How Tejas aircraft with Meteor, EL/M 2052 and High Band Jammer will be a game changer for IAF?

Tejas aircraft will soon be integrated with Meteor EL/M 2052 AESA radar and high band jammer. Earlier Tejas aircraft was not able to exploit the full capability of Meteor missile as it was armed with EL/M-2032 radar. But now that Elta and HAL will be building next generation ELM-2052 radar, Tejas aircraft would remain no lightweight against the best aircraft in the world. Meteor already is one of the best missiles in the world with a range of more than 150 km. And meteor with 180-200km range is around the corner.

Even the maximum range neutral observers are giving to KLJ-7A AESA radar developed by China is 170 km against fighter size target i.e. RCS of 3m2. Pakistan’s own websites claim that it has 1200 TRMs. Pakistan has only China to fall back on which so far hasn’t developed GaN modules based radar.

However, as far as EL/M-2052 Elta HAL radar is concerned, it is a GaN-based radar with 1500 TRMs. It can track 64 targets simultaneously. It has a range of 290 km in the Air to Sea Mode while in the Air to Air Mode, it is rumored to be between 150 to 200 km for a 1 sq.m RCS, not 3 sq.m

Another very authoritative source says that based on the TRM module count and power output a good initial ballpark estimate would suggest that EL/M 2052 radar might be comparable to APG-77 or APG-81 radars. This information is kept secretive but India and Israel might be planning to develop EL/M-2052 version that uses gallium nitride TRMs. By analogy to the Saab GlobalEye AESA radar (which was produced in GaAs and GaN versions), a GaN version of the EL/M 2052 might have up to 70% greater range than the APG-77 or APG-81 based estimate.

So even the second rung aircraft of India will have radars with much superior detection range than topmost fighter jets that are or could be available to Pakistan. This is a fact not overstated by us but apprehensively admitted by own Pakistan observers in hushed tones. That is not all. India is very close to developing a High Band Jammer. Everything about this High Band Jammer has been sorted out just complicated cooling system DRDO is working upon. DRDO had given firm assurance and that was a long time back that by the beginning of 2019 this High Band Jammer will be ready lock, stock, and barrel. So whatever little ability Pakistan Air Force may have acquired by acquiring its Chinese made AESA will be neutralized by HBJ and then any Pakistan aircraft would just be a game from much far away for Tejas aircraft armed with Meteors and EL/M-2052.

Source:- Global Defence Watch