Different military organizations have developed systems of this type. Experts suggest that technological advances will contribute to its combat use.
Advances in the field of technology have today enabled different countries to increase their interest in laser weapons after decades of significant investments in its development, without obtaining the expected results.
The United States, the United Kingdom and South Korea are just a few examples. nations which, they claim, have used these mechanisms for military purposes.
Indeed, according to the information retrieved by the The Wall Street Journal , The US army used a laser weapon in early 2024 to shoot down several drones in the Middle East .
According to what specialists say to the aforementioned newspaper, these systems could be the kryptonite of unmanned aerial vehicles .
By evoking this fictional material, they made reference to the fact that they could be effective in shooting down drones in combat .
How laser weapons work and how they can take down drones
In general terms, laser weapons project highly concentrated beams of light which emit intense heat towards their targets.
They travel at the speed of light and can pass through metals with the aim of, for example, destroying engines fuel tanks, electronic components or other items that are in the line of sight.
In the same way, can be used to blind sensors and cameras of interest for the forces that operate them.
The Assistant Secretary for Acquisition, Logistics and Technology of the US Army, Doug Bush, anticipated the Newspaper that “the old man adage that lasers were five years away from being incredible and always will be, is changing” .
“Lasers for the war against drones maybe they found their moment “, he added.
Bush too He said the United States has deployed this type of systems in several locations in the Middle East, in order to shoot down unmanned aerial vehicles. with successful results.
However, from the army of the North American country They refused to detail what these operations looked like reports the Newspaper.
Experts consulted by the American newspaper maintained that laser weapons promise benefits for military use .
However, they emphasized that They also have a number of limitations this may delay greater presence in conflict scenarios. At least, for the foreseeable future.
What advantages do laser weapons promise for shooting down drones?
The interest of various military organizations in laser weapons has intensified in recent years, in a context where Unmanned aerial vehicles are increasingly used in combat .
Countries like the United States and its allies They tend to shoot down cheap drones with missiles that can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars each. .
Compared to these projectiles, laser weapons can be cheaper despite the fact that its main cost is energy.
Along with this, If they are connected to an efficient power source, they will not experience ammo issues. .
At the beginning of 2024, The UK announced a laser weapon called DragonFire .
According to various international media, British authorities have stated that Its operating cost is less than $13 per shot. .
They also assured that has the ability to hit a coin-sized target within a kilometer radius .
Of course, to use, requires a generator housed in a container of approximately six meters which must be placed on a boat or truck.
What progress has been made in the development of laser weapons
For decades, military organizations have invested in the development of laser weapons, without however obtaining results that would contribute to considering their effective use in the military field .
Since the beginning of this century, for example, the Navy The United States has tested different systems without achieving combat scenarios on a regular basis .
Likewise, at the end of the 1990s, the Air Force of this country and the company dedicated to manufacturing aircraft, Boeing, They built a laser that they introduced into a Model 747 airplane with a shoe horn.
The system weighed approximately 5,500 kilos, according to Newspaperand the aim of the project was shoot down targets hundreds of kilometers away far.
Despite his ambitions, The system presented multiple problems, such as the difficulty of generating the necessary amount of energy .
Complications led to the project being abandoned canceled a decade later, after nearly $6 billion had been invested .
The head of business development at QinetQ, a UK company that helped develop DragonFire, said: Technological advancements have allowed laser weapons to be considered more viable today. for military tasks.
Company representative Paul Gray emphasized that one of the significant improvements is the use of fiber lasers which amplify and concentrate the light of hundreds of filaments into a single beam.
Previously, other systems developed depended on the use of high-risk chemicals or gases .
In addition, manufacturers They found methods to make them more compact one of the most complicated aspects in this field.
The head of the Canadian Armed Forces counter-drone systems office, Lieutenant-Colonel Chris Labbé, told the Newspaper who organized a competition dedicated to this area, in which Officials were surprised by the small size of the lasers presented by the manufacturers .
He said that hten years ago they would have arrived with electricity generators of considerably larger proportions .
The instance was carried out at the beginning of 2024 and The winning company was AIM Defense, an Australian company that developed a laser the size of a filing cabinet. .
What are the limits of laser weapons today?
Laser technology specialist Subrata Ghoshroy stressed to the American newspaper that Although new advances are promising, laser weapons still face many limitations. .
He and other experts have stated that: In the short term, they do not consider it possible to use this type of systems to counter massive missile attacks. .
This is due to factors such as They move at extremely high speeds because the laser weapons developed do not have the necessary range. for contexts with these characteristics.
In addition, these systems They tend to generate very high levels of heat, have problems that make mobility difficult, and some lose up to 75% of the energy they generate. according to the information retrieved by the Newspaper.
Bush added that some vehicles that can carry these laser weapons face increased wear and tear when they move them.
In addition, there is this weather conditions can significantly hamper its operation .
Among these are elements such as rain, clouds or wind .
And although systems like AIM Defense have proven effective compact and efficient, their range is more limited .
The one who won the competition in Canada, for example, fires at a distance of less than 1.6 kilometers, a range that may be limited in a combat scenario.
However, different military organizations They assume that laser weapon technology will continue to advance. . And at a faster pace than in previous decades.
The United States Government Accountability Office states that the Department of Defense invests about $1 billion a year in the development of lasers and other so-called directed energy weapons .
In turn, the naval forces of the said country They have already deployed a laser made by Lockheed Martin on a destroyer ship, while testing other systems. which can even be used in vehicles
The Royal Navy hopes to deploy the DragonFire in 2027, five years earlier than initially planned.
Source: Latercera
I’m Scott Moore, a professional writer and journalist based in the US. I’ve been writing for various publications for over 8 years now, and have been working as an author at athletistic for the past five years. My work has been featured by some of the leading sports websites and magazines across Europe.
