Posted on 01/19/2024 5:52:36 PM PST by Red Badger
Al-Jazeera had some pretty good videos of rocket attacks from Gaza being supposedly intercepted by Israeli "Iron Dome" missiles. It was not clear if the Israeli missiles hit anything. They sure do make a lot of strange turns before they finish.
But there were a number of what appeared to be laser shots from ground installations which definitely hit something coming the other way. There was a distinctive beam that intersected with a rocket trail, and the rocket then sparked and fragmented into a number of glowing pieces.
If these were some types of laser weapon, they had a very low rate of fire and the IDF needed a lot more of them than they had to deal with the swarm of rockets.
There’s a hypothesis suggesting that laser weapons were employed to ignite the houses in Lahaina, Maui aiming to clarify why certain houses were burned while the adjacent hedges and trees remained unaffected.
No, they are and will always be on the losing end of things.
It appears only South Sudan and Chad are worse on Earth.
If lasers do become a strongpoint of defense, I wonder what the next offensive iteration will be.
Yes. For now, the lasers are better against drones. Or, ship-mounted higher powered ones against large anti-ship missiles. Already in use by US Navy I think.
[[Britain says it developed and test-fired a futuristic laser cannon that can shoot drones out of the sky]]
Yeah, great. BUT- it “Might shoot the eye out of a spotted owl” so- we gots to ban it
I would expect observer drones that can locate the laser cannons, and coordinate swarm attacks of maneuvering rockets or drones in a second wave strike.
And then area jammers that can disrupt coordination signals between the attack drones, and the observers. Also, drone-killer drones that release mini-swarms which collide with anything in their assigned areas and altitudes. And decoys, and chaff dispensers and blinders that confuse the targeting systems.
And the beat goes on.
We’re eventually going to wind up like The Road Warrior.
It is fascinating that so many announcements of coming weapons, from the smallest to enormously expensive fighters, bombers and Navy vessels, are promoted through what we used to commonly call "artists' renderings." It was always a sales pitch. Some of this stuff -- Russian, British, or US -- seems like more sales pitches.
If it works, put it into battle, without all the PR. It will prove itself there, not in the press releases. Best wishes.
It will end up being AI fighting AI, cuz bio weppins will deal will bio armeez and civs.
The big breakthrough in this came some years ago by overcoming the overheating problem with lasers. It used a bunch of lasers, each of which would only fire for a brief time, but all their light was focused on and part of the same output. The end result was an output just as strong as one big high temperature laser. But with much less heat.
All this system would have to do is again subdivide the output to dozens of targets simultaneously.
You DO have to adjust for atmospheric distortion caused mainly by changes in air density caused by thermal gradients. But adaptive optics systems can make those adjustments thousands of times per second.
The other option is to use two shots, the first to ionize the air column and a succeeding second shot very shortly after which essentially shoots through the “hole” in the atmosphere created by the first shot.
Semi-autonomous BlueTooth flesh-eating robot fire ants produced and deployed by the millions.
How dare you, sir, make me snicker so loud as to awaken the dogs! How dare you, sir?
I believed that particular version of the launch. :)
That would be kind of cool…
I enjoyed the post a lot. :)
True story, I once got attacked by fire ants in the hundreds.
Put my BDU pants on in the dark, and all of the sudden I felt searing pain.
Turned on the lights, dropped trou, and they were all over my legs.
I went to duty and wound up having to pull my pants down to show my NCOIC and Major.
Good times.
Oh, man! Glad you liked the post because it sounds like it could have triggered a nightmare. lol
I laugh at my old pain.
Being Irish allows you to never learn from your mistakes.
It’s fun…
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