The Us Air Force is currently focusing on a lance laser system from Lockheed Martin, marking a significant step in outfitting a tactical fighter jet with a laser capable of eliminating anti-aircraft missiles.
But in fact, lasers can also be installed on helicopters.
The Apache helicopter successfully tested a high-energy laser pod on targets at the White Sands testing range in New Mexico, the first laser weapon ever employed by a helicopter.
As much as laser armed helicopters might seem like they belong in a command and Conquer video game.
In reality, they are joining a wide variety of ground, air and sea-based Laser platforms, many of which may be entering service in the coming decades and a few of which are already operational.
In fact, a new era of laser Warfare May soon be Dawning, thanks to Laser’s usefulness for countering two important weapon systems: drones and long-range missiles.
Films like Star Wars depict laser weapons as emitting short pulses of green and red light.
However, the phasers depicted in Star Trek in the 1960s were arguably a bit more accurate.
Real laser weapons project a coherent Ray of directed photons or light that strike their target virtually instantaneously.
This beam often streams into the target for several seconds or longer as the thermal energy builds up to destructive effect, although some pulsing lasers also exist.
However, unlike the weapons in Star Trek, the Rays from high energy anti-material lasers for use in the atmosphere are silent and generally invisible, as they usually operate at an optical wavelength indiscernible to the human eye.
In today’s laser weapons are more likely to burn a hole in a Target or cause it to combust rather than vaporizing it.
Why use a laser instead of a bullet shell or missile?
To begin with, lasers are highly accurate and quick acting, since they are fast as light and mostly unaffected by gravity.
This could make them ideal for swatting down small, Speedy targets such as incoming rockets and artillery shells.
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Laser Precision could also be handy for disabling ground or sea Vehicles without killing their occupants.
Of course, a soundless, invisible and recoilless weapon is also pretty stealthy if you can get close enough to use it.
Most importantly, lasers could be very cheap.
Contemporary missile defense systems such as Israel’s Iron Dome or the United States’s Gmd anti-ballistic missile system are much more expensive than the missiles they are designed to shoot down, making them untenable were they to face Mass attacks.
The same problem exists at the Tactical level when considering how to counter the future threat of weaponized drone swarms- basically large flocks of small Expendable drones designed to overwhelm enemy defenses.
Well, anti-aircraft missiles May cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, or Millions.
For anti-ballistic missile interceptors, the energy consumed by a laser weapon might cost as little as a dollar.
For systems hooked up to a power generator, the ammunition Supply could be virtually unlimited.
However, lasers do come with disadvantages that have held back their adoption for decades.
To start with, laser Ng tends to bloom or diffuse in the atmosphere, limiting maximum range, especially when obstructed by sand, smoke or fog.
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In fact, the relative lack of obstructive particles in space explains why they are considered ideal space-based weapons.
Furthermore, lasers may have difficulty burning through denser materials and often requires several seconds of continuous contact to inflict significant damage, which may not be enough time to disable heavier projectiles, depending on the power and engagement range of the laser, as well as the speed of the Target.
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In fact, development of laser resistant materials and countermeasures has preceded a pace, despite lasers having yet to enter widespread operational use.
Finally, laser weapons require powerful electrical generators or dangerously volatile chemical fuels, as well as bulky liquid or solid-state cooling systems.
These limitations pose serious obstacles to producing field Deployable lasers.
However, recent advances in solid-state Laser Technology may offer a solution to limiting the size of the power supply, though they do require additional cooling measures.
There are also legal restrictions.
The 1995 protocol on blinding laser weapons, part of the Un convention on certain Conventional Weapons, forbids the use of dazzler lasers explicitly designed to permanently blind the eyesight of adversaries.
This came into Force after several dazzler lasers were developed and even exported and possibly used, and it is rumored the Chinese type 99 tank may still have such a weapon system despite the protocol.
Fortunately, the protocol appears to have been more broadly interpreted as discouraging the use of lasers as an explicitly anti-personnel weapon.
However, it does not restrict the use of lasers against manned vehicles.
Indeed, lasers might be practical for disabling small ground Vehicles, attack boats and aircraft.
However, the majority of contemporary lasers are designed as defensive weapons to counter drones and enemy missiles and shells.
Indeed, the first laser weapon to see operational use in a combat zone, the Zeus Humvee laser Ordnance neutralization system, was employed by the Us Army to safely detonate roadside bombs and unexploded Ordnance in Afghanistan and Iraq, using the solid-state lasers with a range of up to 300 meters was considered a safer alternative to manually rigging C4 next to the deadly explosives.
Another laser that has entered operational use is the unimaginatively named Ansac-3 laser weapon system, a 33 kilowatt array of six solid-state lasers that proved so successful when tested on board Uss Ponce that the Navy decided to keep the weapon on the amphibious transport after the trials were complete.
Naval vessels may be an ideal platform for lasers, as they can more easily feed than power via their onboard electrical systems.
Furthermore, warships desperately need close defense weapons to protect against high-speed anti-ship missiles such as the Brahmos Cruise Missile.
Numerous other laser projects have failed to produce viable systems over the years.
One of the most infamous was the billion dollar Airborne laser system, a chemically fueled megawatt class laser mounted on the nose of a Boeing 747 jumbo jet designated the Yal1.
Smaller tracking lasers helped aim the huge weapon, which could fire 20 to 40 pulses lasting three to five seconds each.
The abl successfully destroyed two tactical ballistic missiles during tests in 2010.
However, the Air Force ultimately scrapped the program because of the Abl’s Impractical range limitations.
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The jumbo jets would have had to enter hostile airspace close to the launch sites to have a chance at Downing the missiles in the takeoff phase.
The Us Air Force has received a compact directed energy weapon Lance from Lockheed Martin, marking a significant step in out trading a tactical fighter jet with a laser capable of eliminating anti-aircraft missiles.
Tyler Griffin, a Lockheed executive, told reporters that Lance is the smallest, lightest high-energy laser of its power class that Lockheed Martin has built to date.
He further noted it is a crucial Benchmark in developing an operational laser weapon system in the Airborne domain.
The latest report makes no mention of the power Lance is capable of producing, but there has been reports that it will probably be less than 100 kilowatts.