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LAOAG CITY, Philippines – High mobility artillery rocket systems, Stinger missile launchers, and artillery ranging from 105mm howitzers to 60mm mortars delivered an impressive array of volume fires during the Balikatan 2026 counter-landing live-fire exercise at La Paz Sand Dunes in Laoag City, May 4.
Yet, the true lethality of the fires lay not just in their volume, but in their precision—a precision enabled by advanced electronic warfare systems and emitters funded and coordinated by the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command J7 Pacific Multi-Domain Training and Experimentation Capability. As U.S. Soldiers stood shoulder-to-shoulder with their Philippine, Japanese, and Canadian counterparts to repel a complex, simulated adversary, EW architecture operating behind the scenes ensured the massive show of coalition force culminated in pinpoint, synchronized strikes.
During BK 26, the J7 PMTEC team leveraged tactical EW systems to create a robust, non-literal training environment where threats cannot be seen visually. This included integrating sophisticated electronic emitters on PMTEC’s autonomous adversary drone boats. These emitters simulated the electronic signature of an enemy force, providing a signal for the combined task force’s electronic warfare specialists to hunt. This allowed them to rehearse the entire digital kill chain, from initial detection to final destruction. While explosions in the air and sea were clearly audible and visible, the exercise's decisive actions took place in an invisible battlespace: the electromagnetic spectrum.
Modern military forces rely on signals for everything from communication to radar, creating electronic signatures that can be tracked and targeted. The training objective for EW warfighters was to practice detecting these signatures in a live, realistic environment.
"If there were no transmitters, the EW and SIGINT [signal intelligence] collectors would have no input into the exercise,” said U.S. Army Maj. Ryan Rances, 125th Intelligence and Electronic Warfare Battalion operations officer, 25th Infantry Division. “It would be purely visual.”
U.S. Army Capt. Phoebe Lee, division artillery fire control officer, 25th ID, said the next generation command and control relies on EW capabilities to validate and shoot targets.
"Everything you saw leave [during the counter-landing exercise] was a full digital kill chain," said Lee. "Those targets were being sent completely digitally to the Fire Direction Center. We keep pushing forward with it [EW], and we're getting better and more lethal.”
EW is more than tracking blips on a screen. According to experts from the Army Intelligence Center of Excellence observing the exercise, the goal is to get "cuts and fixes” using multiple sensor systems to triangulate a precise, high-fidelity target location. This turns a simple directional "line of bearing" into an exact coordinate that can be fed to a HIMARS or artillery battery for an immediate and accurate strike.
The integration of these live systems is a cornerstone of the PMTEC enterprise, which aims to provide forces with realistic repetitions in a connected, contested environment.
"Doing this in simulation on a computer isn't enough. We have to get out and actually leverage our equipment, leverage our systems," said U.S. Army Col. Barry Jackson, U.S. Army Intelligence Center of Excellence. "That establishes confidence for our units, and it's part of what has helped us to be successful."
That sentiment was echoed by the ground force commander, U.S. Army Lt. Col. Chris Mattos, 2nd Battalion, 35th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 25th ID, who lauded the exercise for demonstrating "the full lethality and might of the combined joint team."
According to Mattos, the counter-landing exercise’s primary win was the seamless integration with partners, including a platoon from the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force and multiple units from the Philippine Army. "We're integrated with all of our heavy weapons and anti-tank weapon systems...the win, first and foremost, is integration, interoperability and partnerships."
The counter-landing exercise at La Paz demonstrated that in modern warfare, the most decisive actions may be the ones that cannot be seen.
“Our overall system of warfare relies on both the combination of kinetic and non-kinetic,” said Jackson. “What we're doing with EW is a component of that. We can't abdicate that space. We have to continue to make sure that we are operating in the electromagnetic spectrum, just as other people do…understanding both how we use the electromagnetic spectrum and how our adversaries use it as well.”
Balikatan is a longstanding annual exercise between the Armed Forces of the Philippines and U.S. military that represents the strength of our alliance, improves our capable combined force, and demonstrates our commitment to regional peace and prosperity.
| Date Taken: | 05.13.2026 |
| Date Posted: | 05.18.2026 16:35 |
| Story ID: | 565234 |
| Location: | PH |
| Web Views: | 6 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, Beyond the Boom: PMTEC's Electronic Warfare Architecture Powers Balikatan 2026, by Eleanor Prohaska, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
