[ilovwindows]

I have always wondered, wouldn't it be pretty easy to create a missile that follows a radar wave to it's source? A fighter plane could use this very missile to shut down a fighter plane chasing it or a ground radar scanning it.

[belter]

Already exists. Meet the AGM-88:

https://fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/smart/agm-88.htm

[kevin_thibedeau]

The British ALARM is more interesting as it has a loiter mode where it can fly up, deploy a parachute, and wait for a radar site to turn on.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/ALARM

[imtringued]

It's basically a flying naval mine with an active tracking mode.

[Buttons840]

After going down the rabbit hole of combat flight simulators (Falcon BMS), I learned about Suppression of Enemy Air Defense missions. Fly to a spot, fire off a few radar seeking missiles at an area, the missiles are programmed to hit any radar they detect. The missiles go in a straight line for several minutes watching for radar, and will quickly fly towards any detected radar and blow it up. So, to support nearby missions you just put out a few of these missiles over and area and then nobody dares turn on their ground radar.

[skhr0680]

I recall Serbia having some success baiting anti-radiation missiles with tactical microwave ovens

[varjag]

It's a successful urban legend.

[abandonliberty]

Like carrots being good for your eyes.

[des1nderlase]

This statement is quite on spot, as carrots were used to cover radar tech.

https://www.livescience.com/38861-carrots-eyesight-myth-orig...

[magicsmoke]

Seems like this could be mitigated by having a network of radar emitters that periodically turn on and off while sharing targeting information through the network to non-emitting missile launchers. Maybe the emitters could also be mobile and drive away to deter inertial-based targeting. Seems almost like a shoot-and-scoot artillery system except with radar instead of rounds. The concept would also work by networking the radars of a flight of fighters together so none of them would have to continuously transmit while also allowing fighters to illuminate targets from multiple angles.

[stouset]

This is precisely how modern IADS (Integrated Air Defense Systems) work. You have long-range search radar deep in your territory which can alert to contacts entering your airspace and feed that information to tracking radar located nearer to the front lines. Tracking radar only needs to fire for as long as necessary to get a lock, fire on an aircraft, and allow the radar-guided missile to establish its own lock.

Missile launch sites are located separately from radar sites so they can’t be targeted (since they have no radar emissions themselves) and so that pilots don’t know ahead of time where to look for missile plumes for visual indicators of a launch.

All of these sites are networked so can feed information across a large region and back to a hardened command center far away. Sharing information this way allows minimizing the amount of time between a vulnerable front-line system revealing its location and launching a missile at its target. Tracking radar and missile sites can even wait to become active until a hostile aircraft is over or even past them to defeat wild-weasel style tactics.

Both tracking radar and missile sites are also often mobile so once they’ve disclosed their location by using radar and/or firing a missile, they can quickly move to a new location to avoid retaliatory strikes from anti-radiation missiles and regain the element of surprise.

[parsecs]

This is pretty much what they do nowadays. Look at patriot or S-400: the launcher, fire control radar, acquisition radar, are all mounted on trucks that can drive around. The radars do indeed share information with other assets like that. However anti radiation missiles ("ARM") are still a threat as the system won't function if all the radars are out

[stouset]

This is the principle behind anti-radiation missiles like the AGM-88 HARM. It’s impractical for A2A combat because in this situation, the enemy missile is already fired at you and all else being equal will hit before yours does.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/AGM-88_HARM

[scottLobster]

Yes, term you're looking for is anti-radiarion missiles, they've been around for a little while https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-radiation_missile?wprov=s...

[mardifoufs]

It already exists! Also works against ground radar. It's actually one of the best ways to clean up enemy air defenses before an invasion

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-radiation_missile

[kop316]

Yep!

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/AGM-88_HARM

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wild_Weasel

[byteofbits]

This is essentially how HARM (Anti-Radiation) missiles work [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AGM-88_HARM]

[muro]

Some loitering ammunition also do that. It waits in the area until SAM battery turns on their radar, then it knows its position and destroys it.