Spatio-temporal cooperative guidance law for loitering munitions based on adaptive sliding mode control

This paper addresses the multi-constraint guidance problem in the cooperative strike of loitering munitions against targets and proposes a distributed spatio-temporal cooperative guidance law based on adaptive sliding mode control. This guidance law simultaneously considers three types of constraints—time coordination, impact angle coordination, and attack azimuth coordination—constructing a unified control framework. By designing a non-singular terminal sliding mode surface combined with an adaptive robust term, it effectively suppresses system chattering and enhances robustness against target maneuvers and external disturbances. Notably, a dynamic azimuth allocation strategy based on target velocity is proposed, which adaptively adjusts the spatial distribution formation of the loitering munitions according to the target's speed, enabling dynamic encirclement or tail-chase attacks against the target. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed guidance law achieves high-precision time synchronization, impact angle control, and azimuth distribution under different target velocity conditions, while the control effort remains within the practical overload limits of loitering munitions, indicating strong engineering applicability and tactical flexibility.