The Threat No One Likes To Discuss

This document is in the back of the novel Failure to Fire. In the plot, al Qaeda sends an operative who is a naturalized citizen of Syrian descent and an Honorably Discharged veteran to the U.S. to develop and execute a plan to shut down the U.S. air transportation system. His weapon of choice, Man Portable Air Defense Systems a.k.a. MANPADS. What follows is an explanation of the threat.

RPGs, cyber warfare, dirty nukes, chemical weapons, and IEDS in the hands of terrorists get all the publicity. Few, if anyone, in the Federal government, the media, or the intelligence community speak about the one weapon that will, for a short time, bring commercial air travel in any country to a screeching halt.

The weapon is not a virus in the nation's or the global air traffic control system, nor a hacker who gains control of the airplane from his laptop in the passenger compartment. The weapon is relatively simple to manufacture and costs less than $50,000 (in 2008 dollars) to manufacture. Hundreds of thousands of them sitting in arsenals all over the world.

The weapon is known by the acronym MANPADS which stands for Man Portable Air Defense System. MANPADS are shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles, and their portability and lethality make them a significant threat to anything that flies.

MANPADS are already in the hands of terrorists. In 2002, two missiles were fired at an Israeli airliner.

In 2003, one of these missiles hit a DHL cargo plane approaching Baghdad International Airport. The pilots managed to land the cargo plane safely, but it was a total loss.

On March 23rd, 2007, a Transaviaexport Ilyushin 76D was shot down. Everyone on board was killed.

In January 2013, the U.S. Navy boarded a dhow that left a Yemeni port controlled by Iranian-backed Houthi rebels. They found 10 Chinese versions of the SA-16 and 10 Russian-made SA-7s, plus tons of other weapons.

Between 1975 and January 2021, when Failure to Fire was initially published, there are 40 documented cases of MANPADS being fired at civilian aircraft. See https://2009-2017.state.gov/t/pm/wra/c62623.htm for more details.

MANPADS come in a variety of flavors. The U.S.-made Stinger was used by Fedayeen against the Soviets in the '80s in Afghanistan to bring down 269 aircraft. The Soviets/Russians build the Strela (known by their NATO names SA-7 Grail, SA-14 Gremlin), and the Igla series (SA-16 Gimlet, SA-18 Grouse, and SA-24 Grinch) have also had success on the battlefield.

The United Kingdom makes the Starburst and the Starstreak. France makes the Mistral. Many other countries have designed their own by combining elements of French, Russian/Soviet, U.K., and U.S. missiles to protect their ground troops against low-flying aircraft and helicopters.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security formed the Counter-MANPADs Program Office to evaluate the threat and develop countermeasures. On March 30th, 2010, the office reported to Congress on the threat, viable countermeasure systems that could be installed on commercial aircraft, and the cost and timeline to deploy them on the U.S. airline and air cargo fleet.

Before this report was issued, the Department of Homeland Security's Science and Technology division announced on January 6th, 2004, that teams led by BAE Systems, Northrop Grumman, and United Technologies were selected to develop a plan and test prototypes to help determine whether a viable technology exists that could be deployed to address the potential threat that MAN-Portable Air Defense Systems (MANPADS) pose to commercial aircraft.

The threat is so significant that later in 2004, the U.S. Department of Homeland stated some nations do a better job than others in protecting their inventory of MANPADS. How many MANPADS are in the hands of terrorist organizations is not available through open sources.

The CIA, Mi-5, Chinese Intelligence, and the Russian FSB may know, but the public does not. Nor does the flying public understand the serious threat they pose.

MANPADS are available on the black market and are cheap. Depending on the age of the weapon and its condition, some public sources say they can be bought for less than $10,000.

A typical MANPADS team consists of a spotter and a shooter. The spotter searches for and identifies the target. The shooter lifts the MANPADS that, depending on the make and model, weighs between 39 and 40 pounds onto his shoulder and points the launching tube at the target. A built-in detection system locks onto an airborne heat source within a bubble that could be up to five miles away and up to about eight to 10,000 feet.

Once the missile inside the launcher tube is "told where to go" by its seeker, the user pulls the trigger. Compressed gas pushes the rocket out of the launch tube, and the missile's motor ignites, propelling the rocket toward the target. At this point, the shooter's role is done.

In the air, the missile's seeker stays locked onto the heat source—either the airplane's structure warmed by the friction created by passing through the air or the engine's exhaust plume. MANPADS are fast and close in on their targets at between 1,300 miles per hour (Strela and Igla series), 1,600 miles per hour (Stinger), or 2,700 miles per hour (Starstreak).

The missiles have two types of warheads—blast fragmentation (think of a shotgun) and a contact or impact fuse. The blast fragmentation warhead is set off when the missile's proximity fuse says the weapon is close to the target. The shrapnel shreds the target causing an engine to fail catastrophically or a structural failure of the wing or fuselage.

Or, if the missile has an impact or contact fuse, when the missile slams into the airplane, its three to six pounds of explosive is enough to bring down or severely damage an airplane or a helicopter.

To counter the MANPADS threat, most military aircraft have countermeasure systems that automatically detect and decoy infrared missiles. Some systems use a combination of flares and/or sophisticated sets of mirrors to confuse the missile seeker and cause the weapon to miss. Other systems include lasers that confuse or disable the seeker and/or destroy the on-rushing weapon.

Several companies—BAE, Elbit, ITT, Northrop Grumman, and Selex E.S.—offer proven systems designed to counter the MANPADS threat. Several manufacturers have demonstrated that these systems can be economically installed on business jets, cargo planes, and airliners of all sizes. A U.S. government-supported program in March of 2007 installed DIRCM systems on 11 FedEx cargo planes.

At the time (2007), Northrop Grumman told the U.S. Department of Homeland Security that to install and test a directed infrared countermeasures system on an airliner would cost about $1.9M/airplane based on a fleet of 300 aircraft. Costs would drop to $1.0 million/plane for a fleet of 1,000!

Operation and maintenance costs, according to the Northrop Grumman study, would be approximately $26.50 per flight hour for 300 aircraft. For a typical three-hour flight carrying 150 passengers, this comes to $.53/per passenger. Installation on the larger airplanes used for transoceanic flights would cost even less per passenger. 

If 1,000 airplanes were equipped, the cost/flight hour would drop below $13, or $.26 per passenger, on a 150-passenger airliner that needed three hours to go from airport to airport. 

Northrop Grumman based its installation on the configuration now used on Boeing's C-17 aircraft. The C-17 configuration is a conformal "canoe" mounted on the belly of the aircraft. At the time of the report, Northrop Grumman stated the system could be ready for deployment in as little as 28 months. This assumes nine months to get FAA certification and the remaining time for installation and testing.

The cost of the hardware and the design of the installation is only one part of the issue. Admittedly, there are legal, labor (union contracts), and training issues that must be resolved as well.  

In 2019, American Airlines had almost 900 plus airplanes in its fleet, and if Delta's, United's, and Southwest's are included, the potential number of aircraft that could be fitted with a countermeasures system is more than 3,000. Installation, system, and maintenance costs would also drop dramatically if these four airlines started installing DIRCM systems on all their planes.

As noted above, on a per-flight basis, the cost is minimal. 

Weight? You've got to be kidding. DIRCM systems weigh less than 500 pounds, including the wiring, sensor, and cockpit display. This is the equivalent of two and a half 170-pound passengers plus a 30-pound bag. On a Boeing 737-800 with a maximum takeoff weight of 174,200 pounds, a 500-pound DIRCM system would have minimal impact on the aircraft's weight and balance.

The payouts to families and crew members that would result if an airliner were shot down by a MANPADS with 150 people on board would be far more than the cost of the DIRCM system. The money would have been better served by equipping some or all the airline's fleet. From a risk perspective, not equipping the commercial airline fleet just doesn't make commercial sense.

The truth is that the systems are practical, feasible, and can be installed on airliners. El Al has installed Elbit's Music system on all its planes. As a firm, they didn't want to take the risk of not having them installed on their planes.

Yet, the Counter-MANPADs Program Office study concluded that DIRCM systems weren't economically viable to install systems on U.S. airliners. Their rationale was that the systems didn't meet the study's standards for reliability. Where was the funding to determine what needed to be done to meet the reliability standards, whatever they were at the time? 

This determination by the Counter-MANPADS program office flies in the face of reality. DIRCM Systems are widely deployed on military aircraft all over the world, and they are reliable. More important, they are effective.

No matter what the study found, the MANPADS threat to airliners, air cargo aircraft, and corporate jets is real. 

The reality is that no government or airline wants to state publicly that MANPADs are a serious threat to civil aviation. They are afraid the danger will scare away potential passengers. 

This approach will continue until an airliner drops from the sky and the handwringing and recriminations begin. The spin-meisters will try to convince us that no countermeasure system is perfect or that the attack is an isolated instance. Not true. MANPADS are out there, and it is only a matter of time before one brings down an airliner.

As this second, revised edition of Failure to Fire is being prepared, we've seen the lethality of MANPADS in the skies over Ukraine. Both helicopter and tactical jets that did not have a working DIRCM system have been shot down by MANPADS. We've seen DIRCM systems work in the skies over Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan, so their effectiveness is not unknown or new. 

In February 2021, around the time the first edition of Failure to Fire was published, FedEx notified the FAA that it was beginning a to install DIRCM systems on its aircraft. They would start with those that operate in the Mideast since the Russian invasion of Ukraine was still a year into the future. 

Therefore, the question remains, why are U.S. airlines installing DIRCM systems their planes now rather than on some crash program after one has been shot down by a MANDPADS?

Marc Liebman

First written in December 2021

Revised in June 2023