV swarm was expelled from the original movement trajectory while maintaining the formation structure and the convergence. Firstly, a false deviation deception protocol was proposed using switching topologies where the constructed false deviation signal was introduced into the formation control protocol. Then, the sufficient conditions of the false deviation deception against the distributed UAV swarms were delivered by deriving the deception feasibility constraint. Furthermore, the explicit expression of the deception reference function was determined to describe the movement trajectory of the deceived UAV swarm. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed method was simulated and verified in case studies.

The current main air threats faced by surface ships are various subsonic and supersonic anti-ship missiles. However, with the rapid development and mass use of UAVs, UAVs and the precision-guided weapons they carry are gradually becoming a new critical threat to surface ships. Existing ship-based air defense systems have a low cost-effectiveness ratio in intercepting UAVs and poor combat effectiveness. Thus, it’s of great practical significance to provide surface ships with low-cost and high-efficiency UAV countermeasures. This paper summarized the classification of existing UAVs equipment and analyzed the potential UAV threats faced by surface ships. After studying the combat capabilities and application characteristics of current main anti-UAV equipment, combing with the current typical patterns of UAV combat and the air defense combat capabilities of surface ships, the paper discussed the future development trend of surface ships' anti-UAV technology including complex target detection, diversification of the interception means, the integration of fire control systems, modularization of weapons, and minimization of equipment costs. Besides, the key technologies of ship-based anti-UAV equipment were investigated, providing a reference for ship-based anti-UAV equipment development.