Pentagon Reports: U.S. Military Lasers Neutralize Three Cartel Drones at Southern Border
POLICY WIRE — Washington, D.C. — This week, the U.S. military successfully utilized a laser to destroy three drones suspected of being operated by drug cartels near the U.S.-Mexico border, according...
POLICY WIRE — Washington, D.C. — This week, the U.S. military successfully utilized a laser to destroy three drones suspected of being operated by drug cartels near the U.S.-Mexico border, according to a Pentagon statement released on Thursday.
The three unmanned aerial vehicles were neutralized late Tuesday night and early Wednesday morning using the Army’s Multipurpose High Energy Laser system, as confirmed by U.S. Northern Command, the entity responsible for certain military defense operations across North America.
The operation was conducted by the U.S. military’s southern border Joint Task Force, a division of USNORTHCOM. The exact location of the drone takedowns and the specific cartels involved were not disclosed. Details regarding the operation remain undisclosed.
USNORTHCOM classified the drones as “hostile” due to their involvement in activities that posed a physical threat to U.S. military personnel and U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents.
Maj. Gen. Curtis Taylor, the commander of the southern border’s Joint Task Force, stated that cartel networks are increasingly using unmanned aircraft systems to aid in illicit human smuggling and to surveil U.S. personnel and law enforcement partners. He emphasized that by combining layered countermeasures with advanced directed-energy capabilities like the laser system, the U.S. military has demonstrated its intolerance for hostile surveillance.
This incident follows a February event where a U.S. military laser inadvertently shot down a U.S. Customs and Border Protection drone in southwest Texas’s Fort Hancock area. Also in February, the Federal Aviation Administration temporarily closed commercial airspace around El Paso due to a safety disagreement between the FAA and the Pentagon over military drone tests involving a high-energy laser system near Fort Bliss.
📄 POLICY WIRE WHITEPAPER PUBLISHED: PAKISTAN’S NATIONAL SECURITY POLICY PRIORITIES
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy noted that the FAA and Defense Department had quickly resolved a cartel drone incursion, and the threat had been normalized. He also mentioned that while cartels have not used weaponized drones within the U.S., they do employ them in Mexico to target rival cartels.
The southern border Joint Task Force, comprising approximately 8,000 U.S. service members, was established last year in support of President Trump’s immigration policies.
Reporting by Policy-Wire (PW)
