High power microwave weapons for future spacecraft in somewhat hard sci-fi setting

In my somewhat hard sci-fi setting I'm thinking of using a high powered microwave weapon as the secondary armament of my ship to supplement the missiles it would carry.

I was thinking it would be a pretty massive active electronically scanned phased array https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Active_electronically_scanned_array that would also double as a radar, comm unit, and electronic warfare suite, but is also capable of focusing it's energy into tight beams to act as a long range directed energy weapon to perform against multiple targets.

I was thinking it could be used to either fry the electronics or burn through critical components of incoming missiles or other projectiles, possiblly vaporize them if small enough, or it could be used at longer ranges to burn through critical components or fry electronics of other starships.

However, I am wondering is a device of this kind of power feasible for a somewhat realistic low end torchship, and what disadvantages keep microwave weapons from being deployed in space as I notice they are quite uncommon compared to other devices such as lasers?

posted about 5 years ago

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