UAS engagement decision modelling for directed energy systems

The problem of countering swarms of uncrewed aerial systems has become of increased importance in modern military settings. This is because small and agile uncrewed aerial systems may be deployed quite easily and used for destroying infrastructure or attacking enemy positions. Such uncrewed aerial systems present a detection challenge as well as difficulty in neutralisation. Hence, there has been much interest in investigating the potential of directed energy weapons for counter uncrewed aerial systems. Recent studies have attempted to model the synchronisation of sensing and effecting for counter-swarm uncrewed aerial systems. This has been achieved under restrictive conditions on the behaviour of the swarm, such as a fixed speed assumption for all uncrewed aerial systems. In this study, a more refined engagement decision process is proposed under a specific operational environment, and it will be shown how it can address the limitations of recent analysis. The modelling framework is based on a stochastic structure coordinating the engagement decision with a directed energy weapon effective range. Analysis of this model, its inherent assumptions and limitations, will also be provided.