Marines To Finally Add 30mm Cannon To Bolt-On "Harvest Hawk" Armament Kits For KC-130Js [2/4] - 'Harvest Hawk' Armament Kits 3.jpg (1/1)

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The U.S. Marine Corps plans to finally add a 30mm cannon to the bolt-on Harvest
Hawk armament kit for its KC-130J Hercules aircraft starting in Fiscal Year
2023. At present, the add-on weapon system can only employ AGM-114 Hellfire and
AGM-176 Griffin precision-guided missiles, as well as GBU-44/A Viper Strike
glide bombs.

The details about the Harvest Hawk's new gun were included in descriptions of
the U.S. Navy's budget proposal for the 2020 Fiscal Year, which it released on
Mar. 18, 2019. The Navy and the Marines share a common budget.

As it stands now, the Marines will ask for more than $6 million to purchase two
30mm guns, associated mounts and other equipment, and support and services in
the 2023 fiscal cycle as part of the ongoing upgrade of the Harvest Hawk system
to the new Harvest Hawk Plus (HH+) standard. The service then expects to spend
more than $13 million to buy six more, plus additional associated items, in the
next fiscal year.

Beyond new weapons, HH+ will also feature updated sensors, an added electronic
warfare capability, and overall improvements that will make it simpler and
cheaper to install, operate, and maintain.

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A Harvest Hawk kit that includes a Bushmaster II firing this ammunition would
offer important added capability to conduct extremely focused strikes on enemy
targets that might be in very close proximity to friendly forces, also known as
"danger close," or situated near innocent civilians. Especially in dense urban
environments, it may be too risky to use even small missiles or bombs.

Guns can also provide a greater volume of fire rapidly on a specific target and
can more readily shift focus from one target to another compared to precision
guided weapons. Automatic cannons also offer greater magazine depth, as well,
and the shells they fire are significantly cheaper than a missile or bomb.

The Air Force had similarly though it might be possible to increasingly move
away from guns on its AC-130Ws and AC-130Js in favor of precision guided
munitions, but has since reversed course. Adding the gun to the Harvest Hawk kit
will require a different mounting arrangement from either of those Air Force
gunships, which both have the cannon fixed in position sticking out the left
side of the forward fuselage.



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