NAVAIR is seeking an advanced anti-radiation missile with a longer range than those in the Navy’s current inventory and that can also attack air targets.
The Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) has published a new notice of sources wanted for Advanced Emission Suppression Missile (AESM) – Enhanced Capabilities from February 18, 2026. While the US Navy is already working on a new anti-radiation missile, which will enter service soon, the new weapon would have one interesting feature: the ability to attack both air and ground targets.
It should be noted that this does not mean that the service has already decided to acquire the new weapon. Rather, the service seeks to see what options are available before a potential acquisition.
What the Navy is looking for
NAVAIR says the Program Executive Office for Unmanned Aviation and Strike Weapons, PEO (U&W), is “conducting market research to identify potential sources capable of providing an advanced anti-radiation guided missile weapons system.” […] with a longer range than exists in the Navy’s current inventory.” The goal is to enhance the ability to suppress and neutralize enemy air defenses in contested environments with a “weapon system that provides similar or enhanced capabilities compared to its current weapons inventory, focusing on extended range, forward targeting, countercountermeasures, and integration with existing and future platforms.”
The service listed a number of requirements for the new weapon, the first being the ability to engage targets “at significant ranges.” The Navy has not mentioned a threshold for this distance, although it is expected to be above the range of the AGM-88G AARGM-ER, itself considered twice the range of the AGM-88E (about 80 nautical miles).
The weapon should have an “advanced anti-radiation seeker with wide frequency coverage,” with the ability to target a wide range of modern and advanced radar systems. Targeting would be done through a precision navigation and guidance system, such as GPS/INS, with anti-jamming capabilities.
What would differentiate this weapon from the current AGM-88E and the new AGM-88G, which is about to join the fleet, is the desired “ability to engage air-to-air and air-to-ground targets.” This would be supported by the request for robust electronic countermeasures (ECCM) capabilities to defeat countermeasures, including chaff, flares, jamming and anti-ARM techniques.
Obviously, the weapon would have to be compatible with the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet, EA-18G Growler and F-35C Lightning II, the Navy’s current fighters. The service also requires a technology readiness level 7 or higher, meaning that a prototype must already be demonstrated in a representative operating environment.
Long Range Radar Killer
As the US military prepares for a possible high-level fight against a peer adversary, one of the key components of each air operation would be Suppression/Destruction of Enemy Air Defenses (SEAD/DEAD). Increasingly complex Anti-Access/Area Denial (A2/AD) defense systems pose a particular challenge to airpower, requiring the ability to counter them from longer ranges.
This requires being able to hit targets that are far behind enemy lines, without endangering the launching aircraft and thus allowing it to stay out of range of the threat. However, in an A2/AD scenario, ground-based air defenses and radars are not the only threat, as other assets represent an equally important threat: airborne early warning and control (AEW&C) aircraft.
These high-value assets are likely to operate deep within adversary-controlled territory, to maximize the protection they could gain, while still being able to do their job efficiently thanks to the range of their radars. Eliminating them would be a strategic objective in any air campaign, as it would severely hamper an adversary’s ability to detect incoming attack packets.
One weapon that has been considered as possibly intended for this role is the new AIM-174B long-range air-to-air missile derived from the Standard Missile 6. In its ship-based form, the weapon has a reported range of 200 nautical miles, which would likely be extended when launched from a high-altitude fighter aircraft, even without the use of the additional Mk72 booster used when launching from the Mark 41 Vertical Launch System (Mk 41 VLS).
One might then wonder why the Navy would look for a new weapon if it already has two that can do the same job. The answer is simple: flexibility.
Since the AGM-88G is an air-to-ground only weapon and the AIM-174B is an air-to-air only weapon, a new weapon with the ability to hit both air and ground targets would bring greater flexibility to the fleet. As a consequence, with a single weapon capable of performing both tasks, a SEAD asset could also pursue AEW aircraft rather than air-to-air armed fighters.
Additionally, this would also allow AEW aircraft to be attacked as targets of opportunity, should one appear while a SEAD aircraft is flying a mission to attack ground air defenses. This flexibility would also allow for a faster reaction in such cases, rather than having to wait for fighters armed with AIM-174 to arrive.
