US bases ‘ill-equipped’ to stop drone attacks, NORAD deputy says

As the U.S. military works to develop tactics to defend against small and cheap one-way attack drones, one of the top commanders for U.S. Northern Command says that domestic bases are “ill-equipped” to deal with drone swarms.

The military is actively building out tactics and procedures to deal with the threat, but the U.S. is “not there yet” when it comes to dealing with attacks on bases, according to Army Lt. Gen. Joseph Jarrard. Jarrard, who serves as the deputy commander of U.S. Northern Command and the vice commander of the American contingent of North American Aerospace Defense Command, was speaking at the annual Space and Missile Defense Symposium on Thursday. Jarrard said that the main issue now is building the capabilities to detect and track enemy drone swarms before they can strike.

“We don’t have the sensors, and depending on where that swarm is going to attack, it depends on whether we have any sensors at all, and also whether we’ve got any effectors to go after that problem,” he said. 

A guide on drone warfare released this summer from Joint Interagency Task Force 401 said that “once a drone is overhead, the most important decisions about protection and countermeasures have already been made or, as it were, missed.”

The military is currently trying several different counter-drone approaches, as it also works to integrate small systems into offensive maneuvers. New countermeasures have included directed-energy weapons, special ammunition meant to deal with fast-moving drone swarms and smaller missile launchers meant specifically for dealing with the threat. But attacks on bases remain a major concern, as waves of tiny drones have proven to be effective at damaging installations.

Last year, Ukrainian forces carried out Operation Spider’s Web, where they snuck in dozens of one-way attack drones deep into Russian territory on commercial trucks. Once in place they burst from containers and caused extensive damage to Russian military infrastructure.

During the Iran war this year, Iranian forces targeted American positions in the Middle East with missiles and drones. Meanwhile, smaller drones also posed a serious threat. In one instance in March, tiny first-person-view drones operated by an Iranian-backed militia attacked an American air base in Baghdad. Video from the drone released by the militia shows the system surveying the area and then slamming into its target.

“We are ill-equipped right now to handle something like that, and obviously we’ve seen it used,” Jarrard told the audience. “We’re seeing it used on a daily basis around the world, and we’ve got to figure out how to mitigate that threat.” 

Most recently, a source familiar with the matter said that the Army is expected to soon add laser weapons to its base defenses. The Department of Defense plansto add laser and other directed-energy weapons to at least five bases by the end of the year.