<HTML>In den USA erscheinen mittlerweile so viele Artikel, die Mikrowellenwaffen für vielfältige anti-elektronik oder anti-personen Anwendungen vorstellen oder empfehlen, dass an dieser Stelle gar nicht mehr alle erwähnt werden können. Hier jedoch ein Artikel aus Aviation Week & Space Technology, in dem u.a. ein Direktor von Boeing aufregende Entwicklungen der HPM-Technologie in den nächsten 12-18 Monaten ankündigt, die HPM auch für Hubschrauber, unbemannte Flugzeuge, Tarnkappenflugzeuge usw. interessant machen. Ausserdem wird ein Produkt der Nürnberger Waffen- und Technologie Firma Diehl vorgestellt.
Electronic Attack Targets Elusive Foes
David A. Fulghum
7. Nov. 2004
[
www.aviationnow.com]
Auszüge:
NEW ENERGY DIRECTION
Aerospace researchers are unveiling unmanned helicopters, microwave weapons and tactics that U.S. Army aircraft must use to survive as they are pushed down to low altitudes in daylight to attack a new lineup of hard-to-find targets. At the top of the Army's list of threats are low-power radios and cellphones that are hard to detect and decipher but that allow groups of irregular fighters to communicate and coordinate their attacks. Like the U.S. Air Force, the Army wants to incorporate electronic surveillance, analysis and attack into its small-unit arsenal of weapons…
Industry also is showing prototypes of directed-energy weapons, including portable lasers and--more importantly as airborne weapons--small, high-power microwave (HPM) devices that can be carried by relatively small unmanned aircraft and helicopters. Senior officials, such as Waldo F. Carmona, Boeing's director of Advanced Army and Rotorcraft Systems, are predicting "exciting" developments in HPM technology during the next 12-18 months as researchers push directed-energy weapon payloads down to 1,000 lb., the magic number that makes them viable for carriage on unmanned aircraft...
Germany's Diehl was at the recent Washington meeting of the Assn. of the U.S. Army showing a man-portable HPM device that offers what company officials say is a cheaper route to fielding such weapons. The suitcase-size version of the CS-110 HPM system can destroy electronic modules (including those in surveillance systems or vehicles), generate resets in computer processors, induce power latch-ups, jam radios or disable infrared or proximity fuses, says Michael Sporer, business manager for HPM new products. He also points out that hardening against nuclear-explosion-produced electromagnetic pulses doesn't work because of different rise times in the power spikes. It can help protect convoys against remotely triggered weapons out to 75 meters. Using flat-plate or corner reflectors, it can focus the beam of energy into a 45-deg. swath. To this point, most HPM weapons have been designed as high-frequency devices (1-10 GHz.) to attack electronic devices such as radars through their antennas, Sporer says. His product--which uses a 24-volt battery, high-voltage generator and two parallel resonators--operates in the 200-450-MHz. band and targets much smaller 2-10-cm.-long cables and metal framework parts at far less cost than high-frequency devices. Critics of these low-frequency devices say their directivity is poor, and they produce large sidelobes that can damage electronics on the vehicles carrying them. High-frequency designs offer more precision and longer ranges when narrowly focused.
Another mission that might best be done by unmanned aircraft is suppression of enemy air defenses, which could include the use of rapid-fire guns and precision-guided missiles and HPM weapons that attack sensitive electronics on antiaircraft weapons and sensors...</HTML>
