“My interpretation of that law is that we won't let a service procure something that doesn't perform and if they want to, JIATF-401 gets to say no,” said Col. Jonathan Beha, chief of requirements for the Joint Inter-Agency Task Force.
Separately, American soldiers also trained with Polish and Romanian allies on the Merops c-UAS system, already in use in Ukraine.
Knowing when to build on commercial systems and when to develop something new can be the difference between parity and information dominance.
"We've got a wide variety of counter-UAS tools, and I actually think that we need all of them, because depending on where you are or what threat you're focused on, your requirements will be slightly different,” Brig. Gen. Matt Ross, commander of JIATF 401, said.
The Enduring-High Energy Laser (E-HEL) program is the Army’s first program of record for a new family of high-energy lasers.
As threats evolve on both the battlefield and homeland, counter-UAS must be able to keep pace.
Air defense radar, counter-drone, and missile launchers are three keys to Army transformation.
The network transport architecture for NGC2 could be a hybrid approach that combines high assurance communications with 5G, WiFi, and multi-orbit satellites.
Modular sensors, AI-driven response, and swarm defeat technologies are redefining how militaries confront one of today’s fastest-evolving threats: low-cost, high-impact drones.
Moscow has also flown drones over Romania and fighter jets over Estonia, moves that European officials have widely condemned.
The Army has been tapped to oversee the new shop and close up the Joint Counter-small Unmanned Aircraft Systems Office it led.