Electronic warfare is integral to how modern militaries fight, and the specific nature of detecting, jamming, and otherwise thwarting signals can confer a huge advantage to the military deploying it.
This is why U.S. military experts are particularly interested in a Russian “jammer” recovered by Ukrainian forces.
Ukrainian forces were reported to capture a Krasukha-4 electronic warfare system brought by the invading Russian army. While it looks like a shipping container with irregular panels, it is actually a sophisticated signal jammer, designed to incapacitate the early warning sensors on airplanes.
The Russian jammer is considered as big a prize as any from a modern battlefield.
For those on the receiving end, electronic warfare can mean system failure for necessary equipment. Shortly after Russian electronic warfare equipment arrived in Crimea in 2014, Ukrainian troops were reported to find that their radios and phones were unusable for hours at a time.
A jammer can also interfere with weapons that rely on electronics, such as causing an electronic fuse in an artillery shell to detonate prematurely.
Additionally, Jammers can affect the guidance system of some missiles as well, disabling or at least interfering with them in flight.
Sophisticated jammers include sensors to scan the area for signals, match against known patterns, and then calibrate a response, by sending out other signals on the same frequency.
Want to learn more? Tonex offers Electronic Warfare Training Crash Course, a 4-day course designed for analysts, engineers, electrical engineers, project managers, electronic warfare technical professionals who design or operate radar systems and electronic warfare systems; and anyone involved in planning, design, analysis, simulation, requirements definition, performance specification, procurement, test, security and evaluation of electronic attack equipment.
Electronic Warfare Training Crash Course describes military action involving the use of electromagnetic (EM) and directed energy (DE) to control the EMS or to attack the enemy.
Tonex offers several courses in Electronic Warfare, including:
Electronic Warfare Short Course (3 days)
Electronic Warfare Threat Modeling and Simulation Training (4 days)
For more information, questions, comments, contact us.