Army researchers speed up delivery of electromagnetic warfare capabilities

ABERDEEN PROVING GROUND, Md. — To accelerate the pace of deploying electromagnetic warfare techniques to Soldiers, Army researchers are developing new methods to deliver capabilities with greater speed and flexibility.

The Army Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Cyber, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (C5ISR) Center’s DynamIQ Electromagnetic Attack program improves how EW tools move rapidly across the battlefield to match the operational pace required in today’s warfare.

The Center’s research supports the Army’s EW Arsenal — demonstrated this year at Project Convergence Capstone 5 and Cyber Quest 2025 — that enables Soldiers to view a repository of available EW techniques, systems and targets. Given the mission objective and threats, users can understand their tools and quickly engage the adversary.

The key to C5ISR Center’s DynamIQ EA program is the ability to take validated EW techniques from the lab or from existing systems and transport them quickly to additional hardware platforms in a matter of hours, with no additional development time, according to a branch chief Shane Snyder. The Army saves time, money and resources by advancing from legacy EW systems to portable solutions.

“The Army is building a flexible foundation for evolving threats by creating a modular mission payload,” Snyder said. “Developing EW techniques in a modular fashion creates platform independence. Soldiers now have the freedom to choose which tools they need for a mission.”

The C5ISR Center has a long history of science and technology investments in Army EW systems, Snyder said. Multiple C5ISR Center R&D teams continue to invest in both offensive and force protection EW systems to ensure the Army can protect Soldiers from EW threats while impacting the threat decision cycles through offensive EW techniques.

C5ISR Center scientists and engineers working with Soldiers, specifically the 11th Cyber Battalion since its activation in 2019, during field testing and experimentation events has provided valuable operational input, said Yaakov Gorlin, a C5ISR Center EW subject matter expert.

Testing events like Project Convergence and Cyber Quest provide the C5ISR Center with venues to test out both emerging concepts and maturing technologies, while getting direct operational feedback through their employment by the Soldiers. The C5ISR Center values these types of events as it allows the engineers and scientists to get first-hand insight into the capabilities being developed by the Center and provide the Soldier with relevant technology faster.

“Soldiers giving us direct feedback and talking about implementation during the development phase enables the Army to move faster,” Gorlin said. “Researchers need to understand what their work in the lab means from an operational perspective. These interactions with Soldiers help C5ISR Center achieve goals of improving ease of use and decreasing the cognitive burden. Software capabilities are tailored to the user.”

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The U.S. Army Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Cyber, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance Center is the Army’s applied research and advanced technology development center for C5ISR capabilities. As the Army’s primary integrator of C5ISR technologies and systems, DEVCOM C5ISR Center supports our networked Warfighters by identifying, developing, maturing, and rapidly integrating innovative technologies to drive continuous transformation.

DEVCOM C5ISR Center is an asset of the U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command. DEVCOM is Army Futures Command’s leader and integrator within a global ecosystem of scientific exploration and technological innovation. DEVCOM expertise spans eight major competency areas to provide integrated research, development, analysis and engineering support to the Army and DOD. From rockets to robots, drones to dozers, and aviation to artillery — DEVCOM innovation is at the core of the combat capabilities American Warfighters need to win on the battlefield of the future. For more information, visit c5isrcenter.devcom.army.mil.