US Navy Close To On-Ship Laser Cannons 309
An anonymous reader writes "The Office of Naval Research and industry partner Northrop Grumman said they successfully tested for the first time an on-board laser defense system known as the Maritime Laser Demonstrator (MLD), using it to destroy a small target vessel. The test actually accomplished several other benchmarks, including integrating MLD with a ship's radar and navigation system, and firing an electric laser weapon from a moving platform at-sea in a humid environment."
Re:Cool way to kill people (Score:5, Insightful)
Eh, it's the bloody navy. Who exactly are they going to vaporize?
You can complain about cool technology "killing people" in the context of, say, dropping bombs on cities. In that case you've got a clear argument that the weapon in question can and will be used in a way that will leave innocent civilians dead, since it's not like shrapnel knows the difference between the barracks and the orphanage. However, a weapon useful only against military targets, for instance a laser to slag warships, missiles and aircraft, isn't very useful for carrying out war crimes, and isn't likely to mistake a bus-full of nuns for an enemy aircraft carrier.
Bottom line, if the people being killed are hostile armed forces in a time of war, not killing them gives them the opportunity to kill you instead.
Just sail over the horizon _then_ fire your guns (Score:4, Insightful)
Afterthought: presumably the torpedo manufacturers aren't too worried, either.
So Expensive (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm glad we didn't cut a penny from the 2011 military budget. Then we wouldn't have these extra boat lasers around that we don't need, along with all the thousands of other defense contractor welfare projects we've run up $TRILLIONS in debt to pay for.
Instead we cut 1% of the Federal budget, from women, children and the poor. Why protect them with social programmes when we can defend them with extra weapons that kill other people, or sit unused, instead?
Re:So Expensive (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm not an "armchair quarterback". I'm a taxpayer. These lasers aren't armoring anyone. In fact they're stealing money from the armor budget you Republicans left unfunded for years, killing so many of our soldiers in the wars you insisted on starting, losing and never ending.
You sound more like a freeloader. A bloodthirsty one. The kind of Republican who refused to properly armor our troops after lying them into war in Iraq for 10 years, driving us to bankruptcy.
You are already as sick as possible without any help from me.
Re:Cool way to kill people (Score:4, Insightful)
In fact very recently you wrote:
*Coughs*
Indeed it is, I am glad you can admit that.
That means by it's very nature it implies aggression. Sure, like most weapons, it isnt impossible to imagine it being used in defense, but it's defensive applications dont even come close to justifying its expense relative to other options, so it doesnt make sense to build and maintain such a weapon unless you intend aggression with it. Simple as that.
If we were really focused on defense, we could build, stock, and maintain a chain of airbases along every coast and border for the cost of our Carrier fleets and have plenty left over. An airbase is superior to a Carrier in every way except one - the airbase can't steam across the oceans looking for trouble, it has to sit in place and wait for someone to at least get somewhat near to us.
Not at all. I am all in favour of armed, I'd rather see us more armed than less. Just with weapons suited to defending ourselves, rather than weapons designed to "project power" into other peoples lands, that's the difference.
You raised it but it doesnt stand up. Britains defense in WWII was overwhelmingly from land-based airfields, which produced much better results at much lower cost. I certainly never claimed that a Navy cannot be used defensively, simply that it makes no sense to build one for that purpose, given the options and the costs involved.
Touchy much? Believe me, if I feel like insulting someone I dont use veils to do it. You may believe you are understanding me, but at points your responses are clearly inconsistent with that belief. It is not rude to point that out.
Re:Cool way to kill people (Score:4, Insightful)
Pointless. A simple 40mm bofors (cheap as hell) or a properly set up AA Gatling will do the job far, FAR better against boat swarms. At the same time they are far cheaper, integrate into system with self-auto corrective targeting based on radar signature of gun's own shells, do not require a heavy supply of energy and have significantly fewer points of failure.
You really have no idea what you are talking about. Every single branch of the U.S. military dearly wants guided lasers to be able to disable incoming mortar rounds, missiles, aircraft, boats and enemy personnel. They have been actively testing these devices for the past several years by removing the guns off of their radar-guided mounts and replacing them with these high-energy lasers.
The lasers are appealing because they make it easier to hit the target. With conventional ballistics, you have to consider both the target's trajectory and that of your interceptor. Additionally, your interceptor has a finite size, so you not only need to line up its path with that of the target, but you also need to coordinate the arrival times of both objects at that point in space. With a light-speed weapon, you just point at where the target is currently. Additionally, if you miss in a populated area, you do not have to worry about your interceptor causing collateral damage. The military currently uses self-deflagrating rounds to address this issue, so that they will burn up before they hit the ground. If you have ever watched a mortar defense system in action, you'll notice it takes A LOT of rounds to hit the mortar.
Finally, your concerns about tracking and auto-correcting are unfounded. These systems use an IR laser and an IR camera to guide it. The system can see the target, the laser beam (due to scattered light), and the hit-region illuminated by the laser. There is no longer any radar needed.
You may not be excited about this system, but the US soldiers deployed overseas are.