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Lasers vs. Drones: Pentagon Picks 4 Weapons to Guard US Bases

AeroVironment, Epirus, Kord and Boeing laser and microwave weapons will face drones in a yearlong Pentagon trial at five U.S. military bases.

ByPeter
Green eight-wheeled Army armored vehicle with a laser turret and sensors on its roof, parked on a dirt test range
An Army Stryker fitted with the experimental MEHEL laser at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, in April 2017. It is not one of the four pilot systems. U.S. Army photo by C. Todd Lopez (public domain).

The Department of War has chosen the first weapons for a program that will put lasers and microwave beams on guard at U.S. military bases. On 5 October it named four directed-energy systems for a counter-drone pilot run by Joint Interagency Task Force 401 (JIATF-401), the Army-led body that coordinates counter-drone work across the military and other federal agencies. Congress ordered the pilot in the Fiscal Year 2026 National Defense Authorization Act, and the department said it will collect real-world data on what the systems need to operate, what they cost and how best to use them.

“High-energy lasers and high-powered microwave systems are tools that can be effectively used in a layered drone defense,” said Army Brig. Gen. Matt Ross, the task force’s director. “This pilot program will test these capabilities in an operational environment so we can understand how best to integrate and sustain them to defend the homeland.”

The four systems

The release names the weapons but not which base gets which system, how many will be fielded or what the pilot will cost, Military Times noted. Most public performance data comes from the manufacturers. Those results are company claims; the Pentagon has not published its own test results.

  • AeroVironment Palletized High-Energy Laser (laser): a LOCUST laser packed on a roll-on, roll-off pallet that can be moved by truck or ship. AeroVironment says a palletized LOCUST tracked and defeated target drones aboard the carrier USS George H.W. Bush in October 2025 (via Military Times).
  • Epirus Leonidas (high-power microwave): Epirus says it disabled all 61 drones flown in five scenarios at Camp Atterbury, Indiana, in August 2025, ending with a 49-drone swarm downed by one pulse.
  • Kord Firefly (laser): palletized and mobile, scalable from 5 to 40 kilowatts. Kord officials said a truck-mounted version typically needs a few seconds on target to down a small drone (via Military Times).
  • Boeing Compact Laser Weapon System (lower-power laser): Boeing says a 5-kilowatt unit defeated Group 3 drones at the Red Sands exercise in Saudi Arabia in 2024, and that the system had defeated nearly 500 drones in testing at ranges of about 200 meters to 2.5 kilometers (via Military Times).

Leonidas is the only microwave weapon in the group. It is the basis for the Army’s prototype high-power microwave under the Indirect Fire Protection Capability program; the Army paid Epirus $66.1 million for four prototypes in December 2022 and $43.5 million for a second-generation version in July 2025, according to Military Times.

Lasers versus microwaves

The two technologies work differently. A laser holds its beam on one drone until it burns through. A microwave weapon can disable a swarm in a single burst by overwhelming the drones’ electronics, although its wider footprint raises concern about effects on nearby systems, Military Times reported.

A low cost per shot is the main selling point for both. Ross has warned against leaning on that number alone. “If I procure that system and it costs me $6 million and I take one shot a year, you can’t tell me that that shot only costs 8 cents,” he told reporters in August. Measuring the full cost of running each weapon for a year is one of the pilot’s stated goals.

Where the weapons will go

In May, JIATF-401 selected five installations for the pilot: Fort Huachuca, Arizona, and Fort Bliss, Texas, both part of the southern border mission, plus Naval Base Kitsap, Washington; Grand Forks Air Force Base, North Dakota; and Whiteman Air Force Base, Missouri. The department said then that it would spend 180 days finalizing deployment plans with base commanders so that operations could begin later this year. Ross said in August that service members will operate and maintain the systems for the year.

The airspace question

Firing lasers inside U.S. airspace has already caused trouble. In February, the Federal Aviation Administration abruptly closed the airspace over El Paso, Texas, after the Pentagon let U.S. Customs and Border Protection use an anti-drone laser near Fort Bliss without coordinating with the FAA, the Associated Press reported, citing two people familiar with the matter. The FAA first announced a 10-day closure; it lasted a few hours.

The department and the FAA then staged a live-fire laser demonstration at White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico. On 10 April, the FAA said its safety assessment found that, with proper controls in place, such systems “do not pose undue risk to passenger aircraft.” The pilot is being run with the FAA, U.S. Northern Command and the military services.

A separate 2 October department memorandum orders officials to treat delays in approving counter-drone systems as an operational risk. It requires every denial to be documented and sent to JIATF-401, bars the services from repeating a weapons safety review for the same system and use unless something material changes, and says legal reviews should generally take no more than 10 days.

Part of a wider buildup

The pilot is one piece of a larger push. On 2 September, the Army awarded AeroVironment $464.8 million under its Enduring-High Energy Laser program for “dozens” of 30-kilowatt LOCUST X3 lasers, which the company called the first production contract for high-energy laser weapons in U.S. history. Military Times noted that the Pentagon has not said whether the pilot systems come from that order. On 29 September, JIATF-401 announced 10 counter-drone contracts with a combined ceiling of $4.15 billion for Domestic Shield, the department’s effort to protect priority defense sites inside the United States, though only $50 million had been obligated, DefenseScoop reported. DefenseScoop linked the rush to the Iran war and to drone incursions at home, noting that cheap drones are draining U.S. stocks of costly interceptors abroad.

Analysis: The pilot moves directed energy from test ranges into daily base defense, where weather, power supply, maintenance and airspace rules may matter as much as beam strength. Its value will depend on data the department has not yet released: which weapon goes where, how often each stays mission-capable and what a year of operation actually costs. Those answers could decide whether lasers and microwaves become a routine layer of U.S. base defense or remain a niche tool.

What to watch: the December shoot-off at Dugway Proving Ground, Utah, where the department says it will assess more laser and microwave systems, and where Ross has said strong performers “can immediately result in a purchase order”; the assignment of systems to individual bases; and the first cost and reliability data from the pilot.

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