Advances in Directed Energy Weapon (DEW) technology during the last 20 years have repeatedly promised a revolutionary shift in modern warfare. However recent high-profile failures, costs of development programmes, bureaucratic inflexibility and institutional reluctance to embrace a shift in tactics could hinder users from developing and exploiting these technologies just as they are reaching maturity/.../
Unlike SSLs and FELs, radio frequency weapons such as High Power Microwave (HPM) and Millimeter Wave (MMW) devices operate in the non-optical portion of the electromagnetic spectrum and can emit beams multidirectionally to degrade electronic components over wider areas. HPM technology is more mature and compact than SSLs and could be integrated into manned and unmanned aircraft, cruise missiles and ground vehicles to disrupt, damage or destroy electronic hardware or burn out unshielded computer systems that would restrict enemy freedom of movement as anti-access/area-denial (A2/AD) threats.
"That would be very effective against air-defence systems or warning radars, target tracking radars, the kinds of networks that underpin an [A2] strategy that China is pursuing and Iran is pursuing as well," said Mark Gunzinger, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Forces Transformation and Resources and co-author of a recent report released by the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments (CSBA). However, since HPM weapons affect all unshielded electronic systems within their beam cones, collateral damage to friendly systems must also be considered.
Modern A2/AD, such as land-attack or ASBMs/ASCMs, and vulnerable space and cyber targets including satellite communications- and GPS-based navigation systems, have altered the character of modern warfare, and present significant challenges to overseas power projections and defence mechanisms.
In a climate of declining defence budgets, non-kinetic systems represent low risk and lower cost solutions. "Guided munitions such as ASCMs, [ASBMs] and G-RAMM proliferate, defensive approaches that rely on expensive, one-time-use interceptors are becoming operationally unfeasible and fiscally unsustainable," said the CSBA report, which advocates a more robust and affordable defensive network through the inclusion of complementary DEWS, which "actually pay for themselves over time", according to Gunzinger.
"You need both kinetic defences like the SM-3, THAAD and Patriot PAC-3 and [DEWs] to provide a more robust layered defence against the kinds of threats we see emerging in the Pacific and in the Persian Gulf," he said, adding that high-powered laser systems would have the capability to counter cruise missiles and UAVs that may be armed and "the kinds of fast attack craft we see Iran investing in that can swarm commercial shipping and military vessels in the Strait of Hormuz and the Persian Gulf".