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The toy-like drones destroyed during an Army field exercise at Fort Sill, Okla., last month weren't anything special; however, the way they were brought down -- zapped out of the sky by lasers mounted on a Stryker armored vehicle -- might grab people's attention.
The first soldier to try out the lasers was Spc. Brandon Sallaway, a forward observer with the 4th Infantry Division. He used a Mobile Expeditionary High Energy Laser to shoot down an 18-by-10-inch drone at 650 yards, an Army statement said.
"It's nothing too complicated but you have to learn how to operate each system and get used to the controls which is exactly like a video game controller," said Sallaway, who hadn't fired a laser before the exercise.
The drone-killing laser was relatively low energy -- only 5 kilowatts -- but the Army has tested much more powerful weapons. A 30-kilowatt truck-mounted High Energy Laser Mobile Demonstrator shot down dozens of mortar rounds and several drones in November 2013 at White Sands Missile Range, N.M.
Since then, researchers have made rapid advances in laser weapons, said Bob Ruszkowski, who works on air dominance projects and unmanned systems in Lockheed's secretive Skunk Works facility.
"We're really on the cusp of seeing the introduction of lasers in future systems," he said.
Which do you prefer, lasers or plasma weapons?
(Score: 5, Insightful) by idiot_king on Wednesday May 31 2017, @05:17AM (28 children)
How about "no weapons." (Sounds scary, doesn't it? Nonviolence-- the most terrifying idea of all!)
Enough kids die in the streets of the US already. Atomic bombs somehow aren't enough to enforce Amerikkka's global dominance? Or the endless disruption of the Mideast? Now we have to go full Moonraker.
Arms are not a solution to anything. We trade lead for photons. Wow, such progress.
But again, I must sigh: technology is always, for some reason, weaponised after it is done being a curiosity. I wish we could break that curse. But we are Political Animals. What a drag.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by takyon on Wednesday May 31 2017, @05:20AM (4 children)
A laser gun is a tool, not a weapon.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 31 2017, @05:33AM
Laser screwdriver. Who'd have sonic.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday May 31 2017, @05:49PM
It can be both. [merriam-webster.com]
1
: something (such as a club, knife, or gun) used to injure, defeat, or destroy
If it's purpose is to destroy things then it's a weapon.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday May 31 2017, @08:44PM (1 child)
A 5mW laser can blind from a distance.
A 5KW laser is a million times more powerful, it does more than pop black balloons - calling it a tool instead of a weapon is like calling a Samurai sword a really good butter knife.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Thursday June 01 2017, @12:25PM
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 31 2017, @05:38AM (1 child)
Lasers don't contaminate the battlefield with lead, tungsten, uranium, and worse. We can even power them with renewable energy sources.
So this is a weapon type for democrats.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday May 31 2017, @08:05AM
In a battle field? I doubt it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Wednesday May 31 2017, @05:58AM (7 children)
History is usually written by the gang with more and better weapons.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 31 2017, @06:04AM (6 children)
AI brinksmanship is where each side builds a Skynet and threatens to switch it on.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by anubi on Wednesday May 31 2017, @11:14AM (4 children)
I get the idea that since we are so heavily invested in "megaweapons", an adversary could well suddenly pop up somewhere with thousands, maybe a million, small drones, preprogrammed to wreak havoc on specific targets.
We would be like a hunter with scads of high powered rifles, prepared for bear, but tangled up in a hornet's nest.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 31 2017, @06:25PM (2 children)
China is the only country that could beat the USA in drone mass production. The USA is pretty damn good at producing things.
This is the ideal nuke substitute. Picture a fully autonomous drone, firing sideways like a tiny AC-130 gunship, just large enough to contain a .223 (5.66 mm) rifle embedded in the wing. There could be a million in the air, killing indiscriminately without human operators. Everything that moves gets shot.
Start with a large amount of ammo. After the enemy population thins out, substitute a larger/heavier power source and cut down on the ammo carried.
Since most people don't have weeks of food and don't have supply tunnels, an undesired country could be cleared out in a few weeks. It is thus recycled into unsettled open frontier land, ready to be colonized.
(Score: 1) by anubi on Thursday June 01 2017, @10:43AM (1 child)
That's scary.
I get the suspicion relations between USA and China are pretty tenuous. And China is growing its manufacturing power by leaps and bounds, while American politicians are paying sky-high execumanagerial salaries and pensions to certain politically well-connected elite to lay American technical people off, outsourcing to H1-B.
I am getting the strong idea that the American populace is getting pretty ignorant technologically as the result of all this H1-B stuff and double-whammied with DMCA / DRM / Copyright / Intellectual Property law designed to keep the general populace ignorant so the technologically-based wishlist-enforcement systems of the elite will be obeyed instead of circumvented.
So we have a nation full of ignoramuses awaiting slaughter.
What really scares me too is something like this is predicted in the Biblical book of Revelation Chapter 9, although I thought this was going to be some sort of genetically modified insect like a desert locust.
I probably bring up the Bible too much on this forum, but that book has some really uncanny things going on with it that I can not explain... ( well, others have their Nostradamus and Edgar Cayce... so don't throw the loony-look at me too hard... )
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 01 2017, @07:47PM
Hey, I'll take the Bible over the Koran any day, so I must mute my complaints. At least Jesus didn't have a lust for 6-year-old kids, and he wasn't fond of stoning women.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday May 31 2017, @08:48PM
The naval warfare simulations which gave each side a certain amount of resources would always be won by swarms of small boats (like Kennedy's PT boat) instead of fleets that included large capital ships, unless the side with the capital ships outspent the swarm by a wide margin.
The swarm of small attack vehicles model is very resource-efficient in a shooting war, but the political negotiations are won with large capital ships.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by HiThere on Wednesday May 31 2017, @04:27PM
Doesn't work, because nobody believes it's Skynet ahead of time.
Actually, Skynet itself doesn't make much sense. What's going to happen is that increasing levels of AI will hollow-out middle management *and* the workers until all that's left is a figure-head top-guy. And the AI will do whatever it's been designed to do while ignoring the pronouncements of the top guy even more effectively than middle management currently does. Nobody seems to be noticing that this is already in process.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 31 2017, @06:23AM (5 children)
It's actually the other way around, much technology is originally created for arms purposes and is later put to other uses. War is the father of all.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 31 2017, @06:46AM
If what you say is true, how do you explain Our Tech is Shit [soylentnews.org] despite all those lovely wars by Bushbamarump?
(Score: 3, Touché) by c0lo on Wednesday May 31 2017, @08:07AM (2 children)
A good for nothing father.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Wednesday May 31 2017, @12:32PM
Deadbeat dad.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday May 31 2017, @09:34PM
>War is the father of all.
Like Alfaðir, Odin, the Allfather?
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by WizardFusion on Wednesday May 31 2017, @09:13AM
I thought that title went to porn. That industry always seems to be at the forefront of technology, or so I have heard.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Wednesday May 31 2017, @06:54AM
As long as some people think that stealing others work by threatening them with weapons is a workable business. It will be better to have the better weapon than letting others have it.
Another aspect of this is there is a breed of people that for some reason always end up being at the top of large corporations, organizations and politicians. And they have the inclination to enslave everybody else. The means and degree vary but the meta goal is the same.
Somehow engineers and technically creative people tend to have more in common with engineers etc of other countries and cultures than with their own "masters". A possible future development is to cut chaff.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday May 31 2017, @07:58AM (2 children)
Anything that requires near unanimous consent among the entire planet in order to work doesn't work.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Wednesday May 31 2017, @04:32PM (1 child)
A valid point, but there's no real advantage in having the most weapons if neither you nor the guy with the second amount of weapons dare to use them (against each other). In the current environment the 3rd or 4th down seems to be more advantageous than being in the top position.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday June 01 2017, @12:21AM
Why do you think there's no real advantage? That mass of weaponry worked real well against the targets the US has fought over the past 70 years. The US never fought the USSR directly (the second largest military power), but the US's military turned out to be a significant advantage in a variety of situations that didn't involve a direct fight with the USSR.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 31 2017, @01:32PM (2 children)
That is both an insane proposition and quite dangerous one (should it actual catch on). And I don't know how something this ludicrous was modded up. There will always be weapons and violence as long as there are Humans. If at any point the sentient being on this planet somehow get on without both of those things, then believe me they will not be Human by any definition.
Even if I would never use force of arms against another person unprovoked, I live in reality where I know others will not offer me the same kindness. I will not be defenseless, nor will I render my government defenseless from other governments so I can claim the moral high-ground and virtue signal to the world my willingness to become extinct.
Arms have always solved problems. That is what they were invented to do. And sometimes they are the only solution that will work permanently.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Wednesday May 31 2017, @02:15PM (1 child)
>And sometimes they are the only solution that will work permanently.
I'm struggling to think of any example of that - ever. Other than total genocide (which is its own problem), violence almost always begets further violence a little ways down the road, once the most-recently-wronged group gets back on its feet.
Not that nonviolence has a great track record either, just that it seems silly to credit violence with permanent solutions .
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Thursday June 01 2017, @12:07AM
There are a lot of examples. The Blackfoot Indians still exist, but they ain't coming back to fight. The Aborigines are still around, but they're not gonna take down Canberra anytime soon.
You don't have to kill everyone. You only have to assimilate or marginalize so thoroughly that reciprocal violence is pointless.
It's almost never a peaceful or pleasant process, but out of such things Frenchmen (as opposed to Normans and Bretons and Burgundians) and Indians (as opposed to Punjabis and Gujaratis or any of the many other smaller political entities that pre-dated British India) are made.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 31 2017, @08:17AM (6 children)
...the one eyed man is king.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 31 2017, @09:58AM (3 children)
I believe he would be laughed at and ignored.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 31 2017, @01:14PM (2 children)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Country_of_the_Blind [wikipedia.org]
"... Nuñez slowly starts trying to explain sight to her. Medina-Saroté, however, simply dismisses it as his imagination. When Nuñez asks for her hand in marriage, he is turned down by the village elders on account of his "unstable" obsession with "sight". The village doctor suggests that Nuñez's eyes be removed, claiming that they are diseased and are affecting his brain. Nuñez reluctantly consents to the operation because of his love for Medina-Saroté. ..."
Lasers can be used in all sorts of helpful ways -- including to launch spacecraft into orbit so people can migrate to space habitats which could support exponential growth of human populations for another 1000 years. Sad that once again: "The biggest challenge of the 21st century is the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity."
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Immerman on Wednesday May 31 2017, @02:26PM
I read the story a long time ago and found it entertaining but ridiculous, as with much of HG Wells work. Seriously - it's trivially easy to prove that vision exists (I can tell how many fingers you're holding up from across the room!), and if everyone else actively refuses to believe you, you still have the option of just shutting up about it and quietly using your "psychic powers" to give yourself a major advantage.
And why would you bother trying to describe a powerful extra sense to those who will never experience it and do not know the lack in the first place? Seems like a pretty jerk move by a guy who just wants to be recognized as special rather than actually using his gift for something useful. The one-eyed man isn't king because the blind exalt him for his difference, he can become king because he has incredible powers of perception far beyond what anyone else can wield.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Wednesday May 31 2017, @04:41PM
Exponential growth in space is a delusion. At least if you're thinking of any very high exponent. Mere survival in space is going to be quite difficult. I will agree that it's highly worthwhile, and the only real future that isn't eventually disastrous, but it's not going to lead to a rapid population increase within the next few centuries.
I suppose it's technically correct to talk of population growth with a doubling time of a couple of centuries as exponential, but that's not how people normally understand the term. Resources in space while vast are rather sparsely distributed, and accelerated movement requires lots of energy. Various forms of ion-jet are a lot more efficient than chemical rockets, but they aren't fast, and they don't get away from the minimum energy cost. Solar sails also depend on the energy cost and are also slow, and can only move in limited directions, but they *do* get their energy directly from the sun without a lot of intermediate conversion as would be required to run an ion rocket. Somebody may someday come up with something better, but until they do that's not the way to bet.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by Webweasel on Wednesday May 31 2017, @12:13PM
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
http://www.electricstuff.co.uk/scarylaser.gif [electricstuff.co.uk]
Priyom.org Number stations, Russian Military radio. "You are a bad, bad man. Do you have any other virtues?"-Runaway1956
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday May 31 2017, @09:37PM
With a 5KW laser, you don't just put out an eye, you also coagulate the lateral geniculate nuclei in under a second.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday May 31 2017, @04:14PM (12 children)
High energy impactor weapons, causing highly ionized plasma on impact with a humongous power picosecond X-ray laser effect developing in that plasma.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Wednesday May 31 2017, @05:03PM (7 children)
I want my laser gun to have recoil.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday May 31 2017, @05:15PM (5 children)
Any directional weapon has recoil.
If you however mean "same recoil as a shotgun"... oh, shit... (ducks for cover behind a tungsten rich asteroid, polished to a highly reflective surface)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Wednesday May 31 2017, @05:35PM (4 children)
Back of the enveloppe math says the a 5kW laser firing 200ms is 1kJ. Counting losses, that about the same energy as a .45 ACP or 9x19 parabellum, but over a much longer period. Not quite sure what it feels like.
I need the 30kW Akira-style bazooka, so the shots can be shorter, and provide that finality that the recoil gives when you pull the trigger. Even video games strive to provide audio/visual feedback for single-shot weapons, however exotic they may be. It's an expected part of the process of hurting someone, that a gentle pressure on the shoulder ain't gonna replace.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by c0lo on Wednesday May 31 2017, @06:57PM (3 children)
The recoil comes from the impulse transfer (over time). A shotgun has a typical muzzle velocity of 500m/s with a slug of 28g - about 14 kg*m/s impulse (and around 4200J kinetic energy).
Now, with light the energy is m*c2. Computing the "equivalent mass" for a 14kg*m/s impulse for light (using impulse=m*c) and multiplying it back with c2 to get the energy, one comes to a value of 14*3*108J = 4.2 * 109J = 4.2 TJ - that's pretty close to the value of 1 ton of TNT to produce a light impulse similar to a shotgun slug.
Of course, the above is 'ngineering masturbation, the kick of the recoil should be expressed in terms of force in both cases.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Thursday June 01 2017, @02:00PM (2 children)
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday June 01 2017, @09:54PM (1 child)
Actually, the E = p*c (p - impulse or momentum) relation holds true for massless particles.
See here [wikipedia.org] (read the "Special cases of the relation (1)").
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Friday June 02 2017, @10:52AM
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday May 31 2017, @09:50PM
You may prefer a phaser then (includes a particle beam).
The phaser rifles in "The Menagerie" (Star Trek's first-ish episode) looked like they should have a pretty good kickback, but the actors failed to portray it very convincingly.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 31 2017, @05:56PM
Plasma weapons are superior. Laser Sword is only +58 attack, whereas Plasma Sword is +70 attack.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday May 31 2017, @09:45PM (1 child)
>Which do you prefer, lasers or plasma weapons?
>High energy impactor weapons, causing highly ionized plasma on impact with a humongous power picosecond X-ray laser effect developing in that plasma.
Wouldn't you rather just release a micro black hole on the target, timed to evaporate (explode) upon arrival?
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Thursday June 01 2017, @12:11AM
Talk about recoil!
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Thursday June 01 2017, @01:38PM
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves