Marines gear up with new microwave weapon to zap drones
The United States Marine Corps has acquired a new weapon to combat drones: the ExDECS microwave system from Epirus. Let's introduce what it is and how it operates.
According to the portal The Warzone, the United States Marine Corps has gained a modern weapon for fighting drones called ExDECS. Presented during the Modern Day Marine conference in Washington, D.C., the system was developed by the company Epirus. ExDECS is a high-power microwave (HPM) weapon capable of disrupting or destroying drone electronics using a beam of microwave radiation.
ExDECS, an advancement of the Leonidas system, was delivered to the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Virginia, where it underwent acceptance tests. This system is part of the PEGASUS program, which aims to evaluate anti-drone systems. Thanks to ExDECS, the Marines gain an advantage in neutralizing electronic threats.
Additionally, it is mobile and can be integrated with light tactical vehicles. Its main task is to protect against drone swarms at a very low cost, as the estimated expense of shooting down a drone is about 5 cents.
Microwave weapons — competition for lasers
Military conflicts increasingly involve drones, and this includes not only state entities but also non-state actors, as was clearly seen during the fights in Syria that ended with the overthrow of Bashar al-Assad. This poses new challenges for armed forces worldwide, which desperately need cost-effective ways to combat drones.
Shooting a missile worth even hundreds of thousands of dollars at a drone worth a few thousand dollars is not financially sustainable in the long term, which is why many different solutions are being developed. Currently, barrel systems with programmable ammunition that reduce the cost of shooting down a drone to even a few thousand dollars are becoming popular, but the ultimate goal is energy weapons.
These weapons are divided into two groups: laser weapons and microwave weapons. While microwave weapons may not burn through armor like high-power lasers, they can damage drone electronics, leading to their destruction. The destructive effect comes from high-frequency electromagnetic waves, which heat an object upon absorption. This leads to the overheating of electronics or, for instance, causing thermal discomfort in humans in the case of ADS systems.
Although there are methods to protect electronics from such attacks, they are very costly and difficult to implement. Additionally, the microwave beam is broad, allowing it to efficiently neutralize an entire swarm of drones.
