L3Harris Technologies [LHX] on Thursday debuted a pair of new flexible swarming “launched effects vehicle” munitions that have been tested on multiple platforms.
The weapons, called the wolfpack family, are called the Red Wolf kinetic platform for long-range precision strikes and Green Wolf electronic warfare platform with electronic attack and detect, identify, locate and report capabilities.
The company underscored both versions are flexible, modular, have in-flight collaboration and re-targeting and support the swarming capability of autonomous aircraft.
Earlier this year the company announced the Red Wolf was successfully integrated on and tested with a Marine Corps AH-1Z Viper helicopter.
In an interview with Defense Daily, company executives said these munitions have been tested 41 times with 10 years of design and development work. The most recent tests occurred within the past few weeks.
The Under Secretary of Defense and Research and Engineering (USD R&E) sponsored the demonstrations with military aircraft and platforms, including a Low-Rate Initial Production (LRIP) contract.
While they declined to specify other platforms tested due to client sensitivity, officials said it has been tested with rotary aircraft, fixed-wing aircraft, unmanned platforms and a ground vehicle. They said it can also be launched from at-sea platforms, but that has not yet been flight tested.
The company’s website for the platform shows it capable of being launched from various Army and Marine Corps rotary aircraft as well as a rocket-assisted ground launcher and a guided missile destroyer.
The company specifically pitched these munitions as flexible and particularly affordable to meet growing DoD demands for affordable munitions in large numbers to compete with the modernizing Chinese military, similar to the Replicator unmanned systems initiative.
L3Harris officials confirmed the price per munition will be in the $300,000 to $500,000 per round range, but declined to tie their interest to any specific DoD programs or requests for proposals or information.
The company noted the munition is proven and ready, compared to some competitors, given how they are currently building dozens of these munitions through 2025 in the LRIP contract with DoD.
“This isn’t PowerPoint. This is ready now, we have been flying it a ton. We’ve flown it over 40 times with our various customers on military platforms. So it’s real. It’s been integrated into military platforms,” Matthew Klunder, L3Harris Vice President of Business Development for Navy and Marine Corps programs, said.
He noted this wolfpack family of munitions can accommodate different kinetic and non-kinetic payloads, increase payload size and fuel for endurance and range.
“If a customer asks us to put something special on there, we can do it. And we’ve done it, even things as simple as parachutes on the back so it can be retrieved and used as a training ground,” Klunder added.
Sterling Jones, vice president and general manager of the company’s Agile Development Group, disclosed the Red and Green Wolf tests show they fly at “high subsonic speeds,” have demonstrated a 200 nautical mile range, 60 minute duration for loitering munitions, and demonstrated jet engine start at over 40,000 feet in real world testing.
The company is producing the LRIP units in different configurations for different customers at its facility in Ashburn, Va.
“We’ve got production enhancements in place and underway to go ahead and meet higher full-rate production demand, hundreds or even thousands of these units,” Jones continued.
He noted the Ashburn factory can boost up to 1,000+ units per year with no additional footprint, adding, “it was designed truly as a building block system where you can just double the capacity by adding a few more benches here and there.”
Jones also said at the $300,000-$500,000 per unit cost range they characterized it as five to six times cheaper than what operational naval strike missiles cost today.
Klunder pointed out recent positive reception from DoD leadership when the Secretary of Defense and USD R&E visited a Pentagon display of the wolfpack this past week and provided “very, very positive support and feedback.”
The company also pitched the flexibility of re-using the Green Wolf, depending on the mission.
Jones said a DoD client had servicemembers test a loitering electric warfare mission variant with a parachute option. The platform was ground-launched, performed the 60-minute loitering mission, came back to base, landed via parachute, then after recovery they swapped out the parachute, refueled and relaunched within 60 minutes.
“It was designed for that. We watched that happen, and that wasn’t done by engineers or technicians from L3Harris, that was done by service members in the field.”