{ "archive_path": "archive/1789553150.49218", "base_url": "www.twz.com/space/new-details-on-how-space-force-has-waged-electronic-warfare-against-iran", "basename": "new-details-on-how-space-force-has-waged-electronic-warfare-against-iran", "bookmarked_date": "2026-09-16 10:05", "canonical": { "archive_org_path": "https://web.archive.org/web/www.twz.com/space/new-details-on-how-space-force-has-waged-electronic-warfare-against-iran", "dom_path": "output.html", "favicon_path": "favicon.ico", "git_path": "git/", "google_favicon_path": "https://www.google.com/s2/favicons?domain=www.twz.com", "headers_path": "headers.json", "htmltotext_path": "htmltotext.txt", "index_path": "index.html", "media_path": "media/", "mercury_path": "mercury/content.html", "pdf_path": "output.pdf", "readability_path": "readability/content.html", "screenshot_path": "screenshot.png", "singlefile_path": "singlefile.html", "warc_path": "warc/", "wget_path": "www.twz.com/space/new-details-on-how-space-force-has-waged-electronic-warfare-against-iran.html" }, "domain": "www.twz.com", "extension": "", "hash": "C1GYR3K56W6JH01T0JGC", "history": { "archive_org": [], "dom": [], "favicon": [ { "cmd": [ "curl", "--silent", "--location", "--compressed", "--max-time", "120", "--output", "favicon.ico", "--user-agent", "Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_7) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/118.0.0.0 Safari/537.36 ArchiveBox/0.7.4 (+https://github.com/ArchiveBox/ArchiveBox/) curl/curl 8.14.1 (x86_64-pc-linux-gnu)", "https://www.google.com/s2/favicons?domain=www.twz.com" ], "cmd_version": "curl 8.14.1 (x86_64-pc-linux-gnu)", "end_ts": "2026-09-16T13:40:46.114559+00:00", "index_texts": null, "output": "favicon.ico", "pwd": "/data/archive/1789553150.49218", "schema": "ArchiveResult", "start_ts": "2026-09-16T13:40:45.520087+00:00", "status": "succeeded" } ], "git": [], "headers": [ { "cmd": [ "curl", "--silent", "--location", "--compressed", "--head", "--max-time", "120", "--user-agent", "Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_7) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/118.0.0.0 Safari/537.36 ArchiveBox/0.7.4 (+https://github.com/ArchiveBox/ArchiveBox/) curl/curl 8.14.1 (x86_64-pc-linux-gnu)", "https://www.twz.com/space/new-details-on-how-space-force-has-waged-electronic-warfare-against-iran" ], "cmd_version": "curl 8.14.1 (x86_64-pc-linux-gnu)", "end_ts": "2026-09-16T13:40:46.352603+00:00", "index_texts": null, "output": "headers.json", "pwd": "/data/archive/1789553150.49218", "schema": "ArchiveResult", "start_ts": "2026-09-16T13:40:46.122804+00:00", "status": "succeeded" } ], "htmltotext": [], "media": [], "mercury": [ { "cmd": [ "/app/node_modules/@postlight/parser/cli.js", "https://www.twz.com/space/new-details-on-how-space-force-has-waged-electronic-warfare-against-iran" ], "cmd_version": "1.0.0", "end_ts": "2026-09-16T13:41:09.629085+00:00", "index_texts": null, "output": "mercury", "pwd": "/data/archive/1789553150.49218", "schema": "ArchiveResult", "start_ts": "2026-09-16T13:41:05.854239+00:00", "status": "succeeded" } ], "pdf": [], "readability": [ { "cmd": [ "/app/node_modules/readability-extractor/readability-extractor", "/tmp/tmpqp8oa137", "https://www.twz.com/space/new-details-on-how-space-force-has-waged-electronic-warfare-against-iran" ], "cmd_version": "0.0.11", "end_ts": "2026-09-16T13:41:05.839943+00:00", "index_texts": [ "U.S. Space Force\u2019s top officer has shared new details about his service\u2019s use of electronic warfare capabilities during Operation Epic Fury against Iran earlier this year. This underscores how space is steadily becoming an arena where conflict actually occurs, and the implications this has for forces operating inside and outside of the Earth\u2019s atmosphere.\n\n\n\nChief of Space Operations Gen. Douglas Schiess highlighted the actions of a member of the 42nd Electromagnetic Warfare Combat Detachment (EWCD) in support of Epic Fury during a keynote speech earlier this morning. Schiess\u2019 remarks came at the Air & Space Forces Association\u2019s (AFA) 2026 Air, Space & Cyber Conference, at which TWZ is in attendance. This is his first major engagement since taking over as head of Space Force less than two weeks ago.\n\n\n\nA previously released picture showing a member of the 42nd Electromagnetic Warfare Combat Detachment forward-deployed somewhere in the Middle East in 2024. USAF/Senior Airman Zeeshan Naeem \n\n\n\n\u201cDuring Operation Epic Fury, our components, notably at U.S. Central Command and Space Command, with support from our components at European Command and Pacific Command, demonstrated that Guardians [the official term for uniformed Space Force personnel] are not supporting from the sidelines as a nice-to-have [sic], but we are delivering space power directly into the fight as a need-to-have,\u201d Schiess said. \u201cOne of those impressive Guardians is Specialist Gray, who hails from Tampa, Florida. She joined the Space Force just two years ago, but listen to the impact she [has] made in her short term already.\u201d\n\n\n\n\u201cShe deployed to the CENTCOM AOR [Central Command area of responsibility] as a part of the 42nd Electronic Warfare Detachment [sic], and within hours of OEF kicking off, she received a top priority target package with one critical objective: reconfigure her weapon system and execute critical non-kinetic fires,\u201d he continued. \u201cShe locked onto the target, optimized her weapon system, and waged electromagnetic warfare against a determined adversary. Even as \u2018Alarm Red\u2019 sirens were blaring, and incoming missiles targeted her site, she courageously held the line, protecting forces, denying adversary capability, and delivering space effects, until her commander had to literally pull her from the console to safety.\u201d\n\n\n\n\u201cSpecialist Gray is just one of the outstanding members of the entire enterprise of dedicated guardians, including the acquisition professionals that developed and fielded the weapon system that she operated, the intel Guardians that developed the targeting package that she used, and the cyber guardians who ensured communication, connectivity, and network defense for the command and control, the guardian instructors who trained her for combat, and the list goes on and on,\u201d the Chief of Space Operations added.\n\n\n\nSchiess did not name the system in question or elaborate further on how it was employed. However, previously released pictures of elements of the 42nd EWCD in the Middle East have shown personnel working with trailer-mounted multi-band antennas that have been associated in the past with variants of the Counter Communications System (CCS). CCS is a family of ground-based electronic warfare jammers primarily designed to disrupt enemy space-based communications capabilities. Prior to yesterday, CCS was the U.S. military\u2019s only publicly acknowledged anti-satellite weapon. Space Force has now confirmed it also has weapons in orbit, which we will come back to later on.\n\n\n\nMembers of the 42nd EWCD pose in front of a trailer-mounted antenna at an undisclosed location in the Middle East in 2024. USAF/Senior Airman Zeeshan Naeem \n\n\n\nA picture released in 2020 showing members of the 4th Space Control Squadron standing in front of what is explicitly said to be an element of the Block 10.2 version of the Counter Communications System. USAF \n\n\n\nThe 42nd Electromagnetic Warfare Combat Detachment has been operating in the Middle East since at least 2024 under the umbrella of Space Force\u2019s main headquarters in the region, U.S. Space Forces \u2013 Central (SPACECENT). President Donald Trump briefly called attention to the detachment\u2019s \u201ccutting-edge defense activities\u201d during a Christmas Eve conference call with deployed service members last year.\n\n\n\n\u201cSometimes we have to be within the footprint of the satellite, and so that\u2019s why Guardians go into harm\u2019s way,\u201d Gen. Schiess did tell TWZ and other outlets at a roundtable after his speech this morning when asked for more details about the 42nd EWCD\u2019s role in Operation Epic Fury, and what lessons Space Force has been learning from the conflict more broadly.\n\n\n\n\u201cElectromagnetic warfare was a big part of that, but also satellite communications,\u201d he added. \u201cThe ability to keep communications, obviously GPS and PNT [positioning, navigation, and timing], were important there.\u201d\n\n\n\n\u201cAnd then, really, missile warning and missile tracking was [sic] incredibly important. Both [Air Force Chief of Staff] Gen. Wilsbach and I talked about \u2018Red Alarm\u2019 situations,\u201d the Chief of Space Operations continued. \u201cBeing able to tell our forces to be able to take cover was extremely important. And as we\u2019ve seen from Ukraine to Iran, the amount of missiles and the amount of things, the folks that are doing that each and every day are incredible, and they are saving lives.\u201d\n\n\n\nChief of Space Operations Gen. Douglas Schiess. USAF \n\n\n\nGen. Schiess\u2019 anecdote about Specialist Gray and the 42nd EWCD did highlight how Iran, especially in the opening phases of the conflict earlier this year, was able to deal real blows to U.S. and allied facilities and forces across the Middle East. Iranian missiles, drones, and other capabilities were able to damage and/or destroy a variety of high-value assets, including aircraft and radars, and cause hundreds of casualties, as TWZ has drawn attention to on several occasions in the past. This has already been a sobering wake-up call with serious implications for potential future conflicts against larger and even more capability opponents, especially China.\n\n\n\n\u201cI think the whole joint force is learning a lot from Operation Epic Fury, the previous operation there, on exactly what needs to be in underground facilities, [and] what maybe can we do from remote locations,\u201d the head of Space Force said at the roundtable today. \u201cYou could also look at what can we do from space to do some of those things? And so we\u2019re looking at all those [lessons learned].\u201d\n\n\n\nGen. Schiess mentioning subterranean facilities and remote operations is particularly notable. Even before Operation Epic Fury began, the U.S. Air Force had been working to expand options for directing operations in the Middle East from a command center in the United States. The service had also been looking to push certain command and control functions at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar underground. Al Udeid was among the many bases Iran subsequently targeted. \n\n\n\nOperation Epic Fury has already added new fuel to a larger ongoing debate about balancing U.S. military base defense priorities globally, including the relative value of investing in new physically hardened infrastructure. TWZ has been following these discussions very closely in recent years. The conflict with Iran has raised serious questions about future operations of any kind at certain bases across the Middle East, and there have been reports that a larger reorientation of America\u2019s force posture in the region could be coming. \n\n\n\nFor Space Force, operations against Iran have provided a broader opportunity for the service to demonstrate its active role in forward-deployed operations. That, in turn, has generated its own lessons learned beyond just steps needed to help better protect units in the field.\n\n\n\nThen-Lt. Gen. Douglas Schiess meets with forward-deployed members of the 42nd Electromagnetic Warfare Combat Detachment in 2025. Schiess was head of US Space Forces \u2013 Space (S4S) and the Combined Joint Force Space Component Commander at SPACECOM at the time. Space Force \n\n\n\nThis extends to \u201creconstitution [of forces] in a combat environment, the logistics and the importance of that relationship with TRANSCOM [U.S. Transportation Command] and to be able to get supplies and replenishment into the theater,\u201d Chief Master Sergeant of the Space Force John Bentivegna also said today, speaking alongside Gen. Schiess at the roundtable. That is \u201csomething we haven\u2019t really worked on before. So definitely, it was a great lesson learned.\u201d\n\n\n\nSpace-based capabilities including early warning, general intelligence gathering, weapons guidance, near-real-time communications, and more, are already absolutely central to U.S. military operations. America\u2019s long-standing dominance in space is also steadily being eroded, with China, in particular, surging ahead in the deployment of new satellites to support a host of mission requirements, including intelligence-gathering and long-range targeting. The ability to leverage space is also proliferating to smaller adversaries, including Iran. \n\n\n\nIn addition, as mentioned, the space domain is no longer limited to just supporting operations within the atmosphere, but is a place where real engagements happen. The U.S. military is now capable of generating so-called counter-space effects using forces and assets within the atmosphere as well as in orbit, as was just disclosed yesterday. \n\n\n\nOverall, Gen. Douglas Schiess\u2019 comments today about the role played by Specialist Gray and the 42nd EWCD during Operation Epic Fury are indicative of not just what is to come in future operations, but how the Space Force is already engaged in combat missions now.\n\n\n\nContact the author: joe@twz.com" ], "output": "readability", "pwd": "/data/archive/1789553150.49218", "schema": "ArchiveResult", "start_ts": "2026-09-16T13:41:03.535405+00:00", "status": "succeeded" } ], "screenshot": [], "singlefile": [], "title": [ { "cmd": [ "curl", "--silent", "--location", "--compressed", "--max-time", "120", "--user-agent", "Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_7) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/118.0.0.0 Safari/537.36 ArchiveBox/0.7.4 (+https://github.com/ArchiveBox/ArchiveBox/) curl/curl 8.14.1 (x86_64-pc-linux-gnu)", "https://www.twz.com/space/new-details-on-how-space-force-has-waged-electronic-warfare-against-iran" ], "cmd_version": "curl 8.14.1 (x86_64-pc-linux-gnu)", "end_ts": "2026-09-16T13:41:03.527735+00:00", "index_texts": null, "output": "New Details On How Space Force Has Waged Electronic Warfare Against Iran", "pwd": "/data/archive/1789553150.49218", "schema": "ArchiveResult", "start_ts": "2026-09-16T13:41:03.481384+00:00", "status": "succeeded" } ], "wget": [ { "cmd": [ "wget", "--no-verbose", "--adjust-extension", "--convert-links", "--force-directories", "--span-hosts", "--no-parent", "-e", "robots=off", "--reject=js,mjs,woff,woff2,ttf,otf,eot,mp4,m4v,mov,webm,ogv,mkv,avi,flv", "--timeout=120", "--restrict-file-names=windows", "--page-requisites", "--user-agent=Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_7) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/118.0.0.0 Safari/537.36 ArchiveBox/0.7.4 (+https://github.com/ArchiveBox/ArchiveBox/) wget/GNU Wget 1.21.3", "--compression=auto", "--timestamping", "https://www.twz.com/space/new-details-on-how-space-force-has-waged-electronic-warfare-against-iran" ], "cmd_version": "GNU Wget 1.21.3", "end_ts": "2026-09-16T13:41:03.471928+00:00", "index_texts": null, "output": "www.twz.com/space/new-details-on-how-space-force-has-waged-electronic-warfare-against-iran.html", "pwd": "/data/archive/1789553150.49218", "schema": "ArchiveResult", "start_ts": "2026-09-16T13:40:46.362696+00:00", "status": "succeeded" } ] }, "icons": null, "is_archived": true, "is_static": false, "latest": { "archive_org": null, "dom": null, "favicon": "favicon.ico", "git": null, "media": null, "pdf": null, "screenshot": null, "singlefile": null, "title": "New Details On How Space Force Has Waged Electronic Warfare Against Iran", "warc": null, "wget": "www.twz.com/space/new-details-on-how-space-force-has-waged-electronic-warfare-against-iran.html" }, "link_dir": "/data/archive/1789553150.49218", "newest_archive_date": "2026-09-16T13:41:05.854239+00:00", "num_failures": 0, "num_outputs": 6, "oldest_archive_date": "2026-09-16T13:40:45.520087+00:00", "path": "/space/new-details-on-how-space-force-has-waged-electronic-warfare-against-iran", "schema": "Link", "scheme": "https", "snapshot_id": "d7895e46-37ee-46a9-b6b8-21963b7b9f5c", "sources": [ "/data/sources/1789553150-import.txt" ], "tags": ",escalation,pool,war-wiki", "tags_str": "escalation,pool,war-wiki", "timestamp": "1789553150.49218", "title": "New Details On How Space Force Has Waged Electronic Warfare Against Iran", "updated": "2026-09-16T13:40:45.519952+00:00", "updated_date": "2026-09-16 13:40", "url": "https://www.twz.com/space/new-details-on-how-space-force-has-waged-electronic-warfare-against-iran" }