Enemy Cruise Missile, Meet the U.S. Rail Gun

Enemy Cruise Missile, Meet the U.S. Rail Gun

Using electricity to fire high-speed projectiles is a relative bargain at $35,000 per shot.

By Mike Conaway in the Wall Street Journal

As Congress meets this month to mark up the fiscal year 2016 National Defense Authorization Act and appropriations bill, members will debate how to best meet tomorrow’s security challenges with today’s finite amount of money. The U.S. built history’s most powerful military through technological innovation. Yet our military advantage is quickly diminishing as other countries acquire comparable capabilities.

China has developed a large and growing ballistic and cruise-missile inventory capable of accurately striking targets on land and at sea over long ranges. Iran has fielded multiple antiship cruise missiles and has an arsenal of ballistic missiles that can reach targets across the Middle East and Europe. Russia has long had sophisticated ballistic and cruise missiles and has increasingly shown a willingness to use them. Other state and nonstate actors possess theater ballistic missiles and rockets that threaten the U.S. military and could be used to terrorize the civilian populations of U.S. allies.

Building and fielding these weapons comes at a fraction of the price it costs the U.S. to design, purchase and deploy defensive weapons systems. But thanks to innovations within the U.S. scientific community and the Pentagon, there is a way to maintain America’s military advantage. Directed energy weapons systems—such as electromagnetic “rail” guns, high-energy lasers and high-power microwave systems—have the potential to deliver effective offensive and defensive capabilities at a fraction of the cost of current systems.

Currently, the U.S. defends against enemy missiles with traditional missile-boosted interceptors. These long-range interceptors require complex systems to find incoming missile threats, and intercept and destroy them before they hit the U.S. or our allies. They are also large and expensive, with some interceptor missiles costing $10 million each. Weapon size is a particular problem for Navy ships, where limited storage space restricts the number of projectiles that can be carried.

At this point, we don’t have enough defense interceptors to defeat large salvos of guided weapons, and our overseas bases have very few defenses against low-flying cruise missiles, which are more difficult to intercept and destroy using traditional missiles. But even if they were 100% effective, the calculus is not in our favor. Using million-dollar weapon systems to combat thousand-dollar threats is economically unsustainable.

Yet by using electricity rather than expensive jet fuels and complicated propulsion methods, directed energy weapons could be game-changers, due to their enormous capabilities and cost effectiveness. And if adequately funded, some of these weapons could be fully operational in a few years.

The U.S. Navy has developed a working prototype of a rail gun that uses electricity to fire projectiles at high speeds with great precision at incoming enemy missiles and aircraft. Already, the Navy can accurately launch projectiles at distances over 100 miles at speeds over 3,000 miles an hour.

Last year the Navy launched a trial deployment of a solid-state Laser Weapon System on board the USS Ponce in the Persian Gulf—the first effective deployment of a laser weapons system by any of the services. High-power microwave weapons that disrupt or destroy internal electronic components of enemy weapon systems are also a near-term possibility.

Within a few years, the Pentagon could field rail guns and powerful lasers to defend U.S. forces against aircraft, cruise missiles, guided rockets, artillery and mortar threats, alleviating some of the need for our current more expensive defense systems. Laser systems will be used to combat swarm attacks by weaponized small boats that act to overwhelm our sea defenses through sheer numbers of inexpensive, expendable and deadly platforms.

Instead of millions of dollars per shot, a rail gun projectile will cost around $35,000, or even less with further development. Conservatively, solid-state lasers and high-power microwave “shots” will cost less than $10 each, with some estimates lower than $1. Rail-gun projectiles are small, and laser and microwave shots are unlimited, freeing valuable storage space and greatly reducing the need to rearm while under way.

The global proliferation of guided-missile technologies and the cost of defending against them suggests we need to re-evaluate our air and missile-defense strategy. Fielding rail guns, lasers and high-power microwave weapons alongside traditional, kinetic interceptors will create a more balanced air and missile-defense architecture.

An enduring pillar of the U.S. military’s planning has been its ability to exploit cutting edge technologies to maintain an advantage over our nation’s adversaries. Directed energy weapons are another opportunity to stay ahead of the competition and put the United States on the right side of the missile-defense cost equation.

Mr. Conaway, a Republican from Texas, serves on the U.S. House Armed Services Committee and the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence.