Thank you to Raytheon for sponsoring this video and huge thank you to Michael Hofle for taking the time to chat with me. Raytheon Laser systems protect people and assets from dangerous drones. 8 have been delivered to US forces already and have been proven in the field. These systems are rugged and integrate directly into existing air defenses. For more information about this incredible anti-drone technology, visit: bit.ly/44mGAtU
Amazing how far these things have come. The last time I heard about these, they were still talking about massive chemical lasers the size of a cargo container.
It's not as crazy. You can look it up. Soviets already had a prototype tank in development in the 80ies that could have left you blind in both eyes from couple miles away.
The potential targets have also been becoming smaller and smaller. Those consumer drones can go down to a mere 249 grams. And then still have a lot of range and 4K.
I was born in the 90s, and we grew up with laser weapons being the weapon of the future. It feels so strange to see them as a real thing now, they really do seem to be the best direct kill counter to drones
not just drone, due to how cheap this thing, it could very well replace ballistic weapon in the future. future war could be fought with laser rifle with near unlimited ammo.
I'm eager to learn more about the power supply, or how they amplify the intensity of the lasers while using limited energy. Historically, lasers, at least combat lasers capable of destruction, took a massive amount of power to operate. But, technology, especially in the power storage realm, seems to advance every year. What a fascinating and frightening world we live in.
I'd imagine it has crazy as fuck power requirements though. Probably a loud diseal generator on board. Im curious about that. So, probably only shoots 100 times before, like, the capacitors need replacing or something. Or the lenses focusing the laser. Of course, that'll all only get better. Imagine once you get it militarized enough to put it at the squad level. Or platoon level.
@@jonny-b4954 They're really not that bad, and when you consider that you're saving on the cost of millions of dollars worth of missiles and munitions while also being able to perform the extremely crazy and unique mission of disabling artillery fire and impromptu missiles like RPGs and Iglas and other such systems mid-air with perfect precision, it becomes extremely easy to justify splurging on an amazing battery and generator. Fwiw if you just look up a 15 and a 150 kw generator, that's probably not far off from the smallest and largest of what the military would be fielding.
They never said it can protect against stuff like mortar rounds and rockets. My guess is that stuff like that moves to fast so they will hitt you before you can put enough energy int them / (heat them upp) for them to fail.
@@jonny-b4954Well it’s cost efficient than let’s say something like the German MANTIS system which has to fire a good amount of 40mm rounds to take out a swarm.
@taskandpurpose Optical engineer here. there are four unaddressed issues for this system: This system can become easily countered by using reflective coatings which reduce the absorbed thermal energy by more than 90%. Using coating materials with higher thermal capacity can also mitigate laser's effectiveness as this system relies on melting the targets. Third, lasers lose energy over distance which limits the interception range. Lastly, increasing projectile speed would reduce the exposure time to the laser. It is one thing to use it on a small, plastic, slow drone with matt colors (with such minimal effects). It's a whole different thing to use it on a hypersonic heavy missile with reflection shielding. Side note: Ironically, solving these 4 issues creates bigger problems: If any military manages to solve these 4 fundamental problems, all military aircrafts will become obsolete as they won't be able to counter the laser and will split apart from long distances as their melting pieces won't be aerodynamically stable. Satellites will also become easy targets, and long range guidance systems which rely on it become crippled. Military doctrine will be back to the naval pre-WW2 era where massive war machines had to outlive each other by being larger and using numerous, bigger and not smarter weapons.
As technology advances, while I was in service, I was happy that I didn't have to face an attack drone like what we are seeing today. On another note, the advances in counter drone technology and have 1000% faith in a system like these DE weapons might make me feel much safer, keeping more attention to targets on the ground.
If you've never watched Styropyro's videos here on YT where he demonstrates the power of lasers readily available to civilians in the US, you're missing out. It really makes one think "if he can do that, imagine what the military is capable of"
@@indiasuperclean6969 Not sure if you are trolling or not but here’s a fact for you. I watch Itchy Boots here on TH-cam. She is a motorcycle vlogger. She began her travels in India, so I was able to see first hand what the country is like. It looked like a beautiful country. Parts of it at least. I have a question for you though. What about all of the cow manure from all of the cows walking around everywhere? Does someone clean all of that stuff up? She was riding through some of the cities there, and there and could barely get through the street because of all of the cows everywhere. At least here in America, we keep our livestock on farms where they belong so we're not stepping in smelly cow shit all of the time.
@@ericcox6764They worship cows over there, they are allowed to roam freely and they sometimes block traffic. To them cow poop is considerd to have healing properties and there are videos of them smearing cow dung all over themselves lmao
This channel is so fucking cool. You’re the first I’ve seen talk to Raytheon and actually see what targets look like post engagement. Absolutely incredible work dude!!
Even $100/shot is economically advantageous compared to losses, or the cost of the DJI. CIWS is more expensive. But this has been the entire point of directed energy weapons. Also seeing soldiers use the same gaming controllers and joystick is pretty great
@@yeet3633 yeah someone need to procure them a box of 5$ logitech mice. Like what the hell man controller aim been known to be garbage for decades already lol
Another interesting story is the airforce's airborne laser (ABL) program produced a megawatt-class chemical oxygen iodine laser (COIL) mounted inside a modified military Boeing 747-400F.
They ultimately did only work temporarily because they have to be up 24/7 I am sure we are well beyond that Tech as we now have drones that can stay up 24/7! I have a Hemi Dodge aRam that will haul a palliatives 15 Megawatt? I need one to patrol the homeless in Los Angeles ! Gavin also!
When I was working at USAKA (United States Army Kwajalein Atoll) in 1987 they were just gearing up for the "Star Wars" laser system. It took an airliner size jet to carry the system. Critics said it wasn't possible due to technological difficulties. American ingenuity proved them wrong as usual.
@@indiasuperclean6969 But sir, does india have super lasers? Because from my point of view, india is rather poor when it comes to having lasers. Let alone SUUUPER LASERS!
The YAL-1 program was proof that for all the sci-fi hype the reality is laser weapons have many limitations. Hurdles to overcome, workarounds to engineer. Effective range and power are the primary areas where more research is ongoing.
It's never been publicly acknowledged they built 'Star Wars' but IK they built it, too. To zap ICBM's in orbit, and damage recon platforms like radar, telescopes, etc.
@@Destroyer_V0 That's a racist troll not an actual indian, they want you to go off about how dirty india is to contradict the 'obnoxious nationalism' and get people more used to calling indians and other brown people from generally allied nations dirty/uncivilized. Don't feed the troll, call them a troll.
For anyone that missed the interview, I would strongly suggest spending the $5 to become a member and going back and watching it. It was fascinating to hear what the Raytheon expert was actually allowed to say. Plus he went into greater detail regarding operation and implementation. Idk, just a plug for the Spare Parts Army membership, but also well worth it!
$5! *Are you insane sir* ? But I will point out one maybe lie in what he said & one opportunity too: *The Lie* - Its PR to placate the woke to say 'You know if you put your hand on a hot burner etc' - Yeah well, with a 15 KW laser *maybe*. With a 300KW to 1000KW laser, you'll be ash before you realise your getting warmer! (Anyone who watched the old 'Robo Cop' vids will grasp why he's obliged to say 'its not against personnel' 'tho). *The Opportunity* - Seriously, I *am* going to buy more Raytheon shares on Monday.
A natural upgrade to this system would be a software algorithm for detecting drones with the EO/IR cameras through foliage (like tree canopies) that would interfere with radar detection. Another would be the option for fully automated fire in the case of drone swarm attacks (with a skip or cancel feature if it accidentally tries to shoot down a flock of geese or something).
In my imagination, drone swarms seem to be the most terrifying offensive weapon to attack ground troops. I LOVE this DEW by Raytheon. Thanks so much for the best story I've seen yet describing the system and it's capabilities. Warfare is changing fast... no-one faster than the US of A.
One word: Slaughterbots... Actually, Slaughterbots and A. I., and we have a version of VIKI from "I, Robot"... to save the human race from themselves, robots have to subjugate or kill them...;-)
The only thing with these is that they can only cover a small area. You’d need hundreds if not thousands of these expensive lasers to cover a large front. Furthermore, you’d need to have multiple in same locations to defend against swarms. If it needs 10-20 seconds on a single target to kill it, you’d need only a few drones to neutralize it.
@@williamzk9083 well yes but its kinda hard to dodge something moving at the speed of light while you can miss with 20mm. If it is already cheaper, good, if it isn't, it will still be superior against munitions, just difficult to supply.
We were using a much more elaborate and fragile version of these in a 727 during the late 2000's to intercept ICBMs. Functioned quite well as a proofing program with a confirmed kill of a dummy payload missile. For longer ranges dust, moisture or anything else would cause refraction of the light beam so we used a lower powered pre shot laser to adjust for the phenomenon.
Do you have any comment about more kinetic use of high-energy laser pulses? The theoretical advantages are obvious - tune it and power it right, and you get a series of small detonations on the target, microseconds apart to blow through the inevitable vapor cloud and continue to penetrate the target until your capacitors run out of juice. It'd "only" require a completely re-engineered weapons system with extra weight for the capacitors, lose significant efficiency, and yes I know the tech isn't there yet.
@@crowe6961 think I read something about a pulse laser being more effective for use in space, because it mitigates the dampening effect of vaporised material accumulating around the targeted location on the object. Within an atmosphere, there are a range of factors which will clear that vapour cloud.
Many decades ago I was researching those devices at a major aerospace firm. Fun times. Haven't worked on them in decades. Interesting to see them finally working.
@@mutum1 It's a racist trolling, trying to get normies to call indians dirty and uneducated. Pretty pathetic that some guy in their basement is this upset about india existing (especially because they're an ally).
Please do something on the latest anti-landmine technology. Can aerial or light ground based drones be used to detect and defuse drones? Your content is great and is well shared. Thanks from Ireland.
Great video Cappy! What was shown here just scratches the surface of the weapon's current and future capabilities. Even smaller outputs can degrade or destroy the sensory inputs of soft targets (biologicals) in the battlespace.
True, but using lasers to permanently blind enemy combatants is a LOAC violation. Our enemies don't seem to care about these rules a lot of the time, but Congress definitely does.
These would be capable of far more than blinding against a human target, but I think we can probably agree that if slowly melting someone's face off with a low-power beam laser is not a war crime, it dang well should be because plinking at them with a .22 caliber rimfire would be more effective. A much more powerful beam laser, or a pulse laser with a terminal effect vaguely comparable to a gunshot (kind of what they're for in this context) would be a different can of worms.
@@Ghost_Hybrid That one's even in a treaty we ratified, it's important. Using lasers with lethal intent is still up in the air, though. The tech just isn't there to do it quickly or ethically yet, but it probably will be soon.
@@Ghost_Hybrid I'm planning to either buy a burning laser pointer or build a laser rifle. Perhaps using a 50 or 100 watt laser array module, similar to styropyro. Not sure how I'm gonna do it, tho. I feel like a blinding laser rifle has some advantages over a gun. For example it's completely silent, so you could blind someone and no one would hear it, it leaves no physical projectile behind like a gun would, and the beam could presumably go through glass, maybe even bulletproof glass. So if your op is camping in a bearcat, just pop him with the laser through the glass. Bulletproof vests won't stop it. And apparently just looking at the dot or any reflected light from such a powerful beam is more than enough to instantly blind you.
I really love how your channel has gone from being mostly a military joke and meme short to a long form investigative information channel. Your military background gives you the mind to ask questions that a normal reporter would not know to ask.
So cool. It's absolutely essential technology. One huge benefit is that the beam travels 186,000 miles per second. It makes a Hypersonic missile basically a very slow turtle.
@@564df6g5h4d6f5g4h6d5 hypersonic missiles can also only move in a straight line at those speeds, so as long as the turret can track fast enough, I'm sure the computer can handle that calculation. it'd surely be easier than trying to shoot a zero out of the air by eyeballing an AA gun.
@@mcarrowtime7095 The real problem is the laser has a very tiny reach and can only shoot down things that a few km away and only if the weather is perfect. So it would need much more than a few stoves of energy to heat up such a rocket in a few milliseconds it has left to destroy the incoming missile.
Sorry Cappy, Ex-grunt here. I don't know where the world is heading, but i used to like the simple life where we just made things go BOOM! Not to sure I like this fancy stuff?
The microwave THOR system is also out there also. It can do a wide dispersal shot downing drone wave attacks. However its max range is about 5K. It is near instantaneous also.
I guess it's now time to research directed energy weapons armor... I wonder if that's why the F-22 recently seen had a very reflective surface. I wonder how long it can shoot before it overheats? Pretty cool weapon. Thanks Chris for another excellent video.
You can't just add reflective surfaces to things to protect against lasers. Lasers work because they melt the target, transferring heat. Lasers will melt through any mirrored surface you can add to a vehicle, especially as the wattage increases, unless you have some kind of fantasy sci-fi mirror. These military grade lasers are not like the laser pointers you use to play with cats. Instead you would have to add a shield that can absorb a lot of energy without degrading, basically a heat shield like the one SpaceX is using on Starship. That is obviously not going to work with small drones. For fighter jets that the weight of that would seriously affect operational range and payload capacity. So if you wanted to take out a target defended by multiple powerful AA lasers (say, an aircraft carrier or a military base) you are going to have to use something like a railgun, i.e rain slugs of metal at high velocity and at various angles of attack.
@@Hibbidyhaiwell...you can always use Calcium-doped Boron Nitride Aerogel Coating that protect your equipment up to 1,300°C and will also give your equipment infrared stealth for anything inside it that burn up to 1,300°C.
Wow! The StarTrek hand held phaser only a bit bigger and with auto targeting. Miniaturization will follow and then more powerful battery technology will complete the technology gap. Can Warp Engines be far behind? Great episode!
Can this laser be defeated by reflective surfaces eg some mirror foil slapped on your little drone or the tip of whatever you are firing? It seems the next step in the arms race would be some paint that disperses light and energy in the specific spectrum those lasers are using but still looks like normal camo to the naked eye. The paint caoting/refective foil wouldnt need to be perfect, but just good enough to lengthen the time to render the laser mostly ineffective and making it easy to overwhelm it.
Even though these systems are cheap to fire, they're probably expensive to deploy. I noticed that there is no mention of the cost of the systems, the power requirements for sustaining their battery life and how much fuel is needed to power the generator for the vehicles to deploy and use them. Also, you did mention that the system needs an operator in its kill chain. Eventually, the powers that be will decide to use advanced AI technology to replace that part of the kill chain as personnel manning the systems become the weakness to the systems ever faster response times. That is something though for another video probably. 🙂
You didn't see the part of the video where the person was just a dead man switch allowing for automatic fire. In 15 years the updated versions are going to be interesting, not to mention countermeasures. I look forward to bedalled drones to reflect directed energy.
As far as kill-chain issues, once these get deployed, it will probably be like C-RAM or Aegis systems: the operator makes the "release" decision and the computer does the aim/fire/target discrimination.
Assuming the 300 second battery supply that can be recharged in 20-30 minutes they mentioned is for the 15kw laser: that's a 1.25kwh battery, which can theoretically be recharged in ~40min if plugged into a normal wall outlet with nothing else on the circuit. The design requirements for the a high-output and power-dense battery may be nasty, but supplying enough power to charge it won't be an issue.
@@mcblaze1968 They already are in Ukraine, to some extent. A minority of units have anti-drone gunners with microwave weapons and the Russians have made heavy use of jamming to reduce effective control range of Ukrainian drones. However, this has not stopped them.
Err.. mirrors? Reflective surfaces? It would seem that the defense against this type of high energy weapon would be coating the drone with materials that are highly reflective to the frequency of light that is being used. Not necessarily to save the platform but to preserve it long enough to complete its mission.
Great video. The US actually deployed a directed energy weapon as far back as the Gulf War to dazzle the crews of armoured vehicles and disrupt the vision of enemy infantry (although it wasn’t widely used because it was deemed to be a 'scary' weapon that could result in negative media coverage). The power of the beam was kept at a level low enough to only cause 'temporary' harm to the enemy's vision if used correctly.
I highly doubt this will be used frequently to knock out sensors on a tank. You don't want to see an enemy tank and just try to blind them. They'll just shoot in the direction of the laser. When you see a tank you probably want to use your TOE missles.
I thought about a very low profile, unmanned, vehicle with a high power laser on a pole. The laser would emit a line and sweep the area in front and the sides. I have done years of work on solid state lasers professionally, and have fried CCD sensors on cameras. You would think that a blind camera or operator would be a poor opponent.
@@JM800 If you are talking about just blinding sensors you don't need anything like 15kw. That might be a useful device but it seems like a much cheaper kind of thing.
I believe this old adage applies. Let’s not put all our eggs in one basket. Considering the proliferation of the drone threat and the use of swarm tactics, not even lasers can’t totally defend against this threat. These laser systems maybe cheap to shoot, but they will be expensive to produce and maintain. The US needs a more layered approach to drone defense, the same way we approach the armored threat. Soldiers at the squad and platoon level need a cost effective , anti-drone weapon. Something easily operated, the size of a LAW rocket, that can deployed a purpose built anti-drone drone. Several companies are converting small racing drones into anti-drone weapons. And maybe we need to look back to the future. The most cost effective anti-drone defense right now might be updated flak batteries. The German made Gepard and ZSU-23 have proven somewhat effective in taking out drones in Ukraine. Couple the lasers optical sensors with a 35mm or 40 mm rapid fire cannon with programmable ammunition, should be pretty effective.
Microspheres will become popular as a paint element on munitions and vehicles. Also, Gammma ray lasers were recently developed. You can always put band filters on sensors, except for the little wavelength notch the sensor uses. Lasers could only be "visible" if there is a lot of particulate matter or vapor in the air, and only if they are using a visible wavelength.
You're talking passive defenses? The problem is that all sounds very expensive, which is a "defeat" from the start at a mil/industrial level, and not the kind of tech likely adversaries are going to be outfitting your average quadcopter with.
It's exactly the kind of weapons/defense we will need on a future battlefield. The smaller the drones get I feel is going to be a challenge still. Drones that just observe that are the size of a pack of cigarettes are going to require sensors of a whole new level. What I've seen used in Ukraine has been enough to convince me drones are a huge battlefield weapon.
Drones like that would still be subject to things like signal detection and jamming, and the smaller the drone the less range and endurance it is going to have. If someone is operating a tiny drone chances are they aren't too far away from it.
@@shadowslayer9988 If you are monitoring the battlefield with your own assets a handful of drone operators hanging out a few hundred meters from your position are unlikely to remain hidden for long.
The lasers were mostly compared to missile based defenses. Gun based defenses are probably a more comparable option. Id be interested in seeing a pro con for that
Kinetic systems can more effectively deal with larger objects with stronger structures. But they tend to be limited in munitions supply. They also can typically disable a target with a single shot in a short period of time. Lasers have the opposite pros and cons, which means that they complement kinetic systems but not necessarily replace them.
I’ve been aware of the IMSHORAD Stryker for a couple years. I also was aware that laser tech is being researched. I think the pairing of a laser radar SAM combo is awesome. I hope the technology isn’t too fiddly. That’s my biggest concern. Can it remain deployed?
Yeah, these are brand new and probably in short supply, but I do think we should send at least a few over to Ukraine, if they are as effective as this video indicates. If nothing else, it would give it more combat time for evaluation with soldiers who are proven to be adaptive.
All throughout this video, I keep thinking of Command and Conquer Generals Quotes: "Tactical Lasers online!" "Laser Crusader ready for engagement!" "Keep the power flowing!"
Don't forget laser technical. A shame GLA only have theirs firing either Ma Deuce, shells, and recoiled rifle, and the avenger cost as much as kirov airship, dreadnought, battle fortress, and aircraft carrier.
More great product Cappy! Glad you mentioned the logistic challenges of keeping these systems in the field. There is the other challenge of the extremely long range of the beam's hazard beyond the target. Stray beam's nominal ocular hazard distances are significant and may impact the window coatings of civil aviation cockpit windows in future.
It would have to be reflective in all spectrum likely to be used for lasers, which if high UV lasers ever become common, which are the most energy efficient at long ranges by far and so will likely be, that would be almost impossible. Five feet of solid lead is still semi-transparent to high frequency UV. Good luck putting five feet of solid leads worth of lead atoms in the air between you and the target. It's also why high frequency IR detection systems *don't work,* because almost everything you want to detect, like humans, or tanks with literal feet of metal around them, are *too transparent to high frequency UV to be seen by it.* You literally just see the thick rock terrain behind everything, including through almost all buildings, all trees and foliage, ect. Useful for geology, but little else. But then you modulate the beam a little, something that with high powered lasers is impossible to avoid anyway, and suddenly it super heats anything relatively solid it's passing through, and induces huge electric currents in anything solid and conductive. Gasses, particle soups (smoke), it doesn't see at all. Solid objects it nukes, so well it doesn't bounce anything meaningful back, again making it worthless for detection or seeing things, but great as a weapon.
It will still be destroyed. Lasers destroy by heat. With that much heat, the reflective mirror will shatter which might even be worse for the drone covered by it.
I think the threat of large numbers of small drones is still a real concern, because very likely the Raytheon weapon requires direct line of sight to operate, which says it must either be above or at the same level as the low flying drones. High flying drones are not a problem with the Raytheon weapon, but low flying still seems to require special positioning of the DE weapon platform. Still, the weapon you presented is very impressive.
I actually just came from why your video on army recruitment is down, there is a potential solution, I'm not from the U.S but I'm from one of it's closest allies, Australia. When I was 19 I drank a bit too much, got into a massive brawl with local law enforcement, when they managed to detain me, I had a court appearance a week later. The judge after he read the case said I'll give you a choice, a military service, or a prison sentence. I jumped on that military service, had a hard time bonding with my fellow recruits because I was also on an 18 month drinking probation. A true second chance, should be offered to young people who can clearly qualify for the military. It will take the stress off the prison system, while keeping the military at healthy levels of recruitment. Of course there would be limitations on what could be offered with a true second chance.
I imagine everyone outside a vehicle wearing laser eye protection goggles in the future. Even a bit of scattering will blind you at these powerlevels. Anyway, against drones there are already some nice autocannon based systems with airburst rounds that do pretty much the same thing. These are more reliable and easier to maintain, sure a few autocannon rounds cost more to shoot down a drone than this laser, but it will still be cheaper than the drone.
Cheaper and less likely to be defeated by smoke or a sandstorm. My first choice would be a kinetic kill system but I'd still want a few lasers for long range fire and the ammo capacity which is absolutely insane for a laser system.
Would love to see a video on the new laser system put on U.S. Navy middle cruisers. Our shipyards in WA have taken many conventional weapons off to install these new systems.
I have been saying this for as long as drones started being a menace, there is a need for a system to fill the "mini Anti-Air" role and it needs to be compact and mass producible because you will need 1 covering every juicy target for a drone strike or to deny surveillance of an area. Looks like the system has arrived.
It's so great knowing our military providers of critical defensive and offensive weapons feel so secure that they can reveal our military advancements so our enemies can know what we are doing and can make effective plans to defeat us. I feel so safe and comfortable.
Anti-personnel lasers may be out for now, but given how much is already possible, I'd not be surprised if in a few decades, regular soldiers were all using laser guns.
If the laser can track and melt a drone or mortar shell, it can definitely set a person on fire. They will never say it though, because it's a war crime to use blinding lasers against people.
First, the laser could be used to blind people. Sure, against the geneva convention, but doesn't mean that it wouldn't cause issues if it shined on your eyes Second, the laser could be a serious dancer to anybody standing under a hanging anvil! you shoot the chain/rope and let the anvil do the kinetic kill
Heard from several different people about lasers on British vessels in the first Gulf war. I happened to work with Admiral Woodward (retired) some years later. When I asked him about it he said it depends what you call a very strong search light and a laser. My reply was I'll take that as a yes then, he just smiled.
We were working on Laser C-RAM (counter rocket/artillery/mortar) 15 years ago, and it's always been "just on the horizon". Drones are a natural target, way easier than artillery shells; they're MUCH slower and have zero armoring or ablative coating. They are small and relatively cold (heat signature), but sensors and targeting controllers have gotten much better in the last several decades. It's almost like DEWs were a solution looking for a problem, which drones obligingly provided. The Airborne Laser (ABL) HEL in a 747 was in the megawatt class years ago, but was abandoned a decade ago because it had to get too close for the intended ballistic missile targets. Hypersonics will be a challenge for DEWs due to the shielding plasma surrounding them when flying near the earth, but slow cruise missiles, not that hard. Also, imagine NOT having to rely on humans for control of all except target confirmation; AI can direct the laser MUCH faster than even the best video-game players to dart from target to target. Guarantee that's the step you weren't shown, along with autonomous surveillance. Yet.
Why would hypersonic targets be a problem? When you have the speed of light even the fastest hypersonic targets are relatively slow, it shouldn’t be a factor.
@@SuperBacDoc The issue (s) with DEWs against hypersonics is that there is both a highly-scattering plasma surrounding them when they are going hypersonic at low altitudes, and they are much tougher due to the enormous temperatures experienced in low-altitude hypersonic flight. When a missile is built to withstand 2500K temps, getting enough additional energy consistently (same spot) on them to down them is extremely tough. That's why the ABL intercept envelope for ICBMs was at very high altitudes (60,000 feet) during boost phase. ICBMs, which are hyper-hypersonic (Mach 20+) when exoatmospheric are much more fragile than HGVs when in boost or midcourse phases. Only ICBM RVs (re-entry vehicles) are hardened, but they only must withstand high temps for less than a minute so typically use ablative materials to survive. HGVs must withstand 2000C+ temps for many minutes, and can't use ablative materials to protect them because such materials affect maneuverability, the whole purpose of HGVs. So the issue has nothing whatsoever to do with the speed of DEW beams, it's that hypersonics are a MUCH tougher nut.
One thing was skipped here, and that's performance in heavy rain, fog. Also didn't show operation at night when the visual side of sensors may not be as effective. I'm not saying these things will make it ineffective, but if it has blind spots where it can't operate it is important to be aware and have alternatives for those moments.
Thanks Cappy! It is hard for us to keep up with developments if we don't have contacts in the military and the contractor world. I was not aware that we had gotten as far as you have shown with hardening laser weapons for deployment. With all the allocations we have had in the last decades, it is good to see progress has been made. I am sure that Turkey and the others that claim they have operational weapons are exaggerating a little. Turkey's economy is in the crapper and has been for at least 5 years. Seems pretty incredible that they could have created something practical before we did. I definitely want to see these things on ships to fight all the missile and drone threats that they would face in the South China Sea or the Taiwan Straight. Also, it would be really nice to have some ready to deploy to the Taiwan area if China becomes "stupidly optimistic" enough to destroy the world economy with their belligerence.
I’m not sure how others feel but at this point I think it would be great to integrate into a overall air defense, leave the lasers for now, to attack drones for a much cheaper cost and most expensive for things like patriot , iris and other ground based air defenses, both working together could be good I think at least but maybe in the future they will be good enough for all kinds of weapons
@@purplenurp5590 The funny thing is that there’s been a shotgun shell called “DroneShot” and it’s pretty cool because it shoots out net to get the drone rotors tangled up and it falls out of the sky. It’s definitely not being used in Ukraine because it’s meant for civilian use to try and keep the drone intact, so the drone owner can’t sue for destruction of the expensive drone, and an intact drone in Ukraine can still detonate their payload.
@@BigManLaskey Saw a video of a Russian soldier trying to shoot down an incoming drone armed with a rpg warhead...let's just say he didn't shoot it down. One DJI drone can take out 4 soldiers if it's armed with 2 gernades.
Tungsten buckshot is a minimum requirement to reach drone altitude, and only when a drone is actively being used for payload delivery, not loitering looking for artillery targets.
You can also clear minefields with these HELs, like in Ukraine. There are also new lasers ( combining different wavelengths into one beam) that are coming out that aren't affected by the weather conditions, or range distances.
What noone is talking about, is the ability for this system topermentantly blind a crowd of enemies in mere seconds with the use of some AI and a bit of machine learning to learn how to hit someone in the eyes.
Yeah I think the segment about not being a good personnel weapon is just mitigating bad PR, if it can track a mortar shell it's not going to struggle with tracking a panicking soldier
Damaging eyes at long distance with a laser has been easy for decades and doesn't need particularly accurate targeting because the eye's lens helpfully focuses inbound light into a small dot on the retina. The sort of pulse laser in a tank's range finder will comfortably burn holes in the back of your eye. It isn't used to do this because intentionally maiming people breaks the Geneva Conventions; you have to try to kill them!
As a welder I see this not happening. If it does not for long. It takes zero time for an auto dark lense to function. So combat eye ppe could just be redone to have an auto dark feature. Chances are it'll be the 1k kw method. At that point you're cooking folks pretty quickly.
Great video and very informative! I wish we had such a tool for protecting our troops, but count me as still skeptical. In the past Raytheon has been known for making weapons with great specs, but that end up too big, cumbersome, fragile, and expensive. Is this any different? Each kill requires a few seconds of a directed attack, which is why Raytheon says it wouldn't work against soldiers. Does Raytheon expect drones in the future won't take evasive maneuvers immediately, like when you put your hand on a hot stove? Or what if the enemy sends a drone with a simple corner mirror which will precisely return the laser to where it came from? At several seconds time to kill, one would need multiple HEL units to defend against the myriads of incoming targets we can expect in the next war. The video mentions only 30 targets at once, but what about missiles that explode into "bomblets" or drones that emit hundreds of shards of flak and smoke to confuse the system? It just couldn't keep up. (And that's not even taking into account the time to retarget after firing: the turret in the videos moved extremely slowly. Why? Is there a limit due to the sensitive optics inside?) If these were cheap, I'd say the US ought to try them out, but this is Raytheon and we know each unit will cost millions. Compare that to the small cost to an enemy to deploy an overwhelming number of tiny drones, any one of which could take the directed energy weapon out of commission for the battle and require repair in a "clean room". Raytheon excels at big, expensive gear. But drone warfare is not like nuclear missiles and space lasers. To stay relevant they need to show that they can beat COTS (Consumer Off The Shelf) weaponry which is cheap, disposable, small, and numerous. This directed energy weapon is just not suitable for that. In fact, it sounds more like a retrofit and marketing rebranding of their anti satellite technology than an actual solution for drones. I hope Raytheon quickly learns the lessons from Ukraine.
You mentioned looking for IEDs in your service. With many drones, they still are IEDs. Many Ukrainian munitions are made of tape and 3d printing underneath commercial drones, so they very much are improvised and I believe there are a few Russian tanks that can confirm they are explosive devices.
Great coverage of an emerging, 'bleeding edge' weapon. The 15 and 50 kW lasers sound like (weather permitting) they're good for subsonic items like drones, and perhaps even mortar rounds, providing they have not been 'hardened' against DE rays. (You KNOW that opponents will harden their missiles/projectiles against DE systems). For ballistic or hypersonic cruise missiles, jumping power by10X (300 kW) may not be enough, given how fast they travel and how little time they're in range, rapidly changing atmospheric effects, slewing challenges at multi-Mach speeds, programmable, unpredictable trajectories, inherently thicker, tougher, high temperature skins, etc. At Mach 5, a missile travels well over a mile a second. (~10 miles in 9 seconds) A shot on these needs to do its job in a small fraction of a second. That likely requires multi-megaWatt.
Anything less than a perfectly reflective surface will just take longer to burn through. Its somewhat difficult and expensive to make surfaces perfectly reflective. It is a logical primary counter measure though. Can be defeated by a supplementary ballistic system utilizing the same aiming and targeting system.
As someone born in 60’s and have been asking were the future? Things are moving very fast in the last ten years. The future is just around the corner. Thanks for sharing.
I am more curious about the ability of space-based laser platforms being used to shoot down long range ICBMs. If they can take those dangerous weapons out of play than the world would be safer as I think the shorter ranger ICBMs can be shot down more reliability than their silo based counter parts.
100% agree. ICBMs currently have little to no counter defense (that we know of). It would a great thing for the world if one or every country had the ability to take weapons of mass destruction of out play
Icbms can be shot down reliably , they are just like bombers and presently they rely on sheer mass and decoys to pass through Youre greatly underestimating modern advancements in software and computing, even the usa is scared china and Russia will successfully shoot down a consequential percentage of its icbm attack China and russia are in full on panic about what the west itself can do if even they can shoot down ballistic missiles😂 Icbms are still useful because they can deliver an angry response to anyone anywhere on earth in minutes and they have no substitute for now When used properly like in a sneaky submarine based launch, icbms are truly op but the land based versions survive by sheer mass and speed Everyone knows they can and will be shot down but since its nukes only one or two needs to get through 😂
I'm curious about the comparison between anti aircraft guns and these systems. I can see a lot of major advantages that the laser would have. But if the technology is still in its infancy, will anti aircraft guns come back out to bridge the gap?
Good point - I'm technically dim enough to suppose you could link *both* to the one radar spotter/targeting system *IF you wanted to* And cynical enough to suppose *If you're selling Laser weapons why woul you cut your throat commericially offering that* ?
Microwaves would seem to be far more effective against drone swarms, as they affect a wider field and degrade the target faster. (The Navy should be installing them on every ship for 360° coverage.) Either way, DE should get a Manhattan Project-like funding investment, as it will greatly determine the future.
Thank you to Raytheon for sponsoring this video and huge thank you to Michael Hofle for taking the time to chat with me. Raytheon Laser systems protect people and assets from dangerous drones. 8 have been delivered to US forces already and have been proven in the field. These systems are rugged and integrate directly into existing air defenses. For more information about this incredible anti-drone technology, visit: bit.ly/44mGAtU
How many drones does it take to bang a Queen Bee 🐝?
No pew-pew sounds ???!!!! Damn it !
Proud of RTX on this one. Definitely need this for the next American battlefield ASAP
For the love of God Chris! Ask the Reytheon guys for a Pew Pew noise!
Mount a small, portable nuclear reactor and it is basically forever gun. What a time to be alive...
Amazing how far these things have come. The last time I heard about these, they were still talking about massive chemical lasers the size of a cargo container.
On a plane on modern marvels
It's not as crazy. You can look it up. Soviets already had a prototype tank in development in the 80ies that could have left you blind in both eyes from couple miles away.
What W/sec would be needed to disable a drone in 0.5 seconds or less?
@@CrackBabyZaches They weren't completed though.
The potential targets have also been becoming smaller and smaller. Those consumer drones can go down to a mere 249 grams. And then still have a lot of range and 4K.
I was born in the 90s, and we grew up with laser weapons being the weapon of the future. It feels so strange to see them as a real thing now, they really do seem to be the best direct kill counter to drones
not just drone, due to how cheap this thing, it could very well replace ballistic weapon in the future. future war could be fought with laser rifle with near unlimited ammo.
The first prototypes of the laser and the neon gas laser were invented by an Iranian (Ali Javan) at Bell Laboratories.
Stormtroopers: Lazer weapons aren't accurate
Yes my exact feeling. Laser weapons and powerful ai have arrrived
I'm eager to learn more about the power supply, or how they amplify the intensity of the lasers while using limited energy. Historically, lasers, at least combat lasers capable of destruction, took a massive amount of power to operate. But, technology, especially in the power storage realm, seems to advance every year. What a fascinating and frightening world we live in.
This is pretty amazing, the fact that it can protect against mortar rounds, Rockets, Etc. Is a game changer.
I'd imagine it has crazy as fuck power requirements though. Probably a loud diseal generator on board. Im curious about that. So, probably only shoots 100 times before, like, the capacitors need replacing or something. Or the lenses focusing the laser. Of course, that'll all only get better. Imagine once you get it militarized enough to put it at the squad level. Or platoon level.
@@jonny-b4954 You saw that they had them on very small vehicles, the 15kw at least, 50kw was on a large-ish truck
@@jonny-b4954 They're really not that bad, and when you consider that you're saving on the cost of millions of dollars worth of missiles and munitions while also being able to perform the extremely crazy and unique mission of disabling artillery fire and impromptu missiles like RPGs and Iglas and other such systems mid-air with perfect precision, it becomes extremely easy to justify splurging on an amazing battery and generator. Fwiw if you just look up a 15 and a 150 kw generator, that's probably not far off from the smallest and largest of what the military would be fielding.
They never said it can protect against stuff like mortar rounds and rockets. My guess is that stuff like that moves to fast so they will hitt you before you can put enough energy int them / (heat them upp) for them to fail.
@@jonny-b4954Well it’s cost efficient than let’s say something like the German MANTIS system which has to fire a good amount of 40mm rounds to take out a swarm.
@taskandpurpose Optical engineer here. there are four unaddressed issues for this system: This system can become easily countered by using reflective coatings which reduce the absorbed thermal energy by more than 90%. Using coating materials with higher thermal capacity can also mitigate laser's effectiveness as this system relies on melting the targets. Third, lasers lose energy over distance which limits the interception range. Lastly, increasing projectile speed would reduce the exposure time to the laser.
It is one thing to use it on a small, plastic, slow drone with matt colors (with such minimal effects). It's a whole different thing to use it on a hypersonic heavy missile with reflection shielding.
Side note: Ironically, solving these 4 issues creates bigger problems: If any military manages to solve these 4 fundamental problems, all military aircrafts will become obsolete as they won't be able to counter the laser and will split apart from long distances as their melting pieces won't be aerodynamically stable. Satellites will also become easy targets, and long range guidance systems which rely on it become crippled. Military doctrine will be back to the naval pre-WW2 era where massive war machines had to outlive each other by being larger and using numerous, bigger and not smarter weapons.
As technology advances, while I was in service, I was happy that I didn't have to face an attack drone like what we are seeing today. On another note, the advances in counter drone technology and have 1000% faith in a system like these DE weapons might make me feel much safer, keeping more attention to targets on the ground.
🎉😢
If you've never watched Styropyro's videos here on YT where he demonstrates the power of lasers readily available to civilians in the US, you're missing out. It really makes one think "if he can do that, imagine what the military is capable of"
For scale styropyro's most powerful laser is ten time weaker than the *weak* military version.
I'm impressed that crazy guy hasn't blinded himself. His lasers are terrifying.
@@indiasuperclean6969 Not sure if you are trolling or not but here’s a fact for you.
I watch Itchy Boots here on TH-cam. She is a motorcycle vlogger. She began her travels in India, so I was able to see first hand what the country is like. It looked like a beautiful country. Parts of it at least.
I have a question for you though. What about all of the cow manure from all of the cows walking around everywhere? Does someone clean all of that stuff up? She was riding through some of the cities there, and there and could barely get through the street because of all of the cows everywhere. At least here in America, we keep our livestock on farms where they belong so we're not stepping in smelly cow shit all of the time.
@@ericcox6764They worship cows over there, they are allowed to roam freely and they sometimes block traffic. To them cow poop is considerd to have healing properties and there are videos of them smearing cow dung all over themselves lmao
@@arandomperson410 That's a known bot based in Pakistan trying to make fun of India. They comment on a lot of T&P videos.
This channel is so fucking cool. You’re the first I’ve seen talk to Raytheon and actually see what targets look like post engagement. Absolutely incredible work dude!!
Even $100/shot is economically advantageous compared to losses, or the cost of the DJI. CIWS is more expensive. But this has been the entire point of directed energy weapons.
Also seeing soldiers use the same gaming controllers and joystick is pretty great
theyre indirectly calling us keyboard warriors trash
@@indiasuperclean6969 get a new shtick.
Hopefully they don't use Logitech controllers
@@yeet3633 yeah someone need to procure them a box of 5$ logitech mice. Like what the hell man controller aim been known to be garbage for decades already lol
@@indiasuperclean6969 Holy shit, talk about reflecting your problems.
I can safely assume India is the opposite of all those things now.
I did not expect to see these in my lifetime.
Incredible that you were also able to get a thorough brief on them.
Another interesting story is the airforce's airborne laser (ABL) program produced a megawatt-class chemical oxygen iodine laser (COIL) mounted inside a modified military Boeing 747-400F.
Pretty sure that was for shooting down ICBMs and satellites. Need that much power for those targets
@@Petrion2008 Correct sir.
They ultimately did only work temporarily because they have to be up 24/7 I am sure we are well beyond that Tech as we now have drones that can stay up 24/7! I have a Hemi Dodge aRam that will haul a palliatives 15 Megawatt? I need one to patrol the homeless in Los Angeles ! Gavin also!
My grandpa worked on this program! it was by far the coolest program he ever let me hear about him working on.
@@tristanmitzel10 As a Navy contractor I helped provide weather data from San Nicolas Island.
When I was working at USAKA (United States Army Kwajalein Atoll) in 1987 they were just gearing up for the "Star Wars" laser system. It took an airliner size jet to carry the system. Critics said it wasn't possible due to technological difficulties. American ingenuity proved them wrong as usual.
difficulties of the time, perhaps.
@@indiasuperclean6969 But sir, does india have super lasers?
Because from my point of view, india is rather poor when it comes to having lasers. Let alone SUUUPER LASERS!
The YAL-1 program was proof that for all the sci-fi hype the reality is laser weapons have many limitations. Hurdles to overcome, workarounds to engineer. Effective range and power are the primary areas where more research is ongoing.
It's never been publicly acknowledged they built 'Star Wars' but IK they built it, too. To zap ICBM's in orbit, and damage recon platforms like radar, telescopes, etc.
@@Destroyer_V0 That's a racist troll not an actual indian, they want you to go off about how dirty india is to contradict the 'obnoxious nationalism' and get people more used to calling indians and other brown people from generally allied nations dirty/uncivilized. Don't feed the troll, call them a troll.
For anyone that missed the interview, I would strongly suggest spending the $5 to become a member and going back and watching it. It was fascinating to hear what the Raytheon expert was actually allowed to say. Plus he went into greater detail regarding operation and implementation. Idk, just a plug for the Spare Parts Army membership, but also well worth it!
Im signing up now to listen
$5! *Are you insane sir* ?
But I will point out one maybe lie in what he said & one opportunity too:
*The Lie* - Its PR to placate the woke to say 'You know if you put your hand on a hot burner etc' - Yeah well, with a 15 KW laser *maybe*. With a 300KW to 1000KW laser, you'll be ash before you realise your getting warmer!
(Anyone who watched the old 'Robo Cop' vids will grasp why he's obliged to say 'its not against personnel' 'tho).
*The Opportunity* - Seriously, I *am* going to buy more Raytheon shares on Monday.
A natural upgrade to this system would be a software algorithm for detecting drones with the EO/IR cameras through foliage (like tree canopies) that would interfere with radar detection. Another would be the option for fully automated fire in the case of drone swarm attacks (with a skip or cancel feature if it accidentally tries to shoot down a flock of geese or something).
The mental image of a US army laser beam vaporizing a flock of geese is amazing
Why would you cancel that? That sounds awesome
Friendly fire may be a problem. Drones are gonna have to start carrying transponders.
@@wesidk5662as Canadian I need this laser to protect myself against Canadian GEESE! 😂
Foliage blocks IR as well..
In my imagination, drone swarms seem to be the most terrifying offensive weapon to attack ground troops. I LOVE this DEW by Raytheon. Thanks so much for the best story I've seen yet describing the system and it's capabilities. Warfare is changing fast... no-one faster than the US of A.
One word: Slaughterbots...
Actually, Slaughterbots and A. I., and we have a version of VIKI from "I, Robot"... to save the human race from themselves, robots have to subjugate or kill them...;-)
Lasers won’t be a breakthrough. The keys is detecting, identifying the drone. After that it can be targeted by an air burst 20mm Round, shotgun.
The only thing with these is that they can only cover a small area. You’d need hundreds if not thousands of these expensive lasers to cover a large front. Furthermore, you’d need to have multiple in same locations to defend against swarms. If it needs 10-20 seconds on a single target to kill it, you’d need only a few drones to neutralize it.
@@williamzk9083 well yes but its kinda hard to dodge something moving at the speed of light while you can miss with 20mm. If it is already cheaper, good, if it isn't, it will still be superior against munitions, just difficult to supply.
It’s actually nuts it makes me think of the black ops 2 campaign funny enough 😂 set in 2025 with the ending attack with a shit ton of drones
Your production quality is looking better. Glad to see it and wish you a lot of success! Thanks!
We were using a much more elaborate and fragile version of these in a 727 during the late 2000's to intercept ICBMs. Functioned quite well as a proofing program with a confirmed kill of a dummy payload missile. For longer ranges dust, moisture or anything else would cause refraction of the light beam so we used a lower powered pre shot laser to adjust for the phenomenon.
Do you have any comment about more kinetic use of high-energy laser pulses? The theoretical advantages are obvious - tune it and power it right, and you get a series of small detonations on the target, microseconds apart to blow through the inevitable vapor cloud and continue to penetrate the target until your capacitors run out of juice. It'd "only" require a completely re-engineered weapons system with extra weight for the capacitors, lose significant efficiency, and yes I know the tech isn't there yet.
@@crowe6961 think I read something about a pulse laser being more effective for use in space, because it mitigates the dampening effect of vaporised material accumulating around the targeted location on the object.
Within an atmosphere, there are a range of factors which will clear that vapour cloud.
Many decades ago I was researching those devices at a major aerospace firm. Fun times. Haven't worked on them in decades. Interesting to see them finally working.
Me too. Long way from a 10 ton truck with a range less than a rifle ...
@@indiasuperclean6969 i feel like this is ironic
@@mutum1 It's a racist trolling, trying to get normies to call indians dirty and uneducated. Pretty pathetic that some guy in their basement is this upset about india existing (especially because they're an ally).
@@mutum1it's a bot account who spams things like that to create negative feelings towards indians
HEL weapons not making a 'pew pew' sound is a huge oversight.
Please do something on the latest anti-landmine technology. Can aerial or light ground based drones be used to detect and defuse drones? Your content is great and is well shared. Thanks from Ireland.
I’m thinking swarms of cheap land crab drones moving across Ukrainian fields would work well. Russia will def be billed
Another excellent episode! As always well researched and presented.
Great video Cappy! What was shown here just scratches the surface of the weapon's current and future capabilities. Even smaller outputs can degrade or destroy the sensory inputs of soft targets (biologicals) in the battlespace.
True, but using lasers to permanently blind enemy combatants is a LOAC violation. Our enemies don't seem to care about these rules a lot of the time, but Congress definitely does.
@@Ghost_Hybrid Agreed
These would be capable of far more than blinding against a human target, but I think we can probably agree that if slowly melting someone's face off with a low-power beam laser is not a war crime, it dang well should be because plinking at them with a .22 caliber rimfire would be more effective. A much more powerful beam laser, or a pulse laser with a terminal effect vaguely comparable to a gunshot (kind of what they're for in this context) would be a different can of worms.
@@Ghost_Hybrid That one's even in a treaty we ratified, it's important. Using lasers with lethal intent is still up in the air, though. The tech just isn't there to do it quickly or ethically yet, but it probably will be soon.
@@Ghost_Hybrid I'm planning to either buy a burning laser pointer or build a laser rifle. Perhaps using a 50 or 100 watt laser array module, similar to styropyro. Not sure how I'm gonna do it, tho. I feel like a blinding laser rifle has some advantages over a gun. For example it's completely silent, so you could blind someone and no one would hear it, it leaves no physical projectile behind like a gun would, and the beam could presumably go through glass, maybe even bulletproof glass. So if your op is camping in a bearcat, just pop him with the laser through the glass. Bulletproof vests won't stop it. And apparently just looking at the dot or any reflected light from such a powerful beam is more than enough to instantly blind you.
All i gotta say is, its 2023. Tech is about to go crazy in the next 2 years.
I really love how your channel has gone from being mostly a military joke and meme short to a long form investigative information channel. Your military background gives you the mind to ask questions that a normal reporter would not know to ask.
That weapon system is terrifying and impressive at the same time.
imagine them being used for anti infantry purposes.... gruesome
6:26 Laser gunners! Thats incredible makes me feel like we're living in Red Alert.
CnC Generals Avenger.
I love that you went as far back as Archimedes of Syacuse for this story.
Its amazing how you finally got the military industrial complex to sponsor you. To be fair, its the most fitting sponsor for your content. Congrats
Next gen drones will be chromed to reflect lasers. Getting into that Terminator2 mood. :)
So cool. It's absolutely essential technology. One huge benefit is that the beam travels 186,000 miles per second. It makes a Hypersonic missile basically a very slow turtle.
Not really. The software to aim it doesn’t move that fast.
@@564df6g5h4d6f5g4h6d5bruh the software probably works damn near that fast though.....
@@564df6g5h4d6f5g4h6d5 Perhaps you didn't read carefully enough. I said, "the beam travels 186,000 miles per second." Not the apparatus.
@@564df6g5h4d6f5g4h6d5 hypersonic missiles can also only move in a straight line at those speeds, so as long as the turret can track fast enough, I'm sure the computer can handle that calculation. it'd surely be easier than trying to shoot a zero out of the air by eyeballing an AA gun.
@@mcarrowtime7095 The real problem is the laser has a very tiny reach and can only shoot down things that a few km away and only if the weather is perfect. So it would need much more than a few stoves of energy to heat up such a rocket in a few milliseconds it has left to destroy the incoming missile.
Stupid idea now all cats in the world will be attacking us bases chasing the laser .
Great show, thank you.
Everyday we get closer to warhammer lasgun.
The emperor of man kind is sleeping rn
Summed up everything I've seen very well, ty again.
It's pretty cool that an entire weapons system is just placed on a pallet for quick moving around on or between various vehicles. Nifty :)
As we have seen with the Russian invasion of Ukraine, pallets are the West's superpower.
The point laser defence system for the raptors in C&C Generals was a very accurate prediction of future technology.
That's exactly what I was thinking 😂
Dont forget the Paladin tanks with their laser secondary
@@rivaldocalvin3131 And the Aura bombe- hol up... I meant particle cannon
Funny, that was my first thought as well.
We are getting closer and closer to a nerd's dream of living in a world with Sci-Fi weapons.
Now... Gimme My Iron Man suit!
I'd settle for a jet-pack...
Working on it. They cancelled the "Future Combat Systems", but no way there isn't a replacement program of some kind that does the same thing.
I like how in the first movie he gets shot up by f22s, wrecked armor, later gets hit by a tank shell, just some scratches 😂🤣
Which model?
@@caesarsalad1170 😂😂
Sorry Cappy, Ex-grunt here. I don't know where the world is heading, but i used to like the simple life where we just made things go BOOM! Not to sure I like this fancy stuff?
We need these in Ukraine ASAP to protect against Iranian Shahed drones. 🇺🇸 🇺🇦
The microwave THOR system is also out there also. It can do a wide dispersal shot downing drone wave attacks. However its max range is about 5K. It is near instantaneous also.
I guess it's now time to research directed energy weapons armor... I wonder if that's why the F-22 recently seen had a very reflective surface.
I wonder how long it can shoot before it overheats? Pretty cool weapon. Thanks Chris for another excellent video.
How about a mirror shield.
🤫
You can't just add reflective surfaces to things to protect against lasers. Lasers work because they melt the target, transferring heat. Lasers will melt through any mirrored surface you can add to a vehicle, especially as the wattage increases, unless you have some kind of fantasy sci-fi mirror. These military grade lasers are not like the laser pointers you use to play with cats.
Instead you would have to add a shield that can absorb a lot of energy without degrading, basically a heat shield like the one SpaceX is using on Starship. That is obviously not going to work with small drones. For fighter jets that the weight of that would seriously affect operational range and payload capacity.
So if you wanted to take out a target defended by multiple powerful AA lasers (say, an aircraft carrier or a military base) you are going to have to use something like a railgun, i.e rain slugs of metal at high velocity and at various angles of attack.
@@Hibbidyhaiwell...you can always use Calcium-doped Boron Nitride Aerogel Coating that protect your equipment up to 1,300°C and will also give your equipment infrared stealth for anything inside it that burn up to 1,300°C.
Please tell me you didn't just imply the f22 was wearing laser armor🙄. Use some common sense now....
Gotta love how Ray-theon is the one developing military lasers
Wow! The StarTrek hand held phaser only a bit bigger and with auto targeting. Miniaturization will follow and then more powerful battery technology will complete the technology gap. Can Warp Engines be far behind?
Great episode!
Can this laser be defeated by reflective surfaces eg some mirror foil slapped on your little drone or the tip of whatever you are firing?
It seems the next step in the arms race would be some paint that disperses light and energy in the specific spectrum those lasers are using but still looks like normal camo to the naked eye.
The paint caoting/refective foil wouldnt need to be perfect, but just good enough to lengthen the time to render the laser mostly ineffective and making it easy to overwhelm it.
Yes, a coating has already been developed by several countries
@@zakjuly6721 You got a source and some details on that?
Cram is a good intermediate solution in the short term.
Thanks for a fascinating video about weapons entirely new to me. Outstanding!
It would be great to have a bunch of those deployed to various "classified locations", you bring us some of the best content.
yep. we had plenty Shahed 131-136 flying around some classified locations
Even though these systems are cheap to fire, they're probably expensive to deploy. I noticed that there is no mention of the cost of the systems, the power requirements for sustaining their battery life and how much fuel is needed to power the generator for the vehicles to deploy and use them. Also, you did mention that the system needs an operator in its kill chain. Eventually, the powers that be will decide to use advanced AI technology to replace that part of the kill chain as personnel manning the systems become the weakness to the systems ever faster response times. That is something though for another video probably. 🙂
You didn't see the part of the video where the person was just a dead man switch allowing for automatic fire.
In 15 years the updated versions are going to be interesting, not to mention countermeasures. I look forward to bedalled drones to reflect directed energy.
As far as kill-chain issues, once these get deployed, it will probably be like C-RAM or Aegis systems: the operator makes the "release" decision and the computer does the aim/fire/target discrimination.
@@granatmof I think microwave type weapons will also be in the mix. In some ways, they are better than a laser.
Assuming the 300 second battery supply that can be recharged in 20-30 minutes they mentioned is for the 15kw laser: that's a 1.25kwh battery, which can theoretically be recharged in ~40min if plugged into a normal wall outlet with nothing else on the circuit. The design requirements for the a high-output and power-dense battery may be nasty, but supplying enough power to charge it won't be an issue.
@@mcblaze1968 They already are in Ukraine, to some extent. A minority of units have anti-drone gunners with microwave weapons and the Russians have made heavy use of jamming to reduce effective control range of Ukrainian drones. However, this has not stopped them.
A 1-watt laser can blind you permanently and instantly. A 50kw would be like a deathstar
Err.. mirrors? Reflective surfaces? It would seem that the defense against this type of high energy weapon would be coating the drone with materials that are highly reflective to the frequency of light that is being used. Not necessarily to save the platform but to preserve it long enough to complete its mission.
Great video.
The US actually deployed a directed energy weapon as far back as the Gulf War to dazzle the crews of armoured vehicles and disrupt the vision of enemy infantry (although it wasn’t widely used because it was deemed to be a 'scary' weapon that could result in negative media coverage). The power of the beam was kept at a level low enough to only cause 'temporary' harm to the enemy's vision if used correctly.
Another fantastic episode Chris, thank you for all your great content. Do you have a team behind you to thank too?
Thanks, yes I work with a very talented video editor named Michael Michaelides who is amazing
I highly doubt this will be used frequently to knock out sensors on a tank. You don't want to see an enemy tank and just try to blind them. They'll just shoot in the direction of the laser. When you see a tank you probably want to use your TOE missles.
You can do both
I thought about a very low profile, unmanned, vehicle with a high power laser on a pole. The laser would emit a line and sweep the area in front and the sides. I have done years of work on solid state lasers professionally, and have fried CCD sensors on cameras. You would think that a blind camera or operator would be a poor opponent.
@@JM800 If you are talking about just blinding sensors you don't need anything like 15kw. That might be a useful device but it seems like a much cheaper kind of thing.
I believe this old adage applies. Let’s not put all our eggs in one basket. Considering the proliferation of the drone threat and the use of swarm tactics, not even lasers can’t totally defend against this threat. These laser systems maybe cheap to shoot, but they will be expensive to produce and maintain. The US needs a more layered approach to drone defense, the same way we approach the armored threat.
Soldiers at the squad and platoon level need a cost effective , anti-drone weapon. Something easily operated, the size of a LAW rocket, that can deployed a purpose built anti-drone drone. Several companies are converting small racing drones into anti-drone weapons.
And maybe we need to look back to the future. The most cost effective anti-drone defense right now might be updated flak batteries. The German made Gepard and ZSU-23 have proven somewhat effective in taking out drones in Ukraine.
Couple the lasers optical sensors with a 35mm or 40 mm rapid fire cannon with programmable ammunition, should be pretty effective.
Next: anti personnel laser.
Microspheres will become popular as a paint element on munitions and vehicles. Also, Gammma ray lasers were recently developed. You can always put band filters on sensors, except for the little wavelength notch the sensor uses. Lasers could only be "visible" if there is a lot of particulate matter or vapor in the air, and only if they are using a visible wavelength.
You're talking passive defenses? The problem is that all sounds very expensive, which is a "defeat" from the start at a mil/industrial level, and not the kind of tech likely adversaries are going to be outfitting your average quadcopter with.
@@MM22966 silica is pretty cheap really.
Sorry friend, but gamma ray lasers ("grasers") don't exist yet.
just put some white paint on it and your good, or discoball all your munitions
@@montypython5521 Titanium dioxide doesn't reflect IR real well and if you can fire something than hangs on to glued on mirrors, I would be amazed.
I'd imagine this weapon could be used to stop nukes too, instead of just drones
Don't worry, we already have that technology. Not to mention, 90 percent of russian nukes will fail to launch or detonate.
@@glengarbera7367 Unfortunately we still need to worry about the other 10%. 400 working nukes is still 400 working nukes.
@@glengarbera7367 no need to use laser weapon, balloon killer is enough
It's exactly the kind of weapons/defense we will need on a future battlefield. The smaller the drones get I feel is going to be a challenge still. Drones that just observe that are the size of a pack of cigarettes are going to require sensors of a whole new level. What I've seen used in Ukraine has been enough to convince me drones are a huge battlefield weapon.
Drones like that would still be subject to things like signal detection and jamming, and the smaller the drone the less range and endurance it is going to have. If someone is operating a tiny drone chances are they aren't too far away from it.
@@HibbidyhaiStill have to find the actual person which I am sure they are trained to evade capture.
@@indiasuperclean6969 lmao, committed to the bit.
@@shadowslayer9988 If you are monitoring the battlefield with your own assets a handful of drone operators hanging out a few hundred meters from your position are unlikely to remain hidden for long.
I 3love it when Cappy places himself in a vehicle. Its hilarious 🤣
i think technology is going to take all the fun out of war.
We should go back to WW1/WW2 weaponry where everyone was pretty much on the same playing field.😂
The lasers were mostly compared to missile based defenses. Gun based defenses are probably a more comparable option. Id be interested in seeing a pro con for that
The German Gepard 35mm AA system works really well and has a higher fire rate then the laser... 2 seconds for a drone kill is too long for a swarm.
Kinetic systems can more effectively deal with larger objects with stronger structures. But they tend to be limited in munitions supply. They also can typically disable a target with a single shot in a short period of time.
Lasers have the opposite pros and cons, which means that they complement kinetic systems but not necessarily replace them.
I’ve been aware of the IMSHORAD Stryker for a couple years. I also was aware that laser tech is being researched. I think the pairing of a laser radar SAM combo is awesome. I hope the technology isn’t too fiddly. That’s my biggest concern. Can it remain deployed?
If only we could think of somewhere that needs a palletised air defence system...🤔
Yeah, these are brand new and probably in short supply, but I do think we should send at least a few over to Ukraine, if they are as effective as this video indicates. If nothing else, it would give it more combat time for evaluation with soldiers who are proven to be adaptive.
The technicals have evolved!
All throughout this video, I keep thinking of Command and Conquer Generals Quotes:
"Tactical Lasers online!"
"Laser Crusader ready for engagement!"
"Keep the power flowing!"
Don't forget laser technical. A shame GLA only have theirs firing either Ma Deuce, shells, and recoiled rifle, and the avenger cost as much as kirov airship, dreadnought, battle fortress, and aircraft carrier.
More great product Cappy! Glad you mentioned the logistic challenges of keeping these systems in the field. There is the other challenge of the extremely long range of the beam's hazard beyond the target. Stray beam's nominal ocular hazard distances are significant and may impact the window coatings of civil aviation cockpit windows in future.
What happens when the enemy starts making their drones out of mirrors or some other reflective material?
Than it will not work
It would have to be reflective in all spectrum likely to be used for lasers, which if high UV lasers ever become common, which are the most energy efficient at long ranges by far and so will likely be, that would be almost impossible. Five feet of solid lead is still semi-transparent to high frequency UV. Good luck putting five feet of solid leads worth of lead atoms in the air between you and the target.
It's also why high frequency IR detection systems *don't work,* because almost everything you want to detect, like humans, or tanks with literal feet of metal around them, are *too transparent to high frequency UV to be seen by it.* You literally just see the thick rock terrain behind everything, including through almost all buildings, all trees and foliage, ect. Useful for geology, but little else.
But then you modulate the beam a little, something that with high powered lasers is impossible to avoid anyway, and suddenly it super heats anything relatively solid it's passing through, and induces huge electric currents in anything solid and conductive. Gasses, particle soups (smoke), it doesn't see at all. Solid objects it nukes, so well it doesn't bounce anything meaningful back, again making it worthless for detection or seeing things, but great as a weapon.
The software will simply be updated to look for any weak spot in the mirror 😂
Laser beam is quite narrow and very difficult to defend against
It will still be destroyed. Lasers destroy by heat. With that much heat, the reflective mirror will shatter which might even be worse for the drone covered by it.
I think the threat of large numbers of small drones is still a real concern, because very likely the Raytheon weapon requires direct line of sight to operate, which says it must either be above or at the same level as the low flying drones. High flying drones are not a problem with the Raytheon weapon, but low flying still seems to require special positioning of the DE weapon platform. Still, the weapon you presented is very impressive.
Perimeter defence directed energy towers. Problem solved.
A battery of C-RAMs will get the job and/or an EMP.
I actually just came from why your video on army recruitment is down, there is a potential solution, I'm not from the U.S but I'm from one of it's closest allies, Australia.
When I was 19 I drank a bit too much, got into a massive brawl with local law enforcement, when they managed to detain me, I had a court appearance a week later.
The judge after he read the case said I'll give you a choice, a military service, or a prison sentence.
I jumped on that military service, had a hard time bonding with my fellow recruits because I was also on an 18 month drinking probation.
A true second chance, should be offered to young people who can clearly qualify for the military.
It will take the stress off the prison system, while keeping the military at healthy levels of recruitment.
Of course there would be limitations on what could be offered with a true second chance.
Two words: Reflective Paint.
I imagine everyone outside a vehicle wearing laser eye protection goggles in the future. Even a bit of scattering will blind you at these powerlevels.
Anyway, against drones there are already some nice autocannon based systems with airburst rounds that do pretty much the same thing. These are more reliable and easier to maintain, sure a few autocannon rounds cost more to shoot down a drone than this laser, but it will still be cheaper than the drone.
Cheaper and less likely to be defeated by smoke or a sandstorm. My first choice would be a kinetic kill system but I'd still want a few lasers for long range fire and the ammo capacity which is absolutely insane for a laser system.
lasers only need fuel for generators or mayby could just connect to civilian power grid while autocanons need a lot of ammo to be carried in trucks
Would love to see a video on the new laser system put on U.S. Navy middle cruisers. Our shipyards in WA have taken many conventional weapons off to install these new systems.
Don't suppose it's a variant of the angry R2D2's already on ships?
I have been saying this for as long as drones started being a menace, there is a need for a system to fill the "mini Anti-Air" role and it needs to be compact and mass producible because you will need 1 covering every juicy target for a drone strike or to deny surveillance of an area.
Looks like the system has arrived.
Maybe. Like to see how capable it is myself on the battlefield. It's a good start though.
It's so great knowing our military providers of critical defensive and offensive weapons feel so secure that they can reveal our military advancements so our enemies can know what we are doing and can make effective plans to defeat us. I feel so safe and comfortable.
How much you wanna bet Black rock will have their perimeters protected by these 10 years from now
Anti-personnel lasers may be out for now, but given how much is already possible, I'd not be surprised if in a few decades, regular soldiers were all using laser guns.
And praise the Emperor, yeah
Laser tag just got a lot more dangerous
If the laser can track and melt a drone or mortar shell, it can definitely set a person on fire.
They will never say it though, because it's a war crime to use blinding lasers against people.
First, the laser could be used to blind people. Sure, against the geneva convention, but doesn't mean that it wouldn't cause issues if it shined on your eyes
Second, the laser could be a serious dancer to anybody standing under a hanging anvil! you shoot the chain/rope and let the anvil do the kinetic kill
@Vyrlokar what is this a damn cartoon 😂
Heard from several different people about lasers on British vessels in the first Gulf war. I happened to work with Admiral Woodward (retired) some years later. When I asked him about it he said it depends what you call a very strong search light and a laser. My reply was I'll take that as a yes then, he just smiled.
That's just a description of laser guided bombs. That's 1960 tech.
@@tubekrake Not at all what these lasers were for. Not very powerful really but they did their job on one aircraft that came close enough.
Legend has it US got the laser gun from aliens that are trapped in area 51
I swear your fucking everywhere
We were working on Laser C-RAM (counter rocket/artillery/mortar) 15 years ago, and it's always been "just on the horizon". Drones are a natural target, way easier than artillery shells; they're MUCH slower and have zero armoring or ablative coating. They are small and relatively cold (heat signature), but sensors and targeting controllers have gotten much better in the last several decades. It's almost like DEWs were a solution looking for a problem, which drones obligingly provided.
The Airborne Laser (ABL) HEL in a 747 was in the megawatt class years ago, but was abandoned a decade ago because it had to get too close for the intended ballistic missile targets.
Hypersonics will be a challenge for DEWs due to the shielding plasma surrounding them when flying near the earth, but slow cruise missiles, not that hard.
Also, imagine NOT having to rely on humans for control of all except target confirmation; AI can direct the laser MUCH faster than even the best video-game players to dart from target to target. Guarantee that's the step you weren't shown, along with autonomous surveillance. Yet.
Why would hypersonic targets be a problem? When you have the speed of light even the fastest hypersonic targets are relatively slow, it shouldn’t be a factor.
@@SuperBacDoc The issue (s) with DEWs against hypersonics is that there is both a highly-scattering plasma surrounding them when they are going hypersonic at low altitudes, and they are much tougher due to the enormous temperatures experienced in low-altitude hypersonic flight. When a missile is built to withstand 2500K temps, getting enough additional energy consistently (same spot) on them to down them is extremely tough. That's why the ABL intercept envelope for ICBMs was at very high altitudes (60,000 feet) during boost phase. ICBMs, which are hyper-hypersonic (Mach 20+) when exoatmospheric are much more fragile than HGVs when in boost or midcourse phases. Only ICBM RVs (re-entry vehicles) are hardened, but they only must withstand high temps for less than a minute so typically use ablative materials to survive. HGVs must withstand 2000C+ temps for many minutes, and can't use ablative materials to protect them because such materials affect maneuverability, the whole purpose of HGVs.
So the issue has nothing whatsoever to do with the speed of DEW beams, it's that hypersonics are a MUCH tougher nut.
One thing was skipped here, and that's performance in heavy rain, fog. Also didn't show operation at night when the visual side of sensors may not be as effective.
I'm not saying these things will make it ineffective, but if it has blind spots where it can't operate it is important to be aware and have alternatives for those moments.
Thanks Cappy! It is hard for us to keep up with developments if we don't have contacts in the military and the contractor world. I was not aware that we had gotten as far as you have shown with hardening laser weapons for deployment. With all the allocations we have had in the last decades, it is good to see progress has been made.
I am sure that Turkey and the others that claim they have operational weapons are exaggerating a little. Turkey's economy is in the crapper and has been for at least 5 years. Seems pretty incredible that they could have created something practical before we did.
I definitely want to see these things on ships to fight all the missile and drone threats that they would face in the South China Sea or the Taiwan Straight. Also, it would be really nice to have some ready to deploy to the Taiwan area if China becomes "stupidly optimistic" enough to destroy the world economy with their belligerence.
probably like china there already getting tested most likely
I’m not sure how others feel but at this point I think it would be great to integrate into a overall air defense, leave the lasers for now, to attack drones for a much cheaper cost and most expensive for things like patriot , iris and other ground based air defenses, both working together could be good I think at least but maybe in the future they will be good enough for all kinds of weapons
Would love to see a video on makeshift anti drone weapons. Of course DOD is using lasers, but what are the options for the boys in the trenches?
Grandpa’s 12 Gauge
12 guage birdshot already being used in ukraine
@@purplenurp5590
The funny thing is that there’s been a shotgun shell called “DroneShot” and it’s pretty cool because it shoots out net to get the drone rotors tangled up and it falls out of the sky.
It’s definitely not being used in Ukraine because it’s meant for civilian use to try and keep the drone intact, so the drone owner can’t sue for destruction of the expensive drone, and an intact drone in Ukraine can still detonate their payload.
@@BigManLaskey Saw a video of a Russian soldier trying to shoot down an incoming drone armed with a rpg warhead...let's just say he didn't shoot it down.
One DJI drone can take out 4 soldiers if it's armed with 2 gernades.
Tungsten buckshot is a minimum requirement to reach drone altitude, and only when a drone is actively being used for payload delivery, not loitering looking for artillery targets.
You can also clear minefields with these HELs, like in Ukraine. There are also new lasers ( combining different wavelengths into one beam) that are coming out that aren't affected by the weather conditions, or range distances.
Thanks for sharing Cappy
What noone is talking about, is the ability for this system topermentantly blind a crowd of enemies in mere seconds with the use of some AI and a bit of machine learning to learn how to hit someone in the eyes.
Yeah I think the segment about not being a good personnel weapon is just mitigating bad PR, if it can track a mortar shell it's not going to struggle with tracking a panicking soldier
Damaging eyes at long distance with a laser has been easy for decades and doesn't need particularly accurate targeting because the eye's lens helpfully focuses inbound light into a small dot on the retina. The sort of pulse laser in a tank's range finder will comfortably burn holes in the back of your eye. It isn't used to do this because intentionally maiming people breaks the Geneva Conventions; you have to try to kill them!
Enemies that do not play by Geneva Conventions rules are absolutely working on these weapons already.
As a welder I see this not happening. If it does not for long. It takes zero time for an auto dark lense to function. So combat eye ppe could just be redone to have an auto dark feature.
Chances are it'll be the 1k kw method. At that point you're cooking folks pretty quickly.
Great video and very informative! I wish we had such a tool for protecting our troops, but count me as still skeptical. In the past Raytheon has been known for making weapons with great specs, but that end up too big, cumbersome, fragile, and expensive. Is this any different?
Each kill requires a few seconds of a directed attack, which is why Raytheon says it wouldn't work against soldiers. Does Raytheon expect drones in the future won't take evasive maneuvers immediately, like when you put your hand on a hot stove? Or what if the enemy sends a drone with a simple corner mirror which will precisely return the laser to where it came from?
At several seconds time to kill, one would need multiple HEL units to defend against the myriads of incoming targets we can expect in the next war. The video mentions only 30 targets at once, but what about missiles that explode into "bomblets" or drones that emit hundreds of shards of flak and smoke to confuse the system? It just couldn't keep up. (And that's not even taking into account the time to retarget after firing: the turret in the videos moved extremely slowly. Why? Is there a limit due to the sensitive optics inside?)
If these were cheap, I'd say the US ought to try them out, but this is Raytheon and we know each unit will cost millions. Compare that to the small cost to an enemy to deploy an overwhelming number of tiny drones, any one of which could take the directed energy weapon out of commission for the battle and require repair in a "clean room".
Raytheon excels at big, expensive gear. But drone warfare is not like nuclear missiles and space lasers. To stay relevant they need to show that they can beat COTS (Consumer Off The Shelf) weaponry which is cheap, disposable, small, and numerous. This directed energy weapon is just not suitable for that. In fact, it sounds more like a retrofit and marketing rebranding of their anti satellite technology than an actual solution for drones. I hope Raytheon quickly learns the lessons from Ukraine.
You mentioned looking for IEDs in your service. With many drones, they still are IEDs. Many Ukrainian munitions are made of tape and 3d printing underneath commercial drones, so they very much are improvised and I believe there are a few Russian tanks that can confirm they are explosive devices.
great point! they're like a flying IED , an IED with wings .
@@Taskandpurpose Improvised Explosive Drones.
Great coverage of an emerging, 'bleeding edge' weapon. The 15 and 50 kW lasers sound like (weather permitting) they're good for subsonic items like drones, and perhaps even mortar rounds, providing they have not been 'hardened' against DE rays. (You KNOW that opponents will harden their missiles/projectiles against DE systems). For ballistic or hypersonic cruise missiles, jumping power by10X (300 kW) may not be enough, given how fast they travel and how little time they're in range, rapidly changing atmospheric effects, slewing challenges at multi-Mach speeds, programmable, unpredictable trajectories, inherently thicker, tougher, high temperature skins, etc. At Mach 5, a missile travels well over a mile a second. (~10 miles in 9 seconds) A shot on these needs to do its job in a small fraction of a second. That likely requires multi-megaWatt.
GREAT now we can play lazer tag lol with pew pew pew
This is an incredible innovation, but it won’t take long before drones start sporting reflective armor.
True. But that might compromise one of the main draw of drones: They can be cheap.
Never expected the US military to start using big laser pointers in warfare.
well i guess you did not watch startrek lol
You should start expecting more of that
Seems like much of this topic was discussed back in the anti ballistic missiles era… Question was, what happens when the drone is wrapped in tinfoil?
Same thing with body armor id say. It'll block some at first, but if you shoot at it enough times, eventually one shot will get through...
Anything less than a perfectly reflective surface will just take longer to burn through. Its somewhat difficult and expensive to make surfaces perfectly reflective.
It is a logical primary counter measure though. Can be defeated by a supplementary ballistic system utilizing the same aiming and targeting system.
Skynet approves of this weapon system.
As someone born in 60’s and have been asking were the future? Things are moving very fast in the last ten years. The future is just around the corner. Thanks for sharing.
I am more curious about the ability of space-based laser platforms being used to shoot down long range ICBMs. If they can take those dangerous weapons out of play than the world would be safer as I think the shorter ranger ICBMs can be shot down more reliability than their silo based counter parts.
100% agree. ICBMs currently have little to no counter defense (that we know of). It would a great thing for the world if one or every country had the ability to take weapons of mass destruction of out play
You could also smoke some very bad people
There was a design for a submarine towed laser defense system that could (on paper) reach space targets
But it never left the napkin math stage
let's hope not the moment icbm s are out of the picture is the moment that world war wars get back on the menu
Icbms can be shot down reliably , they are just like bombers and presently they rely on sheer mass and decoys to pass through
Youre greatly underestimating modern advancements in software and computing, even the usa is scared china and Russia will successfully shoot down a consequential percentage of its icbm attack
China and russia are in full on panic about what the west itself can do if even they can shoot down ballistic missiles😂
Icbms are still useful because they can deliver an angry response to anyone anywhere on earth in minutes and they have no substitute for now
When used properly like in a sneaky submarine based launch, icbms are truly op but the land based versions survive by sheer mass and speed
Everyone knows they can and will be shot down but since its nukes only one or two needs to get through 😂
I'm curious about the comparison between anti aircraft guns and these systems.
I can see a lot of major advantages that the laser would have. But if the technology is still in its infancy, will anti aircraft guns come back out to bridge the gap?
Good point - I'm technically dim enough to suppose you could link *both* to the one radar spotter/targeting system
*IF you wanted to*
And cynical enough to suppose *If you're selling Laser weapons why woul you cut your throat commericially offering that* ?
@@Farweasel Rheinmetal has both. Raytheon just doesn't have a AA gun division like Rheinmetal has in Oerlikon.
Microwaves would seem to be far more effective against drone swarms, as they affect a wider field and degrade the target faster. (The Navy should be installing them on every ship for 360° coverage.) Either way, DE should get a Manhattan Project-like funding investment, as it will greatly determine the future.
yeah, but its hard tossing a microwave that high in the air
@@brulsmurflmao
DoD has all sort of Directed Energy Weapon programs in development, HPM included.
@@brulsmurf From what I've seen, microwaves have about a 1 km range; that's enough to take out drone swarms.
@brulsmurf I love this stupid comment 😂😂
Awesome video T&P!
Oh god there's gonna be an Army Expert Laser Weapon Badge lol