As the skies fill with smarter radars and networked surface-to-air missiles, the US Navy has quietly signed a major deal for a technology designed to make the difference between a pilot returning to base or vanishing from the radar picture.
A €62 million bet on staying alive
The US Navy has awarded a $73.8 million (about €62 million) contract to defence giant BAE Systems for a new generation of radio-frequency countermeasures. Behind that dry budget line lies a clear priority: keeping expensive, crewed combat aircraft alive in airspaces that are getting deadlier every year.
The deal covers 1,248 towed RF decoys, widely believed to be part of BAE Systems’ Dual Band Decoy family. These devices will equip US combat aircraft and will also be made available to allied air forces through Foreign Military Sales programmes.
The Navy is treating these decoys as expendable munitions, not rare prototypes – a sign they expect to use them in bulk if a major conflict breaks out.
At an estimated flyaway price of $110 million per F-35, the logic is simple: sacrificing a relatively cheap electronic “bodyguard” is far preferable to losing an aircraft and its pilot.
How a towed decoy can steal a missile’s “attention”
The Dual Band Decoy is a small pod that trails behind the aircraft on a cable, like a high-tech tail. Once deployed, it starts broadcasting an artificial radar signature designed to look more attractive than the fighter itself.
When an enemy radar-guided missile locks on and begins its final run, the towed decoy interferes with the missile’s seeker. It can amplify or reshape the radar energy so that the missile “sees” the decoy as the true centre of mass, not the aircraft pulling it.
The result is brutal but effective: the missile veers off course and detonates on the decoy instead of the fighter. In that final few seconds before impact, the difference between success and failure is a handful of metres and microseconds of processing time.
Instead of trying to make jets completely invisible, the US strategy is to break the enemy kill chain step by step – deceive, delay, then misdirect the shot at the last possible moment.
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These decoys are associated in US documentation with the ALE‑70 family, a series of advanced towed systems that operate across multiple frequency bands. BAE’s latest versions use gallium nitride (GaN) technology to generate powerful, agile signals capable of confusing modern radar seekers.
A sky crowded with smarter threats
From single radars to integrated “kill webs”
Modern air defences no longer rely on one big radar and one missile battery. They are built as dense webs of sensors, communication links and launchers. Long-range search radars, low-frequency arrays, passive receivers and infrared sensors all share data in real time.
Even low-observable jets like the F‑35 or future B‑21 can be exposed when they open weapon bays, fly in formations, or operate near advanced surface-to-air missile (SAM) systems. Once detected, they may face salvos of different missiles fired from multiple locations.
Traditional jamming still plays a role, but many new missiles are hardened against basic noise or barrage techniques. Some can switch between active and passive modes, using reflections from other radars or even home in on the jamming source itself.
Layered protection instead of magic invisibility
The US answer is not to chase perfect stealth, but to multiply layers of protection:
- Reduce the aircraft’s own radar and infrared signature.
- Use onboard electronic warfare to jam, spoof and detect threats early.
- Add expendable decoys that physically separate the “target” from the aircraft.
The towed decoy sits on that final layer. When all other tricks fail and a missile is already on the way, the decoy gives pilots a last-ditch option that does not depend on out-turning or outrunning the threat.
A crucial upgrade for the F‑35 and carrier air wings
Fifth-generation fighters with a new twist
The F‑35 already carries one of the most advanced electronic warfare suites ever put in a tactical fighter. It can map threats passively, jam enemy radars and share data across the battlespace. The new decoys add a second, physical “avatar” for the aircraft.
Because the decoy is towed tens of metres behind the jet, a missile must choose between two closely spaced radar sources. For a human, that may sound simple. For an overloaded seeker with milliseconds to decide, it complicates the engagement geometry and increases the chance of a wrong choice.
In a dense fight – multiple aircraft, overlapping jammers, ground emitters – that extra ambiguity can be enough to force enemy operators to fire more missiles for the same probability of kill, draining their stockpiles faster.
Carrier groups planning for contested seas
For carrier strike groups, this technology is more than a technical upgrade; it is a political and strategic hedge. Operating within range of Chinese or Russian long-range SAMs and anti-ship missiles will require naval aviators to punch through tightly defended bubbles.
A fighter package launching from a carrier might involve F‑35s and F/A‑18 Super Hornets carrying precision weapons, escorted by EA‑18G Growlers that provide heavy electronic jamming. Towed decoys give every frontline jet its own personal escape hatch if a missile gets close.
Buying decoys like bullets, not like trophies
A consumable, not a luxury
One of the more revealing details in the contract is the budget line: the decoys are funded under “munitions” accounts. That places them in the same category as missiles and bombs, signalling that the Navy expects to expend them routinely in training and combat.
The 1,248-unit order will supply operational squadrons, training units and war reserve stocks, while keeping BAE Systems’ production lines warm. In a long conflict, industrial capacity to replace spent decoys could matter as much as the technology itself.
Feeding the coalition
A significant slice of the funding comes from Foreign Military Sales, the US mechanism for arming allies. NATO and close partners flying American-built aircraft are prime candidates to receive the same decoy systems.
This serves three purposes at once: it standardises protection across multiple air forces, strengthens interoperability in joint operations, and feeds revenue back into the US industrial base. For Washington, that is both a security and an economic win.
How decoys fit into America’s wider defensive toolkit
The new contract does not stand alone. US forces already field a dense suite of electronic warfare and countermeasure systems, many of which work in concert with towed decoys.
| System | Platform | Main role |
| AN/ALQ‑249 NGJ‑MB | F‑35, F/A‑18 | Wideband radar and GPS jamming |
| EA‑18G Growler | Carrier air wings | Offensive and defensive electronic attack |
| AN/AAQ‑24 NEMESIS | F‑35, F‑15EX | Laser and microwave defence against missile seekers |
| ALE‑70 | Multiple fighters | Automatic directional decoying of IR/RF threats |
| MJSU‑167/MJUES | Most combat aircraft | High-rate chaff and flare dispensing |
| P‑8A + MQ‑4C | Maritime patrol | Real-time mapping of hostile emitters |
| AN/ALR‑94 | F‑22, B‑21 | Passive threat detection and warning |
In practice, an incoming missile might first be detected by a passive receiver, then confronted with jamming, then forced to track a towed decoy, while the aircraft also manoeuvres and drops chaff. Each layer slightly nudges the odds away from a successful hit.
What “dual band” and “GaN” actually mean
Two terms often appear around this programme: dual band and gallium nitride. Both matter for understanding why these decoys are being upgraded now.
“Dual band” simply means the decoy can operate effectively in more than one radar frequency band. Modern air defences do not all use the same wavelength; long-range surveillance radars, fire-control radars and missile seekers each work in different parts of the spectrum. A decoy able to mimic or disrupt several of them is far more versatile.
Gallium nitride, or GaN, is a semiconductor material used in high-power amplifiers. Compared with older technologies, GaN can generate stronger signals from smaller, more efficient hardware. For a towed decoy, that translates into more powerful, agile jamming and a better chance of fooling advanced seekers without overheating or failing mid-mission.
Realistic combat scenarios and hidden risks
In a large-scale conflict against a peer adversary, a typical air package might see multiple missiles fired from different ranges and angles. Some would be older designs susceptible to simple jamming. Others could be the latest “home-on-jam” models that adjust their trajectory towards the source of interference.
Towed decoys help in this second case by moving the apparent source of jamming away from the aircraft. The missile’s logic points it towards the decoy, not the jet. For the pilot, survival may rest on deploying decoys at the right moment, coordinating with jammers and executing defensive manoeuvres without losing situational awareness.
There are risks. Adversaries are already working on seekers able to discriminate between a real aircraft and a decoy based on subtle motion patterns, radar cross-section changes or combined radar/infrared cues. That triggers an ongoing chess match: as decoys grow more sophisticated, seekers adapt, and so on.
Another concern is logistics. Treating decoys as expendable munitions means stock levels and industrial output must keep up with training and potential wartime usage. If a conflict lasts longer than expected, shortages of decoys could force pilots to take greater risks or fly fewer missions.
Why pilots still matter in an age of smart machines
Despite the technology, human judgement remains central. Pilots must decide when to deploy a decoy, when to trust onboard automation, and when to abort an attack to avoid unacceptable risk. Training now includes detailed simulations of integrated air-defence networks, where crews practise timing their countermeasures down to the second.
For readers less familiar with air power jargon, all of this underlines a simple reality: survivability is no longer about thicker armour or faster engines alone. It is about confusing sensors, manipulating signals and forcing enemy missiles to chase ghosts. The US Navy’s latest €62 million investment is another step along that path, turning every combat jet into both a target and its own electronic illusionist.