US Has Lost ‘Dominance In Electromagnetic Spectrum’: Shaffer

[unhappycamper]

http://breakingdefense.com/2014/09/us-has-lost-dominance-in-electromagnetic-spectrum-shaffer/



The Navy’s new EA-18G Growler electronic warfare aircraft (over $120,000,000+) during sea trials.

US Has Lost ‘Dominance In Electromagnetic Spectrum’: Shaffer
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr. on September 03, 2014 at 3:49 PM

NATIONAL PRESS CLUB: “We have lost the electromagnetic spectrum,” said Alan Shaffer, the Pentagon’s research and engineering chief, this morning. “That’s a huge deal when you think about fielding advanced systems that can be [countered] by a very, very cheap digital jammer.”

We’ve heard senior Pentagon officials fret about electronic warfare before, most prominently the Chief of Naval Operations, Adm. Jonathan Greenert, but this is the bluntest and most alarming statement yet.

“We have got to, in my opinion, regain some dominance in the electromagnetic spectrum, or at least parity, so things that we buy continue to operate as we intended them to,” Shaffer said. For example, the Pentagon’s biggest program ever, the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, has much-touted information technology built-in, but, he told reporters cryptically after his public remarks, “if we don’t really pay attention to the EM spectrum, it is not a good news story for the F-35.”

So what the hell happened? “There is no single answer,” Shaffer said when I asked him at the annual Common Defense (ComDef) conference here. Part of the problem is that the US government has sold off many of radio frequencies it used to own, “for good economic reasons,” he told the audience.

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Oh yea, we have to buy EA-18G Growlers ($120,000,000+) because the F-35 does not have room for jamming equipment.

Design As We Go.

[littlemissmartypants]

1. I love aircraft and this is making my head hurt. eom