Drone Jammers and Busters Are Among Latest NATO Weapons For Ukraine

Drone jammers or killers/busters use a Russian drone's own radio frequencies and GPS against it, forcing them to land - where they can often be repurposed by Ukrainian forces. 

As an alternative there is the old-fashioned way, which is just shooting the thing down with whatever weapon is handy. JL 

Stavros Atlamazoglou reports in Business Insider:

Unmanned aerial systems have become an integral part of modern warfare. The "standard" method of destroying them is with air-to-air or anti-aircraft fire. The second way to shoot down a drone is by interfering with its electronics through radio-frequency energy. The Dronebuster is a compact, lightweight counter-drone weapon specialized for use against commercial drones. It uses radio-frequency energy to overwhelm the drone's GPS control frequency. The Dronekiller is a rifle-sized counter-drone weapon that uses radio-frequency energy to interrupt a drone's command-and-control signals or guidance. Ukrainian forces have shot down 85 unmanned aerial systems as of April 1.

As the war in Ukraine is entering its second month, the US, NATO, and the EU continue to supply Kyiv with weapons to fight off the Russian invaders.

Western countries have sent billions worth of weapons to Ukraine, including "kamikaze drones," anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles, machine guns, rifles, grenades, helmets, and body armor.

Despite reports of Russia repositioning its forces, fighting has continued in parts of Ukraine, including in cities where Russian troops are firing rockets, missiles, and artillery.

With the war set to drag on, potentially with more brutal urban combat, the US military is reportedly looking for ways to provide Ukraine with counter small unmanned aerial systems — drone-killing devices to swat Russian unmanned aerial vehicles out of the sky.

Unmanned aerial systems have become an integral part of modern warfare. First developed by US intelligence agencies and the Pentagon, they started off as intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance platforms.

They debuted in the Balkans during the NATO campaign and the hunt for Serbian war criminals. During the war on terror, drones like the MQ-1 Predator and MQ-9 Reaper played a more significant role in military and intelligence operations.

Armed with weapons like the AGM-114 Hellfire missiles, they were increasingly used for close air support and precision-strike missions, though drone strikes often led to collateral damage, including civilian casualties.

Drones could stay over a target for hours and monitor the situation on the ground, providing commanders on the ground and at more distant headquarters with tactical intelligence and awareness of conditions on the ground.

 

"Drones can be dirty cheap but deadly," a Green Beret assigned to a National Guard unit told Insider. "A well-aimed loitering munition can take out the C2 [command and control] of an enemy, sowing chaos and confusion. A swarm of them can even halt or stop an armored column."

In the skies over Ukraine, small loitering munitions, or "kamikaze drones," are some of the most dangerous unmanned aerial systems. Reports indicate that Ukrainians are using them effectively, enabling small units to wreak havoc on Russian forces.

But the Russians are using them too. Zala KUB-BLA loitering munitions, which pack a 7-pound warhead, have been sighted in Ukraine. The Ukrainians have managed to disable a few of them, mainly through counter-drone weapons, such as the Ukrainian Bukovel-AD, an electronic-warfare device mounted on a truck, Nota jamming arrays, and EDM45-UA jammer guns.

According to the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense, Ukrainian forces have shot down 85 unmanned aerial systems as of April 1.

"Drones are proliferating [on] the battlefield, and so is anti-drone tech," said the Green Beret, who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

There are two main ways that these drones are being shot down.

There is the "standard" method of destroying them in the air with air-to-air or anti-aircraft fire. Drones are generally slow, making them easy targets from the ground, even with small-arms fire.

More advanced drones, such as the US military's MQ-9 and the RQ-4, fly at very high altitudes, often over 50,000 feet — far out of reach of small-arms fire.

 

The second way to shoot down a drone is by interfering with its electronics, primarily through radio-frequency energy.

The rapid adoption of drones has made anti-drone systems "really important," the Green Beret told Insider. "We've been using them for a while now, primarily in Syria and Iraq, where the ISIS had a decent drone capability."

Two types of anti-drone weapons under consideration by the US are Flex Force's Dronebuster and IXI's Dronekiller, according to Politico.

The Dronebuster is a compact and lightweight counter-drone weapon that is specialized for use against ommercial drones. It uses radio-frequency energy to overwhelm the drone's control frequency, causing it to stop and either hover or return to its operator. It can also overwhelm a drone's GPS, causing it to hover, land, or crash.

The Dronebuster is the only handheld anti-drone weapon authorized for US military use. It can be used in a fixed site or as a handheld unit, giving its operators some flexibility.

The Dronekiller is a rifle-sized counter-drone weapon that uses radio-frequency energy to interrupt a drone's command-and-control signals or its guidance, causing it to land or to return to its operator. It has a range of about 1,100 yards and can spot a drone by its radio-frequency signature.