The electronic warfare unit of China's People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has come out with a list of targets for a possible coordinated attack on the US aircraft carrier strike groups, in the event of a conflict. The US military radars, sensors, and communication systems may come under fire from the electronic warfare weapons of China.
According to media reports, this was revealed in the latest issue of the magazine Defence Industry Conversion in China, supervised by the State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence.
“This information can provide references for the development of electronic countermeasures technology and related equipment in China’s future naval battlefields,” an electronic countermeasures expert with the PLA wrote in the report, according to South China Morning Post.
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The report looked into the US Navy’s Cooperative Engagement Capability (CEC) system. According to the US Navy, the CEC is a real-time sensor netting system that enables high-quality situational awareness and integrated fire control capability. It is designed to enhance the anti-air warfare capability of US Navy ships, US Navy aircraft, and US Marine Corps Composite Tracking Network units by the netting of geographically dispersed sensors to provide a single integrated air picture.
“It is formed through the networking of phased array radars, which relies on wireless communication links. When the opposing force employs electronic interference, the wireless links are prone to disconnection or disruption,” the report in the magazine read.
Platforms such as drones can move near the radar and create a sense of false targets, majorly reducing the detection accuracy and effectiveness of the CEC system.
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The other targets identified by the PLA include E-2C Hawkeye early warning aircraft and US military signal transponders which could be exploited to gain access to the military network of the US.
The CEC networks could be manipulated by mimicking a friendly response with the correct signaling method. Besides, continuous access requests can be made to overwhelm one of the CEC nodes with identification tasks, disrupting its operation, the report noted.
