The United States Air Force has reportedly deployed 20 new missiles to deal with the escalating threats from North Korea and Iran that can “zap” their military electronics, thus rendering their militaries completely ineffective.
“Known as the Counter-Electronics High Power Microwave Advanced Missile Project (CHAMP), the missiles were built by Boeing’s Phantom Works for the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory and tested successfully in 2012,” The Daily Mail reported. “They have not been operation until now.”
The Mail’s report came from Ronald Kessler, a former Washington Post and Wall Street Journal investigative reporter who is also a New York Times bestselling author. Kessler writes:
Because of sequestration budget cuts, the CHAMP missiles did not become operational under the Obama administration. But after I emailed then Trump National Security Adviser H. R. McMaster in August 2017 information about CHAMP that I was about to include in my book, The Trump White House, he thanked me for letting him know about the capability, agreed to an interview, and ordered a briefing from the Pentagon.
As a result, the Pentagon funded the program and ordered Air Force training worldwide to deploy and operate the missile systems.
The missile, which reportedly has a range of 700 miles, is delivered from bombers and flies at a low altitude and delivers “sharp pulses of high power microwave (HPM) energy.”
The pulses delivered by the weapon system can reportedly destroy electronic systems that are buried deep inside mountain bunkers and underground military facilities.
Kessler reports that U.S. officials believe that even if North Korea and Iran tried to shield their military equipment, their efforts would not be sufficient. Kessler adds:
Most amazing of all, the missile renders inoperable any radar that might detect it as it flies to and from a target. Thus, a country cannot take out CHAMP before it strikes and has no way of knowing why its facilities have suddenly gone dead.
CHAMP missiles emitting HPM also differ from an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) attack that is created by detonating a nuclear weapon in the atmosphere. Because it is targeted, HPM leaves intact civilian facilities needed to sustain life.
Tensions have risen sharply in recent weeks with North Korea, which has resumed missile testing, and Iran, which has reportedly been behind multiple provocations in the Middle East in recent weeks.
“In response to a number of troubling and escalatory indications and warnings, the United States is deploying the USS Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group and a bomber task force to the U.S. Central Command region to send a clear and unmistakable message to the Iranian regime that any attack on United States interests or on those of our allies will be met with unrelenting force,” National Security Adviser John Bolton said earlier this month. “The United States is not seeking war with the Iranian regime, but we are fully prepared to respond to any attack, whether by proxy, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, or regular Iranian forces.”
President Donald Trump will reportedly visit South Korea next month to discuss with South Korean President Moon Jae-in how to deal with the latest missile tests from North Korea.