The Battle Blimp

Commenter jjames129 inquired as to why I think Hybrid Airships would be a better replacement for Helicopters in combat missions. I have actually been thinking about this topic for some time, as I have a passion for aviation technology both on and off the battlefield.

LEMV is really anything but ideal for combat missions. My feeling in my earlyer post was that if LEMV "somehow" got used in a combat extraction mission, as in, that was the only option at the time to save some Marines, and that it "somehow" proved that it was better at combat then helicopters, this would prove the concept of a "Battle Blimp" definitively. That's a rather unlikely scenario, but if it happened the military would probably order a small fleet of hybrid airships designed specifically for combat missions, which in turn would help bring down the price of Airships and usher in another golden age of airships that man has only dreamed about over the centuries.

However the reality is that LEMV is not ideal for these kinds of missions because it's not made for combat, but what if the military developed a true Battle Blimp? A Hybrid Airship designed to go head to head with tanks, airplanes, helicopters, infantry, you name it. What would this type of airship look like?

My idea is that an Airship like this would be based off Lockheed Martin's SkyTug design, but instead of carrying cargo in it's gondola, it would be a medium armored battle station with a tank like undercarriage on a swivel. This undercarriage would be a turret armed with a Bofors 40 mm anti-aircraft gun, a M61 Vulcan mini-gun and possibly some rockets. The Gondola itself would also have the ability to be able to deploy and redeploy troops out the back.

In this way, you are no longer asking for an airship with the ability to deploy tanks on the battlefield, instead the airship IS the tank and is already deployed on the battlefield.

The airship could also have M61's placed precariously on the outside of the ship to give it a full 360 degree force projection. These Vulcan cannons could be used to shoot down incoming rockets and airplanes like they do on Navy ships.

In this way you have a true Battle Blimp. Versatile like a helicopter, devastating like an AC-130, endurance like a drone, and durability like a ship. A true game changer in this modern world of conflict, and ideal for winning the war in Afghanistan.

No longer would the military need to send convoys of tanks and troop transports to any one location, when they could send a few Battle Blimps loaded with troops that would reach the location, deploy the troops, provide over-watch with a much greater endurance then helicopters, and then pick up the troops and bring them back to base when the mission is accomplished.

Hybrid Airships have not been tested in combat, so there is the possibility that the Battle Blimp concept could go up in flames like the Hindenburg. But with no Hydrogen gas to ignite that seems unlikely. The real question is how much punishment can a Hybrid Airship take before it can't fly anymore? Given that it has four engines, and it can fly on one, and that bullet holes cause vertully no helium to escape. That a hybrid airship with engine's as powerful as those on the SkyTug can keep airborne without any helium in it's envelope at all (still inflated with air of course.) That RPGs bounce off because it's essentially a giant airbag, that the envelope is invisible to radar, that the engines don't give off a vary good thermal signatures for rockets to lock on to, that it's much quieter then a helicopter, and that...

I think there is a pretty good chance the Battle Blimp will be able to survive a hell of a lot more enemy fire then a typical helicopter. But the only way to find out is to build one and throw it into a combat situation.

So? From my prospective, why isn't the military building battle blimps? It's not like the Military hasn't been testing experimental equipment on the battlefield since the American revolution. Has helium really become that expensive?