HAVE laser weapons finally arrived, three decades after US president Ronald Reagan鈥檚 鈥淪tar Wars鈥� anti-missile dream? Sort of.
You can on YouTube. Yet the laser is still a prototype, not a field-hardened weapon. And it is a lot less potent than Reagan believed possible.
The new weapons can destroy rockets, mortar rounds, small boats and drones a few kilometres away. The Pentagon imagines using them against weapons launched by insurgents, and to defend cities and ships.
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It鈥檚 a far cry from Reagan鈥檚 goal in 1983: to thwart an all-out Soviet nuclear missile strike, tipping the cold war balance. Back then, the navy already had a ground-based laser called MIRACL that generated a 1-megawatt infrared beam for a few seconds by burning vast quantities of chemical fuel. The aim was to adapt it for space and put dozens of lasers in orbit. Each would generate a 5-megawatt beam to destroy a missile up to a few thousand kilometres away.
Such weapons would have been 50 times more powerful than those shown on YouTube, and their targets were a thousand times more distant. The logistics of putting massive lasers and chemical fuel tanks in space were ignored. Other options, such as nuclear bomb-driven X-ray lasers, were considered, but the end of the cold war in the early 1990s finally doomed Star Wars.
鈥淭he logistics of putting massive lasers and chemical fuel tanks in space were ignored鈥�
At that time fears emerged that rogue states might be able to launch a nuclear missile. The US responded with Star Wars lite 鈥� the Airborne Laser programme, in which a megawatt-class laser was put in a jumbo jet. With fewer targets and better chemical lasers, it looked more plausible. But even though it hit some test targets, it was cancelled in 2010 due to power and range limitations.
Cue another step down for beam warfare. Smaller solid-state lasers, powered by electricity and hitting 100 kilowatts, are now powerful enough to be a short-range weapon. The navy, army and air force are trialling versions, and their use in combat may not be far off. If Reagan鈥檚 big dream had come true, it could have sparked a huge new arms race. We should be thankful little won the day.
This article appeared in print under the headline 鈥淟ight warfare鈥�
