Joint Task Force Southern Border used the Army Multipurpose High Energy Laser this week to stop three unmanned aircraft judged to be a threat along the U.S. southern border. Officials said the drones were believed to be linked to drug cartels.
The operation was the first use of the laser system to defeat cartel-linked drones at the border.
Army Maj. Gen. Curtis Taylor, the task force commander, said the result showed both readiness and a technological edge. “The successful defeat of these adversarial drones is a direct testament to the readiness, vigilance and technological edge of the joint task force,” Taylor said. “By integrating layered countermeasures alongside advanced directed-energy capabilities like this laser system, we have made it clear that we will not tolerate hostile surveillance.”
A War Department official said directed-energy weapons are part of the department’s plan for future warfare and homeland defense. “The department is proliferating directed-energy technology to protect the homeland and the southern border,” the official said. “And U.S. Northern Command and Joint Task Force Southern Border are deploying these capabilities to take out any … cartel drones that are doing incursions at the border.”
The same official said lasers offer a lower cost per engagement than firing expensive missiles at inexpensive drones and can be used against drone swarms. “The future of warfare obviously is going to include mass attritable drones,” the official added.
Developing scaled directed-energy systems is one of the department’s six critical technology areas, alongside applied artificial intelligence, biomanufacturing, contested logistics, quantum and battlefield information dominance, and scaled hypersonics. Officials said the department plans to buy large numbers of drones and counter-drone systems, including directed energy, as soon as next year.
In June, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth observed directed-energy tests at White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico, including a Golden Dome for America milestone. “Cutting-edge directed energy was harnessed, and the Dynamic Defense Autonomous Defeat system flawlessly and autonomously cued, targeted and eliminated a multitude of incoming threats,” Hegseth said. “This test was executed on schedule and dynamically defeated every threat. I watched our elite warfighters integrate with next-generation technology to stop incoming drones and cruise missiles dead in their tracks.”
In July the department awarded two Joint Laser Weapon System agreements with an initial value of $86 million and a program ceiling of $847 million. Emil Michael, undersecretary of war for research and engineering, said the goal is to field systems that can be deployed across multiple domains to defend the homeland against emerging threats.
