Drones have become a fundamental element on the battlefield. So much so that different nations invest billions of euros in these devices for their armies, as is the case in Spain. In the United States it was not going to be less and, since the beginning of 2020, they have had a Joint Office of Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems (JCO).
The US Pentagon conducts two annual demonstrations of its drone systems prepared by its JCO. Through the technology they develop, the North American country aims to prepare for the possibility of the attack of a swarm of unmanned aerial vehicles.
Earlier, in 2018, the Agency for Advanced Defense Research Projects (DARPA) had already paid attention to the importance of drones. However, instead of thinking about defending themselves against these devices, they created a set of them to attack.
What is the American anti-drones system like?
Last year, the JCO made two demonstrations of the technology they were developing: one in spring and one in autumn. This 2022 takes place for the moment, which took place from April 4 to 22 at Yuma Proving Ground (Arizona), a Pentagon testing space.
Specifically, its anti-drones system uses different electromagnetic pulses that go from the earth to the air. In the tests, the team resorted to drones of different weights:
- Group 1: 9 kg drones.
- Group 2: drones between 9.5 and 25 kg.
- Group 3: drones between 25 and 600 kg.
Michael DiGennaro, leader of the test team, explained at a press conference what they were doing in their experiments: “We were analyzing the scope to attack the approaching targets and the amount of time it took to deter or defeat the target.”
The JCO carried out its checks with different systems: Leonardo DRS, Epirus and Raytheon. Although they are in the early stages of testing, the most effective to date seems to be the Raytheon anti-drole system.