Pentagon's special ops directorate selects EnforceAir C-UAS platforms

The US Department of Defense’s (DoD's) special operations and low intensity conflict (SO/LIC) directorate has selected Israel-based D-Fend Solutions as the sole provider for radio frequency capabilities for counter-drone operations.

D-Fend Solutions’ EnforceAir was selected in January for follow-on integration and operational assessment into small-unit, tactical counter unmanned aerial systems (C-UAS) missions by SO/LIC officials, members of the Pentagon’s Combating Terrorism Technical Support Office (CTTSO), and the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU).

D-Fend Solutions’ selection “puts us in a very good place” to compete for other Pentagon C-UAS initiatives, company Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Zohar Halachmi told Janes in early February.

The EnforceAir platform is designed as an autonomous detection and mitigation system that locates and identifies adversarial UAS systems operating in controlled or restricted airspace, a company fact sheet stated. The system then engages and takes over the aircraft’s command-and-control systems, forcing the UAS to land in a predetermined area, it added.

The system utilises an application consisting of “non-jamming and non-kinetic technologies” to overtake and forcefully land an adversary UAS, the fact sheet stated. The takedown application in EnforceAir “does not require line of sight, making it ideal for all complex environments, whether urban or rural,” it added.

The technologies demonstrated in the EnforceAir programme will likely play a large part in the layered defence approach Pentagon strategists are aiming for in a higher-level C-UAS strategy, Halachmi said.

“You will not only have one [C-UAS] system that feeds out” to support all units at every level across the US armed forces, Halachmi said. The EnforceAir will likely be one of “several platforms that create a system of systems” across all domains for C-UAS operations, he added. Under this scenario, the D-Fend Solutions’ offering would be one of several air-based C-UAS solutions for combat commanders, Halachmi said.