[extropy-chat] LASER: DARPA's HELLADS small laser weapon makes headway

Eugen Leitl eugen at leitl.org
Fri Sep 2 10:34:47 UTC 2005


On Thu, Sep 01, 2005 at 11:44:34PM -0700, J. Andrew Rogers wrote:

> State-of-the-art active radar systems do not detectably radiate at all,
> another very, very slick piece of American military technology.  It is how

I don't see how this is supposed to be possible. Are you sure you're not
meaning passive radar?

> stealth attack aircraft like the F-22 can use search radar while still being
> invisible in the broad RF spectrum.
> 
> Many critics fail to understand that at some level of power, a laser is
> qualitatively different in its interaction with matter than a milliwatt
> laser pointer.  These lasers have proven quite effective against dumb/hard
> targets.

At some level of power, you have plasma defocusing the beam in the path,
requiring very large apertures, which make such lasers not portable. Over
distances, you need active optics tracking the beam despite atmospheric
microlensing.

Mirorring the target makes it effectively immune against laser (though
the sensors remain the weak part of it, of course). 

-- 
Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://leitl.org">leitl</a>
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