‘Death Zones’: Russian military creating system to make areas of airspace inaccessible to foreign missiles and drones, reports say

Russia’s electronic warfare specialists will practice creating ‘protection areas’ in the country’s airspace that could render foreign satellite navigation systems completely useless, disabling an enemy’s high-precision weapons.

According to Moscow daily Izvestia, citing a source in the Defense Ministry, radio-electronic warfare troops will practice using the technology during exercises this year, with the practice to be held nationwide in 2022.

The system, known as Field-21, creates interference that disorients foreign satellite navigation systems, including the American GPS NAVSTAR. According to experts, the creation of special zones could be used to protect military facilities, as well as industrial areas, making the airspace virtually impenetrable. They believe the new approach will radically increase national security.

With satellite navigation foiled, enemy high-precision weapons and drones will not be able to direct themselves towards their target.

“Electronic warfare systems hit several cruise missile systems at once,” military historian Dmitry Boltenkov told Izvestia. “Satellite navigation interference causes them to get ‘lost’ in space and dramatically reduces their accuracy. If the radio altimeter signal is suppressed, the ammunition will also not be able to perform its combat mission as expected.”

Radio-electronic troops have already been deployed in Syria, where an electronic warfare protection dome has been created over the areas of Tartus and Khmeimim, protecting the military from attacks by militant drones. Russia has been involved in the Syrian Civil War since 2015, when it was invited by the Damascus government, led by President Bashar Assad, to help fight against a terrorist insurgency in the country.

In Russia’s Far North, the powerful Murmansk-BN system has been deployed on the Arctic coast, and is capable of interfering with the communication, navigation, and control systems of ships, submarines, and aircraft illegally crossing the border. In March 2019, the Norwegian Defense Ministry officially complained to Moscow, stating that the jamming technology is affecting security in Norway’s own air space.

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