What term describes the purposeful effort to create false or distorted RADAR signals?

The term that describes the purposeful effort to create false or distorted RADAR signals is jamming. Jamming involves using electronic signals to overwhelm or disrupt the normal operation of RADAR systems, rendering them ineffective or misleading. This is typically done by generating a strong signal at the same frequency used by the RADAR, thereby masking the real returns and creating confusion in the system.

Jamming is often employed in military contexts to protect assets from detection and guidance systems or in scenarios where deliberately misleading RADAR systems is advantageous. It specifically aims to degrade the performance of RADAR by flooding the receiver with false information.

In contrast, other terms such as disruption and interference may refer to any disturbance in the RADAR signal but do not specifically indicate the intentional creation of false signals that jamming does. Deception could imply misleading an enemy RADAR system through tactics or technology but is less precise than jamming in the context of directly generating false signals. Thus, jamming is the most accurate term for this context.