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By:

Commodore S.L. Deshmukh

31 October 2024 at 3:00:19 am

The Microwave War Is Coming

As drones and electronic warfare reshape the battlefield, high-power microwaves offer India an unconventional weapon. Wars are becoming increasingly dependent on something that cannot be seen, heard or easily defended against: electromagnetic energy. Drones need electronics to fly while missiles need them to navigate. Disable the circuitry and an expensive weapon can become an expensive piece of inert metal. That is the promise of the high-power microwave array (HPMA), one of the more...

The Microwave War Is Coming

As drones and electronic warfare reshape the battlefield, high-power microwaves offer India an unconventional weapon. Wars are becoming increasingly dependent on something that cannot be seen, heard or easily defended against: electromagnetic energy. Drones need electronics to fly while missiles need them to navigate. Disable the circuitry and an expensive weapon can become an expensive piece of inert metal. That is the promise of the high-power microwave array (HPMA), one of the more intriguing branches of directed-energy warfare. Instead of destroying a target with an explosive projectile or burning it with a laser, an HPM system floods the target with intense electromagnetic energy, interfering with, or in sufficiently powerful applications, damaging. the electronics that make it work. The weapon is invisible and potentially capable of engaging several targets without the logistical burden of conventional ammunition. Potent Weapon The technology is not entirely new. What is changing is its scale and sophistication. Modern HPMA systems use large numbers of antenna elements to generate high gain and steer beams electronically. Active phased-array architectures can direct electromagnetic energy rapidly towards different targets, while advances in waveguides, power generation and pulse technology are attempting to reconcile three notoriously difficult requirements: enormous power, extremely wide bandwidth and precise electronic beam steering. The modern battlefield is becoming saturated with small, cheap and numerous electronic threats. A swarm of drones can impose a disproportionate cost on a defender if each incoming aircraft requires a missile or another expensive interceptor. Directed-energy weapons turn that equation upside down. Their principal attraction is not simply destructive power but potentially deep “magazine depth” provided sufficient electrical power is available and they do not run out of bullets in the conventional sense. The physics is both elegant and unforgiving. An intense microwave field can couple into a target through antennas, cables, circuit-board traces and other conductive structures. These can behave as unintended receivers, channelling electromagnetic energy into sensitive components. The resulting voltages and currents can overwhelm electronic circuits, producing anything from temporary disruption to permanent component failure. The engineering challenge is considerable. Generating immense instantaneous power is only the beginning. The system must transmit it efficiently, focus it accurately, steer it towards a moving target and avoid crippling its own electronics. Researchers are therefore exploring both active and passive phased-array designs, including architectures capable of radiating pulsed waveforms with extremely high instantaneous power. If these technologies mature, they could have uses extending well beyond counter-drone warfare—to radar, electronic warfare, power beaming and high-throughput microwave and millimetre-wave communications. China has clearly recognised the strategic potential. Its military-industrial establishment has been pursuing high-power microwave technology alongside lasers and other directed-energy systems. Chinese research has increasingly focused on countering the proliferation of drones and other aerial threats, where the economics of conventional interception are becoming uncomfortable. Some reports have attributed extraordinarily high-power levels - running into the tens or even hundreds of gigawatts - to Chinese HPM developments. Such figures should be treated cautiously, since the distinction between peak pulsed power, radiated power and practical engagement capability is important. But the direction of travel is unmistakable. Chinese Interest China’s interest also extends to electronic warfare and potentially space. An HPM system capable of interfering with or damaging vulnerable satellite electronics could add another layer to anti-satellite capabilities, including threats to low-Earth-orbit constellations. That would be strategically significant in a world increasingly dependent on commercial satellite networks for communications, navigation and military connectivity. America is hardly standing still. The Pentagon has been investing in directed-energy systems as part of a broader effort to counter drones and other asymmetric threats. The deployment of advanced laser technology in the Indo-Pacific illustrates the strategic logic: future air and naval defences will increasingly combine missiles, guns, electronic warfare, lasers and microwaves rather than depend on any single weapon. India, meanwhile, is beginning to enter this contest with an indigenous proposition. Bengaluru-based Tonbo Imaging unveiled its Wavestrike high-power microwave directed-energy system at Aero India 2025. The system uses klystron-based technology to generate concentrated microwave energy and combines search-and-track radar with electro-optical systems to identify and engage targets. Its reported range is around 3km, with the ability to target individual drones as well as swarm formations. For India, the significance lies less in any single specification than in the emergence of a domestic directed-energy capability. The country faces an increasingly complicated security environment in which inexpensive drones can threaten military installations, airports, borders, ammunition depots and critical infrastructure. A weapon that can disable several electronic targets without creating the blast radius of conventional munitions is particularly attractive in populated or infrastructure-sensitive areas. There is also an industrial lesson. The development of HPM systems requires expertise in power electronics, microwave engineering, radar, semiconductor technology, software and advanced manufacturing. Success therefore depends not merely on producing a weapon but on building an ecosystem capable of continually improving it. The microwave war will not make missiles obsolete. Weather, range, power requirements, shielding and the complexity of real-world targets will constrain directed-energy weapons for years. But the battlefield is moving towards a simple proposition: whoever controls the electromagnetic environment can increasingly control the machines operating inside it. For India, Wavestrike is an early attempt to ensure that it is not merely a spectator in that contest. The next generation of warfare may well be decided by who can make the other side’s electronics go mysteriously dark. (The writer is a retired naval aviation officer and a defence and geopolitical analyst. Views personal.)

India working on logistics of Tahawwur Rana's extradition

  • PTI
  • Feb 14, 2025
  • 3 min read

Updated: Feb 18, 2025

Tahawwur Rana

Washington: India is working on the logistics of Tahawwur Rana's surrender and extradition from the US, Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri has said, as President Donald Trump announced that his administration has given the go-ahead to extradite the 26/11 terror attack accused “to face justice".

“This is an issue on which the US authorities have taken very clear decisions. I think you've seen the President announce it himself from the White House podium" the decision of the US to extradite Rana, Misri said at a press conference here on Thursday.


During a joint press conference with Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the White House, US President Donald Trump announced that his administration has approved the extradition of "very evil" Tahawwur Rana, wanted by Indian law enforcement agencies for his role in the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks, "to face justice in India”.


In response to a question by PTI on the timeframe by when Rana will be extradited to India, Misri said: "We are working on the logistics of his surrender and extradition to India. There are a few final steps to be completed. The two sides are in touch on this particular issue.”


The India-US joint statement issued during the Prime Minister's visit to the US notes that Modi and Trump reaffirmed that the global scourge of terrorism must be fought and terrorist safe havens eliminated from every corner of the world.

“They committed to strengthen cooperation against terrorist threats from groups, including Al-Qaeda, ISIS, Jaish-e Mohammad, and Lashkar-e-Tayyiba in order to prevent heinous acts like the attacks in Mumbai on 26/11 and the Abbey Gate bombing in Afghanistan on August 26, 2021," the joint statement said.


“Recognising a shared desire to bring to justice those who would harm our citizens, the US announced that the extradition to India of Tahawwur Rana has been approved," it said.


The leaders further called on Pakistan to expeditiously bring to justice the perpetrators of the 26/11 Mumbai, and Pathankot attacks and ensure that its territory is not used to carry out cross-border terrorist attacks.

"The leaders also pledged to work together to prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and their delivery systems and to deny access to such weapons by terrorists and non-state actors,” the joint statement added.

Rana, a Canadian national of Pakistani origin, is currently lodged at a metropolitan detention centre in Los Angeles. He is known to be associated with Pakistani-American terrorist David Coleman Headley, one of the main conspirators of the 26/11 attacks.

Speaking at the joint press meet, Trump said "Today I am pleased to announce that my administration has approved the extradition of one of the plotters and very evil people of the world, and having to do with the horrific Mumbai terrorist attack, to face justice in India. So, he is going back to India to face justice."


The extradition of Rana was cleared by the US Supreme Court in January as it rejected his review petition in the case.


India last month said it was working with American authorities for the early extradition of Rana.


"The US Supreme Court on January 21 declined to hear a petition from the accused. We are now working with the US side on procedural issues for early extradition to India of the accused in the Mumbai terror attack," External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal had said.


In November 2012, Ajmal Amir Kasab, the lone surviving gunman among the Pakistani group, was hanged to death in Yerawada Jail in Pune.

-PTI

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