Drone killing gun - UAS Vision

Drone-Killing Gun Spotted at US Base in Iraq

A shoulder-fired weapon that zaps drones with radio waves and looks like something out of a sci-fi movie has been spotted at a U.S. military base in Iraq.

The author and futurist Peter Singer recently tweeted a picture that appears to show the weapon, known as the DroneDefender and made by Battelle, sitting in a corner of the Kara Soar Counter Fire Complex in northern Iraq next to a backpack and a copy of his book, “Ghost Fleet,” with the caption: “The Things They Carried Into War: Scene from Fire Base Bell in Iraq.”

The tweet was subsequently cited in an article by Thomas Gibbons-Neff, a reporter for The Washington Post, who reported the weapon is probably being used by American troops to target small reconnaissance drones operated by the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, or ISIS.

The weapon, which the company makes clear isn’t authorized by the Federal Communications Commission and thus isn’t available for sale in the U.S., uses radio waves to cut the link between the drone and its controller.

The base in Iraq — renamed from Fire Base Bell shortly after it was established to highlight its mission to conduct defensive operations — has come under sporadic, though deadly, attack. Marine Staff Sgt. Louis F. Cardin was killed and eight others were wounded at the base in a March 19 attack by ISIS rocket fire. Cardin, of Temecula, California, was assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment, 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit, based at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina.