Essay on Electronic Warfare: Denying Enemy Access to the Electromagnetic Spectrum

Electronic warfare is a strategic action that involves the use of an electromagnetic spectrum or using any other tactic which is connected or related electromagnetic spectrum to make an attack on the enemy during military conflict (Vakin et al., 2001). The primary purpose of electronic warfare is to deny the enemy the advantage of accessing the electromagnetic spectrum. It can be applied to sea, land, and event space, which are operated or unmanned by the system. The target for electronic warfare can be humans, communication, radar, or any other assets of the opponents. Radar fundamentals are the principles that are used when monitoring the detection systems which the applications of radio waves to determine or predict the angle, range, or velocity of a given object targeted during the war.

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When using radar, the distance away from given objects or target will be determined by the time it takes for the echo of that object to return signal to where it originated from. There is the use of a substantial parabolic antenna, which is always in rotation and scanning the sky to detect any object within the monitored areas (Vakin et al., 2001). The parabolic antenna still performs two significant functions, whereby it acts as the transmitter antenna for the pulse, which is released and also the receiving antenna for the pulsed, which are coming in from the signal.

Vakin et al. (2001) in preparation for electronic warfare, a given country or group will set up a decoy, thus a specific device like an aircraft that is designed to monitor enemy radar. A decoy will perform three primary functions, which include saturation of the enemy air defense system; decoy will also confuse the enemy to expose its forces before the right time. Lastly, the decoy will help to destroy or defeat the tracking, which is done by the enemy radar. On electronic warfare, the saturation decoy, which is a vehicle designed to be able to emulate and penetrate the aircraft with the aim of deceiving and saturating the enemy air space. There is also the use of towed decoy, which is a small jammer that is touched to the aircraft and is designed to assist individual aircraft in defeating the missiles which are sent by the enemy. The towed decoys provide the countermeasures at the end game. Again the is the use of expendables active decoys, which are mainly designed to provide the necessary protections for the dispensing aircraft just for some set period. Expandable decoys will involve the use of a small parachute to reduce the rate of falls.

Some principles govern all the operations on the radar; the basic radar principles are similar to the sound wave reflections principle. The detector operates with the echo reflections whereby the sounds will be sent to the objects. Then the purpose reflects the sound. When the soldiers want to determine how far the enemy or the target is, they will use radar range equations given that radar transmit power will assist in getting the frequency, minimum detectable signal, and any targeted radar which is across the section.

On managing the radar during the war the soldiers and experts will have to use azimuth determination which will include the local star time and latitude, on the application of azimuth determination a unit is being fixed on an object which is relative to the vertical or horizon of two bodies with the known coordinates, thus will make it easy to locate the coordinates of the objects. When monitoring the sea, the radar can be checked by the elevation determination where the height of the object is being calculated based on the sea level, so it will predict the position of the objects which are above and below the sea level.

Conclusion

In conclusion, when we are discussing modern warfare or conflict, it is worth noting that such a kind of war can be conducted on all possible dimensions like water, air, and even space. Still, regardless of where the fight is conducted, it is the humanity that will suffer.

Reference

Vakin, S. A., Shustov, L. N., & Dunwell, R. H. (2001). Fundamentals of electronic warfare. IEEE AEROSPACE AND ELECTRONIC SYSTEMS MAGAZINE, 16(10), 13-14.