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Laser Shoots Down Artillery Shell In Flight
An anonymous reader writes "The Mobile Tactical High Energy Laser is a joint project between the US Army and the Israeli Defense Ministry, with much of the work being done by TRW. Tuesday they had a spectacular success when they shot an artillery shell out of the air."
Didn't they have this back in the 60's? correct me if I'm wrong, I was always told this.
Wasn't this in the movie Real Genius?
... when they fire one of these at a disco ball? heh.
...but is this thing as accurate as Luke Skywalkers light-sabre?
If not, you'll have to use the (air)force, George...
Anyone else think this thing looks like Laser Eye from Shining Force 1? Ahh, memories...
Reading through the article doesn't give much info about details such as:
How much does one unit cost?
How long is the "reload"/"re-aiming" time?
Will it survive real heavy artillery battle?
GREAT BALLS OF FIRE!
They say in the article that it was developed by the army and TRW, but we all know it was Mitch Taylor and Chris Knight.
Where does the laser go if they miss the shell? Disperse into a cloud? Hit a passing 747? Birdstrike? Internation Space Station? Mars? Passing alien ship?
Sounds to me like an easy way to make a lot of enemies.
best web host ever
Well, they could build an artillary shell out of corner prisms. Corner prisms would reflect the laser beam back to where it came from. I wouldn't want to be standing near the laser if that happened.
Do you put a GPS and transmitter in an artillery shell?
Thus, if you want to protect the target, you either have to vaporise the entire projectile so the momentum is dispelled by the air, or maybe it's an explosive shell and the laser persuaded it to explode (which is another way of vaporising it, I suppose).
Breaking it in two or poking a hole in it wouldn't be sufficient.
Does anyone know exactly what they meant by the laser "destroying" the projectile?
like the ones used to pass the first generation patriot missle system. The gen 1 patriots were so bad that final analysis showed that in one test the patriot missed the mark only to have the target slam into it, thus causing both to break up. In the official scoring this was marked as a hit and win for the patriot sytem even though it was a random fluke. Unless someone not affiliated with the military or the defense contractor verifies the results I shall remain skepticle until field use proves the system.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
They make it sound as if an artillary shell is a HARDER taregt to hit than a rocket. Rockets accelerate, tumble, and move erratically. Artillery shells move in well understood, computable trajectories. They probably had the damn flight path of the shell computed before they fired it. It's one thing to shoot down a shell when you know it's path ahead of time, another entirely to get a fix on an unknown, erratic rocket and destroy it.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Ah yes, the Israli terrorists and their suicide bombs... You know, those suicide bombings are done in the same studio as the fake moon landing.
Your sitere's a whore, so mods, do your work and mod this troll down.
My prediction - your opinion is not popular enough - your post is going to get modded down.(Also the reason this is an AC post). I'd love to be proved wrong, though!!
Yipee! Won't we all be safe once the "civilized world" is protected from the barbarians? Why, the "bad people" won't even be able to shoot at usat all, let alone support the "terror-ists" with their insidious "terror-ism".
So, lets review. 'Predator' unmanned aircraft armed with Hellfire missles for patrol and attacks, lasers to shoot down artillery (and you know bullets are coming soon), Star Wars V2 to protect us from missiles, and any country that tries to develop anything we don't like gets a "regime change".
Yeah, I can't see why the rest of the world hates the west, can you? We turn war into a fuckin' video game, and relegate them to attacking us with swords while riding their camels.
I know it's the natural evolution of war, but it also seems like the natural evolution of capitalism applied to the battlefield. He with the most money to make the best toys wins, and he who doesn't hopes for an aid package to be sent to his widow.
Of course, we might get charitable in a few years and let them have some low powered lasers, but only if they attach them to the sharks... I mean, come on, is it too much to ask for some sharks with frickin lasers on their heads?
I think it's time for some sugar... rants like this could be dangerous... nice Echelon, niiiice Echelon.
Hm, maybe I should get a book on lasers from the librar
NO CARRIER
If I knew the wedgies I gave you back in 6th grade would have resulted in this . . . I might have taken a moments pause.
If the Palestinians wouldn't continue to blow themselves up in shopping malls and coffee shops, there would be peace.
You and your Allah-worshipping friends are the problem. They won't normalize relations with Israel and constantly foment anger against Israel and the US.
That's why there's a problem in the Mideast.
Do you think that Christian countries would have this same type of problem? They have learned over the centuries to "let it go". The Arabs can't let the littlest thing go and accept that they were spanked repeatedly by the Israeli military.
Well, think of it his way, better to evaporate one terrorist than helicopter rocket attack a car and kill innocent people walking by with shrapnel...
What about collateral damage of these lasers, compared to the laser mounted on those fight planes mentioned a while ago?
Thanks!
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And we can solely thank USA funding for all this too, because the rest of the world realizes who is WRONG here.
Wait, are they wrong because of the conflict with Palestein, is this the same additude that caused the Europeans to sit back while the Nazis tried to exterminate the jews during WWII? And then, after the war, you kicked them out of Europe, and they came here. How fucking nice of you.
if the lasers will able to shoot down the shells if the shells had a reflective surface.
Hmmm... I guess Rappin' Ron Reagan wasn't as idiotic as many thought with his Star Wars ideas.
Okay, so this is off topic but I've got some karma to burn.
I think that the capital markets should punish BOTH Israel and its Arab neighbors by withholding investment in areas that either sponsor terrorism or refuse to participate in peace initiatives. Capital hates instability. These countries have a vested interest in peace: peace = investment = prosperity.
Really, end of message
I don't imagine many 747's fly over battle zones and/or test sites. Additionally, I imagine one could select a wavelength that would destroy the shells and yet attenuate promptly through the medium of upper atmosphere, protecting the satelites and space station personnel.
One must also must make sure the beam does not reflect from the ionosphere back to a random earth location, but again, careful wavelength selection would prevent this, dissipating the beam into harmless warm ozone.
hi, I like pancakes -.-- -.-- --..
Who? Who is predictable?
looks like we're getting ready to fight the Goa'uld invasion forces... ;-)
"I would say that 99 per cent of what my father has written about his own life is false." - L. Ron Hubbard Jr.
Gosh, it looks as if all those old sci-fi books really were a glimpse of the future.
:-)
Now if this prediction made in the 1969 edition of Popular Mechanics would just come true:
"Future watches won't just be for keeping time either. Wlatham engineers forsee this exciting possibility: Wristwatches in the year 2000 will be used for more than time measurement. They will be total communication centers, containing devices not only for accurate timing but also for voice and vision communication; and simple recording -- they'll even contain simple miniaturized computers"
Wow -- imagine that, a miniaturized computer in your wristwatch -- nah, it could never happen!
But a Dick-Tracy wristwatch communicator, yeah, that'll work
Oh yeah, you fucking troll... bulldozers are real terrorist weapons.
And Israel apologized for the rocket, unlike the fucking terrorists who blow up people and celebrate.
Puh-lease. Like Israel is running out of stuff to shoot at people. This doesn't increase anybody's ability to harm anyone else - it's a defensive capability. We have 2000-lb bombs that land within a few feet of whatever we feel like. We have machine guns, artillery, and RPGs. So does Israel. This is a defensive machine - it doesn't significantly upgrade anyone's ability to kill someone over what already exists. If it saves our lives on the battlefield, more power to them. What I really want to know is how often it can change targets and fire - that's the difference between stopping an artillery barrage or just a handful of rockets. Your post was off-topic and irrelevant, and I hope it gets modded appropriately. Besides, even if you were on topic, if you're claiming the Palestinians are somehow without culpability and that Israel is the only wrongdoer, or even significantly worse than their adversary, you're insane, ill-informed, unbalanced, or any combination thereof. I pray that in spite of short-sighted fools who preach what they don't really understand, there may someday be world peace. Also, I pray that people stop using names of their ex-significant-others as their handles.
Israel firing a rocket into an apartment building full of children
An accident. Shit happens.
By contrast, Palestinean suicide bombers don't walk into pizza parlors and 'accudently' blow them up.
or bulldozing away people's homes
HELLO??? How biased can you be. You totally neglected to mention the fact that these homes belong to the suicide bombers.
I no sympathy for religious zealots who purposely bomb innocent civilians...
Or forcing people out of there own land because of their religion?
First intelligent thing you've said. You're right. Israel should pull back. No other option.
This is a good point, it should be noted that Israel has not been innocent when it comes to dealing with their neighbours. Most of the wars they are in now were started by them. It's too bad there is extreme bias in the media against palestinians.
What if the shell had a very glossy finish (like a mirror or something). Would the laser still have the same impact (no pun intended)? I'm just curious.
does anyone know if this 'test' was a rigged demo like the anti-missle one where the incoming had a beeper broadcasting where it was?
sure, that beeper was technically a stand-in for a yet to be developed radar system, but there was a _lot_ of political pressure to get a 'success' to hand to the headline happy media. [and there's still no way for any sensor system to discern missle warheads from their accompanying decoys. but that's okay, cheney and the kids slapped classified on further test so you can't tell if the money would be better spent trying to inspect all those daily shipping containers that are the real threat of bio and nuke delivery to the states at the moment.]
is this just more of that noise? anyone found signal?
anti-missle systems are good. anti-shell systems are good. but there's a zark of a lot of garbage reporting pushed out there to fund dubious projects. is this more?
I have no problem with the Jews taking thier land back. Even if it is after 1300 years. If Native Americans started a revolution in A.D. 3000 to take North America Back, who's side would you be on?
If Native Americans started a revolution in A.D. 3000 to take North America Back, who's side would you be on?
Whose do you think? I surely wouldn't support an aggression. So I would be opposed to the Native Americans attempting a coup.
"This shootdown shifts the paradigm for defensive capabilities. We've shown that even an artillery projectile hurtling through the air at supersonic speed is no match for a laser," said Army Lt. Gen. Joseph Cosumano, head of the missile defense command.
Now if they can just stop those pesky spies from stealing our tech, poisoning our water supplies, blowing up our factories, and planting thermonuclear devices we can be the first to reach Alpha Centauri!
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
finally a defense against the sunburn missle http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2001/2/11 /233616.shtml
and we can give the finger to the rest of the world for ever.
That would show those fucking socialist European wossies who's king of the hill.
All I asked for is that the word "la-ser" be printed with quote marks around it, is that so hard?
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
As another military first, I just shot down a cat mid-yowl with a boot.
You're neglecting drag (except when you're talking about vaporizing the projectile). Breaking a reasonably aerodynamic projectile in to decidedly non-aerodynamically optimized parts will seriously change the course of the object. If you're just trying to get an artillery shell to miss it's intended target, breaking it in two would almost certainly be sufficient. Try throwing a tennis ball then half a tennis ball for something of an example.
PULL! (boom)
BZAAAP!
Good show, good show!
Don't trust any concentration of power.
I wonder how the laser could do this. This is indeed the most technicaly challenging part of the task. I visit military exhibitions regularly but I never heard of a system that could work against targets of that size (projectile). Even tracking rockets is very difficult and they're way bigger and emit a lot of detectable heat.
My guess is that in their setup the targeting system knew from where exactly the gun fired. In a real-life war this is usually not the case. So until the tracking is reliable (and not easily fooled), this sounds entirely vaporware.
That airliner didn't fly into a live fire area, until the USS Vincennes decided to make it one. The question became not whether Robocruiser made a mistake but how. An interesting story, albeit tragic.
TRW shot down my credit rating back in '95. I'm still figthing incorrect information as I apply for loans. Nothing ever changes.
Oh...that TRW...
"Tactical high energy lasers have the capacity to change the face of the battlefield," he [Lt. Gen. Joseph Cosumano] added.
Not nearly as much as, say, PEACE would change it.
Gahd. If we put 1/3rd as much money into peace as we do war, there'd be no wars.
(Globally, some $800 billion is spent on the military. We need all of about $20 billion to feed everyone, and another $10 billion to provide clean water. It'd take only $30 billion to retire the debts of all developing nations.
And then there'd be a lot of happier, healthier people ready to make a go at bringing peace to earth.)
--
Don't like it? Respond with words, not karma.
Shields, what the gungons had in the final battle of episode I.
That's why there's a problem in the Mideast.
I realize that this is somewhat offtopic, but probably should be addressed. Personally, I don't condone the actions of the few Palestinians that go around blowing up innocent people. However, there are two sides to a story, and living in the United States, we typicaly see only the sides of our allies (i.e. Isreal). Isreal protects its "settlements" using what we would call terrorism if it was commited by a muslim state.
Remember that bully that picked on you in school? Did you ever think about slashing his tires or something along those lines to get back at him? You of course realized that if you did no one would care what that jerk did to you. There are definatly better ways to resolve issues like this, maybe it'd be easier to find those with a little less name calling.
I fully expect to be modded down for replying to this, but the truth of the matter is that I don't really care. People can either go on pretending that the situation is black and white, so no one can ever come up with any kind of reasonably thought out peace. It's so much easier to say that we are right and they are wrong.
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Though there are many things that can be said against laser weaponry, there are also a number of good things:
;-) I mean - come on! Lasers!!
:-( I had imagined something like a "real" sci-fi laser... I hope they are working on it... otherwise it might make a great "case mod" - right?
- Combined with the laser for the JSF (Joint Strik Fighter), dogfights and attacks against weapon factories, military headquarters and the like become much more precise, and as a result reduce the loss of civilian life.
- The technology seems to be easier to replicate than for example a missile shield, which might mean that in the end weaponry like nuclear missiles become obsolete. At least it is a step in the right direction... right?
- It just seems cooler
On another note, I was a bit dissapointed with the picture!
I like it! (But will anyone get it?)
Doonesbury did a classic on this one (site is down). Let's not assume the military is disclosing all.
Looks like I'll need to save up about One Hundered Beeellion Dollars to buy one of these babies...
It took a little poking around, but I found an explanation of how this thing works... looks like deuterium gets them a longer wavelength that travels through the atmosphere better.
Whatever the reasons are, I wouldn't want to be anywhere near that thing while it's fueled. Raw flourine is incredibly nasty stuff, and the hydrogen flouride exhaust is really awful, too... it dissolves in water to form hydrofluoric acid, which is reactive enough to eat glass (you have to keep it in teflon bottles). I hope they're not discharging it into the atmosphere!
--Larry
Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by incompetence
OK, no problem. Here's my second plan. Back in the Sixties I had a weather changing machine that was in essence a sophisticated heat beam which we called a "laser."
What are its weaknesses, that's the question.
IBM or GNU
...that's the year the Palestinian government (at the time) started kicking Jewish settlers out of Palestine. The palestine's didn't want "infidels" and "zionists" in their "holy land" so they tried to kick the jews out. But the jews ended up kicking their asses instead, and formed Israel. The Arabs(babaloynians) started it becuase they can't share or play nice with their neighbors.
hello? they wiped out an entire village of homes with dozers. home of suicide bombers my ass.
I see nothing wrong with the Jews getting their land back... However it's hard to calculate exactly how big "their land" is. Do we refer to the torah and make a rough estimate? From what I have observed, the country of Israel is already much bigger than any previous Jewish kingdom. And yet there is still an insistance to build settlements on areas that are palestinian.
GoatPigSheep, the 3 most important food groups
It discusses future plans for the system.
Wrote Iraqi, thought Iranian. Never mind....... brain fade.
Bullshit. Cite your evidence.
Israel bulldozes the homes of terrorists. That's a fine policy with me.
Call me un-patriotic, but the first thing that I thought about while reading this (aside from how cool it looks) was that it probably wouldn't be so hard to take out. Although they say it took out the Katyushas both "singly and in salvos" they also say that they've only fired 25 rockets. I wonder, it it's such a great defense system, why not fire 25 - or perhaps only 10 would do it - rockets all at once? I'm not declaring that it isn't a perfect defense - that's obvious. I wonder how easily it could be destroyed or disabled. Those electronic eyes look like great targets for a HV anti-tank round to me.
So, you're saying it's okay for one group of people to kill another group of people today because the ancestors of one killed the ancestors of the other? By that logic, it would be okay for the child of a murder victim to later go and kill the child of the murderer.
Suppose the Native Americans started their hypothetical revolution now. Would it be right for them to simply kill any non-Native Americans? Would that really be justice? Or just vengeance?
Going back to the Palestine-Israel situation, you can keep going back grandfather by grandfather and you'll see that each side has been involved in a very long cycle of violence. What about the people living there (Philistines) when the Jews found their "promised land"? The Old Testament is full of stories about the military exploits of the Israelites.
This situation will never be resolved if all sides are going to insist that they have suffered the most and that they were harmed first. If they can't get past that, then they'll just keep killing each other.
The whole thing is very saddening, really.
The situation is not black and white, but it is white enough in Israel's general direction and black enough in the Arab world to justify taking sides against the violence perpetrated by Arabs and siding with the retaliation performed by the Israelis.
I recommend reading Longitudes and Attitudes by Thomas Friedman for a greater grasp of Mideast affairs post-9/11.
I see alot of doubtful slashdotters but I can tell you that anyone that has seen a navy CIWS close in weapons system fire at a inbound drone traveling at MACH II does not doubt the trajectory technology. The CIWS never misses and as a matter of fact will continue to shoot individual pieces as well as the plane towing the cable all while being perfectly aimed by computer. So don't think for a moment they cannot calculate and fire on something moving even faster than a artillery shell.
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Remember, this is a coherent beam of laser photons. Lasers lose little of their energy and gain only slightly in cross-sectional area with increasing distance. It is likely that any deployed system will have a range vastly greater than artillery. These things can be miles behind the front or even in the air. Plus, the accuracy is such that we will soon be able to vaporize selected individuals in a crowd.
Before long we will have the ability to render even sophisticated armies totally obsolete. I think this is a good thing. We'll turn opposing officers and armor into cinders in the first fifteen minutes of any engagement, sparing not only civilian bystanders but the great majority of the troops.
Thirty years from now, the greatest challenge to our armed forces will be how to deal with the POWs. No power on Earth will be able to oppose us when we decide to bend other nations to our will.
You may like this situation (I certainly do) or not, but be prepared to face the reality. Our obligation to the rest of the world, as American citizens, is to work to keep our Constitutional checks and balances in place so that our mighty power is used for worthy ends.
-ccm
Too much Law; not enough Order.
my god, I don't think a country that has commited so many terrorist acts against innocent people deserves such technology.
Yes, because as the Palestinians have shown, you can commit many terrorist acts against innocent people with very little technology...
modding down 'unamerican' views?
Israel gets this technology because it, unlike Syria, Jordan, Egypt or Saudi Arabia, has an industrial capacitiy and a healthy research and development environment.
The United States part in THEL is 20% of the R&D budget, same as the US part in the Popeye long-range missile. The US funded Arrow to the tune of 80% because Israel wasn't an ABM signatory and could work on some things the US was treaty-bound not to work on.
Israel has made some serious technological advances in Agriculture, Desal, Military Avionics, Artillery, Small Arms, Computer Science without US assistance.
Remeber that Israel developed nuclear weapons in a partnership with South Africa, not the United States.
And do not forget that in the late 40s and early 50s the USSR, France, Czech and United Kingdom supported Israel while the United States supported Iran and Jordan.
It wasn't until the 1973 war that the United States threw it's support behind Israel, a point at which most of the Israeli industry was already developing.
As for World Peace, all it does is keep the status quo, which is not always a good thing.
Sales of Light Pens and magnifying glasses shot up drastically today...
Was this like the testing for the Bradley fighting vehicle? Was the rocket actually in flight when they shot it, or did they figure it was an easier shot after it hit the ground?
actually, it made me think back to previous laser or missile based "star wars" tests where they installed GPS transmitters in the targets. the target was destroyed, congress saw headlines like 'Missile Test A Success' and gave the program its continued funding, and it wasn't revealed until afterwards that the test was rigged. i hate being lied to.
Sure a terrorist can reek some havoc, but they'll never "win" anything. We can level whole military infastuctures without cuasing collateral damage anymore. WEEEEEEEEE! I can melt your tanks and radars without using bombs, so no more hiding them in schools you lousy commie-muslim-leftists!
Well yes, this is fine and all, but can an artillery shell stop a laser!?
Why limit yourself to just post-9/11? Does that date specify what is relevant and what is not?
Be a man! View at -1
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if missiles are delivered the unconventional way. 9-11 showed the kind of warfare we're up against. I doubt Al Queda will launch missiles any time soon.
Given that jet fighters have in the past obtained radar locks on UFOs (and this is from the pilots themselves), but that UFOs seem to be far too fast to shoot missiles at them, we now have a weapon with which to start a SPACE WAR!
ALIEN COMMANDER: Fuck me! Nobody told *me* they had lasers now! Did I miss a frickin' memo?
graspee
Yes, in fact 9/11 is a milestone date from which foreign policies and foreign governments should be analyzed in light of.
If the analysis of post-9/11 policy of Arab governments shows that nothing has changed (and it hasn't), then what kind of peace can we expect into the future? The past has shown that Arab governments cannot be trusted to foster peace among their people, and nothing post-9/11 has shown that they are willing to actually have peace with Israel (despite Prince Abdullah's claims to the contrary... You did read the book, I'm assuming).
Interesting. Esp. given that most peaceful times are due to a conglomeration of folks (nation) having a strong, defensive military.
I can't help but feel that future tacticians will laugh at these toys we're pumping out. There's no way we can build a defense system against the kinds of weapons we can make now. How do you defend against an airburst nuke? You don't. What does this do against gas attacks? Zilch. What happens if it's power supply is sabotaged? Ouch. They can sit around with thier high energy lasers and play star wars untill the cows come home. It won't change a thing. An era of warfare is ending, and a new one is beginning
The soldier of the future is undetectable. He'll be able to look like a native, walk like a native, and pass as a native - and under his normal looking clothes he'll have enough ordinance to destory 5 metropolises in succession - or kill a single target.
Inevitably, the established war machine learns from it's enemies, the easy way or the hard way. Consider the revolutionary war, the korean war, the vietnam war. Each has brought about an evolution in tactics. If we really are in a new war on terrorism, then the tenant that we start from is this - anything that is in a fixed location can be found and destroyed.
The new tactics will revolve around not having a fixed position and preventing your current position from being discovered.
Look at that toy and tell me what relevance it has to modern war. Answer: dick. We'll be able to sell them, and that's about it. The stealth bomber is probably the last step in the right direction the military has taken in a long, long, long time.
Giant laser beams. All we need is a giant shark to attach it to and we'll be right on our fucking way! Crap.
Maybe the state's highest function is to grind out insoluble problems. (Zelazny, Hall of Mirrors)
Seems to me that this technology has very very wide ramifications for the world and warfare.
In the 1800's steel technology developed to the point where it could be used to build battleships. At the time, the British Empire 'ruled the waves' with their wooden ships. The technology change meant that WWI eventuated as the Germans realised that they were at the same starting gate as the Brits. An arms race developed which neither side could win resulting in a clash that killed millions.
In 2000's the current world power has a distinct advantage in air superiority, this more than anything else makes them the power they are. This new technology seems to me to wipe that power base out. Current jets are about as useful as wooden ships if a laser can shoot them down as easily as an artillery shell (sure there is stealth but I don't know how long that will remain effective). To my way of thinking, the US is making a rod for it's own back by developing technology that can effectively neuter it's own advantages. In addition satellites, ICBMs, tanks, are all completely vunerable (imagine the blinding effect of all spy/gps and comms satellites being shot down in minutes). This changes the playing field and IMHO makes it a more dangerous world.
"This shootdown shifts the paradigm for defensive capabilities. We've shown that even an artillery projectile hurtling through the air at supersonic speed is no match for a laser,"
Right. No match when its a highly simplified test and there arent a few different sources of artillery shells firing AT the Laser. Please, this means nothing in a practical sense.
"There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals."
Nuclear devices cannot be detonated by random shots. They require very precise triggers. The most you'd get would be radioactive shrapnel from the destroyed bomb.
"The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than that of whether a submarine can swim" -EWD
The book you suggested happens to be an oppinion of one man who has man "friends"... this is exactly the problem with trying to take a realistic approach. When you bring in a ton of preconcieved ideas you have your mind made up before hearing anything to contradict you. Tell me how Arab governments "canntot be trusted" and then try checking out this site.
As for reading material, maybe reading more than just the book you were assigned to in your global politics class or where ever you picked this up at, you'd be able to understand more than just one side. Here's something to get you started.
Be a man! View at -1
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As an ex army cannoneer, I'd like to know more about the artillery shell that was destroyed by the laser.
...
... we used radar at night to track where our shells were landing.
Here's what I can tell you
I worked on the m198 Howitzer, which can fire a 100 pound 155mm HE (high explosive) shell at a muzzle velocity of around 750m/s. With other combinations of propellants and rounds, the velocity could easily reach 1 kilometer per second or greater. Not too shabby for a 100+ pound piece of steel going down range into a target the size of a 5 gallon bucket.
The inherent problem with an artillery shell is that its trajectory is highly predictable... its all about math. So, for the purposes of a high powered laser, as long as it can perform some really nifty calculations in a split second, and point itself right into the path of a traveling artillery shell, then the shell will actually fly into the laser if everything goes according to plan.
Artillery shells can also be detected with radar
So, whats next... assuming that the laser works by calculating the trajectory of the shell, and positions itself ahead of the shell, would the next advancement in artillery be shells that wobble to avoid running into a high powered laser?
Besides these basic artillery shells, there are also laser guided and rocket assisted shells, whos trajectories may be a bit harder to calculate.
Here are just some of the factors that go into calculating the trajectory of an artillery shell...
1. The exact weight of the shell.
2. The type, amount, and temperature of the propellent.
3. Resistence of travel (air friction) based on weather conditions and altitude.
4. Curvature of the earth and gravity.
So there you have it folks... this laser is an amazing piece of technology.
Skiers and Riders -- http://www.snowjournal.com
Now, all we need to do is to find an enemy to use it against.
If we don't know where the shells are coming from, what's the chances that this system will be able to realistically identify a genuine incoming round, activate (from idle) and reliably shoot it down in time? We're not getting the first couple of rounds, and after that, our existing counterbattery systems will be silencing the enemy artillery.
If we do know where they're coming from (and we damn well should, given what we spend on reccetech), then why aren't we pasting them with our existing overwhelming air superiority and artillery?
So what's the theatre? Where are these systems going to be deployed?
One in the White House, one in the Pentagon... where else? Whatever we build on the WTC site? But do we reckon that any grunts are going to get the benefit of it? Hmmm.
It's neato technology, but it seems like a solution to a problem that the US has spent trillions to ensure that it doesn't have any more.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
now they can hit hijacked planes with... no, it doesn't help that situation. But they can shoot those little boats, like the one that hit the cole, and... no, it doesn't help that situation either. Oh right, it helps the people who are making the weapons. Long live the military industrial complex. May we never feel the need to yield to international law or qualify our actions. war war war. great job, guys. I won't sweat it if Usama finds a cannon and tells you where he's going to shoot it. In other news, i still have to pay too much fucking money for college.
ofcourse they knew exactly which flightpath the shell was going to follow and where it was going to be at what time beforehand. So taking it down wasn't really that hard.
They probably shot some shells before and got the flightpath recorded into a computer. Then they shot the "test" shell during compareable weatherconditions and perhaps they even did some minor adjustments, it doesn't really matter, they knew the trajectory beforehand, so when they shot the "test" shell the laser knew exactly at which point to fire at which coordinates.
This isn't how things go in the real world, so I wonder how much of an defense contractor technology bragging hype this is and whose interests are behind this (it's not difficult to make a guess here).
China! you're forgetting about China. Sure, they're not as powerful as the US military-wise, but not that far behind either. Besides, their comunist regime with absolutely no concern for public opinion allows them to use some very radical war strategies.
Never underestimate the power of a good strategy, even (especially) when you don't have the upper hand
There are two kinds of people in the world: Those with good memory.
I remember reading about a radio transmitter system that was capable of confusing shells and causing them to blow up in mid air. I know it was deployed to protect hospitals in Bosnia. From what I remember it was a small, portable, and reliable system that could cover a large area. What real advantage does this system have over this already existing one.
This wasn't rigged. Everyone was told ahead of time that the target missle had a GPS receiver on the warhead as well as a C-band beacon.
The purpose of the test was not in acquisition and tracking, but in the kill vehicle technology (plot a path to a moving point, get within infrared range, correct course, and detonate). Sounds simple, but it gets a bit trickey a closing speeds of ~10km/s.
The x-band satellites just weren't operational over the pacific when these tests were being done. So, when Colo springs control asked Hawaii where the missle was, it responded with information from the GPS receiver but provided artifically 'degraded' data stream. This was underlined and not hidden in the test plan (released before the test). It was done as a 'simulation' of x-band (national missle defense system) data.
Honestly, peoples hostility to this program in current time has me baffled.
The reson pundits of ABM tech would underscore every little failure, or break out conspiracies and wave around "rigged" results, was that we should not be researching ABM technology. Russia's on board now, you can stop pissing your pants worrying were going to invoke a nuclear war by having this technology.
If you hate being lied to, you should take the time to better research what people (including myself) and news sources in general tell you.
-malakai
-Malakai
A Dragon Lives in my Garage
Yeah sure they did. Next you'll be telling me NASA put a man on the moon!
No Sig For You
I believe lasers would be more useful to shoot down enemy airplanes.
As for shooting down incoming nuclear missiles... do as the Russians planned to do... detonate nuclear
missiles among the incoming missiles. Who cares about the EMP when you save your people from being
nuked?
Wonder what happened to this program. Manufactered the primary optic for it back in 97 or 98. What the frig took em so long.......
After seeing the previously fixed results of SDI tests, reading about the problems with the Patriot missle system, and learning the true history of the testing of the Bradley "fighting vehicle," I don't doubt that these results were fixed. I just wonder how much.
(BTW, a good movie about the Bradley tests is "Pentagon Wars", starring Carey Elwes and Kelsey Grammer. It's been playing recently on the Starz channels. For more info see: http://us.imdb.com/Title?0144550)
<?php while ($self != "asleep") { $sheep_count++; } ?>
There was a huge technological divide in Vietnam too, and currently in Israel/Palestine, Russia/Chechnya, David/Goliath....
1. Can satellites currently be shot down with a laser?
2. Who else is anywhere near obtaining this type of proficientcy in laser weapons? Since our satellites and drones now are some of our most important assets when gathering information.
Technology isn't everything. Hell, technology plus military leadership plus strategy plus tactics plus logistics isn't everything.
There's politics. An enemy does not have to defeat the entire power of the United States; it only needs to plausibly threaten enough damage to make the US reconsider its commitment, and balance the value of objectives versus projected losses. North Korea, for instance, might question whether we'd either (a) offer them a hefty no-questions-asked aid package, or (b) accept the destruction of a major American city on the west coast. The Iraqi ambassador might suggest to the US ambassador that, should the US attack, the first Iraqi action would be launching its entire chemical arsenal at Jerusalem, and query as to whether or not the ensuing chaos would be helpful to the US. And so forth.
Protecting South Vietnam's dictatorship was not worth it, politically...
Oh, and the US does and will continue to cause collateral damage -- we killed quite a few innocent bystanders in Afghanistan, for instance. Some were due to misidentification, some due to misses, some due to accepting bad intelligence. And, should there be war in Iraq, there will probably be deliberate "collateral" damage in the sense that it may be necessary to directly or indirectly damage civillian infrastructure e.g. power grids, water supplies, that sort of thing.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
Abblative Shielding
a weapon where we don't have to wait for destruction.
I write code.
You are kidding, right? There are roughly 6 billion people in the world now. Are you really saying that it costs $3.33 per year to feed each person? Not terribly likely. Learn to do a little math.
there are many of their competitors (I am in one of them) that would never be able to pull their inefficient, moronic, paper-pushing idiot selves out of their no management ability swamp long enough to even figure out what a photon is.
I'm suprised no one else caught this. The initial description of "concentrated light energy photons" made me a little wary, but then I noticed:
"the laser tracked, locked onto and fired a burst of concentrated light energy photons at the speeding shell... Seconds later, at a point well short of its intended destination, the projectile was destroyed"
I dunno what kind of crazy trajectory that laser had, but at 300km a second, this thing must have been pretty darn far away...
One would think that "instantly, the projectile was destroyed" would sound even better--and more importantly, have been accurate.
int func(int a);
func((b += 3, b));
using this "laser" I will hold the world ransom for....1 MILLION DOLLARS
You mean "they give us egg-roll?"
Then there is the whole freaking huge population of China to deal with. If they wanted to, they could possibly be the one country that could attempt a landing on US shores and invade us, simply because of their sheer numbers. If they don't care about their soldiers, then a war of attrition could easily occur.
Not to mention that Hussein would have no qualms about wrapping himself in civilians, just so he can pan the cameras across the rows of dead babies a couple of hours after the attack. Human shields 'R' Us
Can you say, "Northern Ireland"?
WTF is that under "Related Links"?
"Ad: PriceCompare"
I understand OSDN has to make money, but how is that related?
--just some preliminary WAGS here, total random order off the top of my head:
A successful knockout requires precise aiming, artillery is a parabola, farther away the higher the arc, the easier to see and knockout. Solution, low altitude cheap drone cruise missiles,nap of the earth flying, highly maneuverable, very close to the ground. They are configured stealth angularity, paint and composite emissions absorbing materials. Work until the atmospheric or exosatmospheric lasers are in place.
Decoys until the defensive laser is overwhelmed. These things heat up, require some kind of fueling, whether conventional gennys for electricity or pulse nukes, whatever, their "fuel supply" is a limiting factor. Get them to use up the available fuel supply on masses of cheap joke targets that can't be ignored, ie, every tenth one is a real destructive device, and etc. Once their fuel is gone, proceed with attack. the supply lines for these devices as well, there will always be weak link humans in these supply lines, cut a part of the line someplace removed from the laser.
Blackmail. Make the cost of using the lasers too high. An example, they use overt lasers, you use covert biologicals in their civilian sectors.
They use space, you contaminate their water in a major city.
They use B-2's, you use a dozen or a hundred guys with bic lighters one night.
They steal your natural resources when you are a small weak country, you ally with a strong non allied country and promise them 1/2 your resources for help.
They do economic sanctions, you make their economic infrastructure non functional, the "backhoe whoops" syndrome, or code red part deux
The BEST though--blackmail/bribe/control the opposing forces top leadership and business people. You win hands down no fighting required, the ultimate trojan horse attack, the Quisling gambit.
About comments of reflection - since an intense burst of light can generate enough heat to burn through steel, its not that far-fetched to see that an intense beam (even while being deflected) will generate heat. (If) it's deflected, even the object deflecting absorbs some heat generated. Explosive shell and intense heat = BOOM!
Actually no.
Preasent Israel is about the size it was under King David, and qite a bit smaller than under Solomon (unless the borders have changes significantly in the month since my map was printed)
I am sorry, but prove it. I have sufficient faith in the human race as a whole to believe that for the most, peaceful living points toward the same goals. For the most part, if the same people are allowed and not discriminated against in practicing their own religions, they don't give much of a damn about other people and their religions either (until, at least, the other religion goes about opressing (crusade anyone?))
You thoroughly underestimate people's ability to just "deal with it." I mean, even when you look back in the days of slavery, many african americans was pretty much like "oh well, kinda sucks, but such is life." And many of them didn't rebel unless they were treated real bad, etc.
Of course, there will probabbly always be pissed-off people, and extremist groups. Bell curve will always have that 1% tip. However, if we can increase education, and generally allow people to communicate with eachother (instead of in a "herd"), eventually there will be understanding and tolerance for eachother. Eventually we can tighten the said curve until the tips are marginal in number AND in presence.
I hope, that one day, it will be _Star Trek_.
My life in the land of the rising sun.
Holy ass-raped Bill Gates by Stallman Batman! Did them cats just shoot down a shell with a laser beam?
Assuming that we actually get to employ this weapon system in a war we are justified in fighting, I am very concerned about Israeli participation in this project.
The Israelis have a history of taking our weapon technologies and putting them on the market, often without consulting us in advance. An excellent example is the AWACS capabilities we've recently provided them that have found their way into the arsenal of the Chinese and which could end up costing the lives of American servicemen if the Taiwan strait heats up.
This would be particularly damaging with this weapon system, given its ability to dull the effectiveness of the mainstay of our military capability, that is, dropping and/or launching projectiles at otherwise defenseless adversaries.
Might this be a case of a weapon system whose chief expense was in its design? Now that it is understood how to create these things, is it possible that they might be produced inexpensively, and by nations that normally aren't capable of fielding hi-tech weaponry?
Instead of working to enhance our security, I can envision a scenario where exactly the opposite takes place.
But then again, if we continue to engage in immoral campaigns like Serbia, Afghanistan and Colombia, perhaps it's all for the best.
Maybe the Palestinians can build one.
Is this truly the only Earth I can live on?
Unless the projectile takes a few seconds to heat up.
It's a different world over there. The children are terrorists. It's a shame the Israelis didn't finish the job.
Or forcing people out of there own land because of their religion?
Excuse me, what Muslim countries is Israel attacking? Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Yemen, Sudan, Iraq, Iran, Quatar, Oman, United Arab Emirates, Morocco, Chad, Libya, Lebanon, Jordan, Indonesia, the Phillipines? Hmmm, there must be some other factor (Google News: 13 hours ago) that you're missing. Israel's not attacking any Muslim country. Just some Arab-Israeli ("Palestinian") misfits wanting an overthrow of Israel.
In other news, there was another suicide bombing this afternoon on the West Bank in the settlement of Tampa. "When I arrived I saw body parts lying on the road," said a woman who witnessed the blast. "I went into the shop and saw some remains covered in blood and nearby a severed leg which belonged to another body." The street was crowded with schoolchildren and shoppers on their way home from work.
The Spanish Authority has condemned the bombing. The Español Inquisition-Jihad is claiming responsibility for this attack, which is in protest of the illegal American settlements on the occupied territory owned by the Spaniards. Gov. Jeb Bush was unavailable for comment as he was attending a funeral of a victim of last week's suicide bomber.
I seem to recall reading in "Into the Storm: A Study in Command" by Tom Clancy and Gen. Franks (ret) that the troops were able to track incoming artillery rounds before they even arrived, allowing them some time to get a warning out.
If you think artillery isn't a problem for field troops because of our "air superiority", you're very much wrong. Building a cannon of any type, primitive or advanced, is relatively easy for a nation-state. No ammount of advance bombing can wipe out all of the enemy artillery (unless we just carpet bomb the nation w/ nukes..)
Even in Desert Storm, it was a problem. But we calculated the reverse trajectory right back to the enemy and blew them away with our own artillery. Nonetheless, if any of those incoming shells had contained chemical or biological agents, our troops would have been in serious danger. This gives them a chance at avoiding artillery strikes entirely.
On a side note, as part of FCS2012 (previously FCS2025), the US Army is developing systems to track incoming projectiles of any sort, including tiny bullets. Last I heard, it was still in testing, but it was going to be implemented in combat to help locate snipers, and to eventually control energy shielding systems on tanks and such, if not to outright destroy the incoming round.
CCDs are getting damn quick and very high-res, and with just a few frames of data, a microprocessor as old as the P5 could track the projectile well enough to do an intercept. Launching a projectile of any sort (even a high-velocity gunshot) cannot be done quick enough sometimes due to the mechanical energy you must expend. Therefore, a purely electrical response is the only option that can assure early detonation.
However, as somebody mentioned already, when will we get some of these mounted on the sharks??
Most nations have signed the Geneva Convention to regulate the conduct of war- amoung other things, this means that you can only attack people with weapons meant to kill them, but not infect, poison, or maim.
(A gentleman's agreement between the respective military-industrial-complexes, really. Dead soldier -> proud military funeral -> enhanced militarism and anticipation of future retaliation. Wounded soldier -> disabled veteran begging on sidewalk -> budget pressure for providing care, and public squeamishness about enrolling in future conflicts. Too much peace hurts our economic growth!)
This means no chemical weapons (tell that to Russia!), no hollowpoint or fragmentary bullets, few shotguns, and no lasers aimed at people. Because the easiest ways to hurt someone with a laser is to burn his eyes out, this is consistent with Geneva.
But, today's new, powerful anti-munition lasers will be an attractive option in the anti-aircraft role as well. Military planners must be thinking of this, but they don't want to talk about it for fear of striking taboo/war-crimes territory.
But I wonder what'll happen if a laser-defense battery suddenly finds themselves face to face with an enemy Hind who snuck up terrain-masked. Will they run for it and hope he's a slow shot, or light it up and watch the fireworks?
And, if the the ABL gets built and we get another hijacker repurposing an airliner into a weapon, the president will be hard pressed not to order him zapped, too.
(Of course, another reason planners might not talk much about targeting aircraft with lasers is that the US and Israel have no potential opponents whose aircraft can't be simply destroyed with Beyond-Visual-Range missiles. Won't stop me from speculating.)
"Mini me stop humping the laser..ok..honest to
god...Why don't you and the giant laser get a
fricken room for god's sake?"
?sp
TheIDF has world class technology development and software development. Don't forget they own the process that allows them to make smaller nukes than anyone - probably on the order of 3-4Kg of fuel. All self developed.
Merkava tanks including the cnomputerized fire control and autoloaders? Self created.
UAV technology - initially invented there.
Jericho missiles and Ofek Spy satellites - all homegrown.
Homegrown cruise missiles...
Good point... Although, one has to imagine that this would be a fatal flaw of the weapon.
If it takes a few seconds to heat up, then it's reasonable to implement a mechanism in the missle to detect heat and to do something to subvert the lazer. Presumably, the lazer is going to be difficult to aim (or at least lock in on) as you need ultra-fine precision when dealing with such small angles over a large distance.
A simply mechanism to throw the missle randomly off course and then correct should wreck havoc on this weapon...
int func(int a);
func((b += 3, b));
With all these laser developments one article I recall reading a good year ago (possibly New Scientist) was the fact these extremely high energy lasers have the ability to blind. Now typically one assumes you need to be exposed in the line of sight, but in the case of many of these military grade lasers the sheer reflection (that you would hardly notice) from an unassuming object (such as a car hood) can render all those in sight of the car (military and civilian) completely blind.
What I am wondering is the implications and serious research since then that makes these lasers suddenly OK, especially given the force that the Geneva convention brings when it comes to blinding your opponent.
Could the next thing boon in war be forgoing shooting artillery shells and moving into showering a known occupied area with blinding lasers?
I know how hard in Counter-Strike it is to shoot while flashed..
The best diplomat I know is a fully activated phaser bank.
-- Scotty.
Why do America and Israel need an anti-missile laser? No-one would want to send a missile at them; they're such fair, fun-loving people.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
And yeah, the analogy has a big hole. Spain is obviously a real country. Palestine (in modern news media parlance) is more closely comparable with Atlantis: Nobody can agree on where either of them is actually located or if they even exist.
What happens to the effectiveness of this laser if the projectile is mirror-polished? (Sure, it will get scratched up by the rifling of the gun, but still...)
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
So now they only have to outlaw using mirror finish on the shells...
"Accuracy doesn't matter with a 50 megaton bomb."
Not quite. The initial targets in a nuclear exchange are, of course, the other guy's nukes. (what's the point of starting a nuclear war if you're going to get vaporized just like your enemy?) In this case, accuracy is *imperative*. Your target is the blast shield on the top of the enemy's missile silos and ~2m in diameter. If you miss even by a few feet, your 50megaton bomb digs a big hole in the ground but the silo survives, and you get nuked back. In the case of cities, accuracy isn't that important, but keep in mind that those are only secondary targets in any nuclear exchange.
>If you havn't heard, the US is the ONLY MAJOR >world power. I meant what world power _in the past_ hasn't (sorry, I thought that was obvious). True, the US is pretty much the only major world power today (though the UK has some clout also), but the cold war only ended about 10-15 years ago. Anyway my whole point was that the US hasn't done anything others haven't before it, IMHO. Also, I'm not sure I understand your point about Israel. How is putting an end to Israeli aid going to accomplish peace exactly? Last time I checked the Arabs' publicly stated objective was to wipe Israel off the face of the Earth, not make peace with it.
Ok, I know the mirror thing won't work for defense against lasers, but how about the thermal tiles they use on the space shuttle? Those little buggers are so very not thermally conductive, wouldn't they make an effective shield against a laser weapon?
Granted, several inches of thermal tiles may not be practical on an artillery warhead, but certainly would be on tanks and the like.
Learn how a CPU works before you learn to program. Seriously.
So when this might laser fires, what happens to anything (a airliner or billion dollar satelite) that is in the path of the laser?
I don't think it will be to popular if they start shooting down their own stuff by accident because it was behind the actual target.
... how a society can deal with losses.
The West does have enough tanks and missiles to wipe out all Muslims, but it does not have any guts to do so. Muslims have guts to butcher all westerners, but they don't have planes and missiles to do that.
Ability to deal with losses brings us to the biggest underlying difference between the Western civilization and the traditional cultures. It is K- versus R- reproductive strategies.
K means a few offsprings, most survive, life has a very high value. R - millions of offsprings, a few survive, price of life is nothing. Now bring it into human realm, and you will be able to trace several pieces of the culture (such as "Live free or die" or "Whatever it takes") to the R-strategy times. And now nobody wants to die - neither for the country nor for anything else.
This is why Western type society will probably never commit genocide even if its survival will depend on it.
Tigers respect lions, elephants and hippos. Maggots respect no one. (C) S. Dovlatov
"Solution, low altitude cheap drone cruise missiles..."
You can't get any cheaper than an artillery shell. That's why they are used so widely all over the world. The eqipment is far more rugged and battle tested than any drone to be fielded. Pipe dreams of rapid deployable cruise missile-like weapons are nice, but right now, they're pipe dreams for all but the largest of nations. And even those nations are going to stick with artillery. For the simple fact that it's simple to use and can be rapidly deployed. Maybe someday somebody will come up with the RPG of missile drones (simple to use, advanced AI with decent target recognition on the cheap for use in the rugged third world? Don't hold your breath), but you'll never be able to put more cheap drones into the air faster than I can saturate the area with artillery. Your point about decoys is probably the simplest, best bet, but I'm assuming target discrimination will improve as well. It's the same old game of move, counter-move over an over.
Blackmail. Make the cost of using the lasers too high. An example, they use overt lasers, you use covert biologicals in their civilian sectors. They use space, you contaminate their water in a major city. They use B-2's, you use a dozen or a hundred guys with bic lighters one night. They steal your natural resources when you are a small weak country, you ally with a strong non allied country and promise them 1/2 your resources for help. They do economic sanctions, you make their economic infrastructure non functional, the "backhoe whoops" syndrome, or code red part deux.
Just because you may be able to accomplish your objective by other means doesn't render a specific technology/strategy and/or weapons platform automatically irrelevant as you seem to be implying. In fact, it's the same argument you hear opposing ballistic missile shields. "Well hot damn. They may protect us from ICBMs, but they can still sneak a nuke in across the boarders, therefore a missile shield is completely useless!"
I've always found that particular leap of logic astounding, personally. I can wage war by other means, therefore, that particular defense is useless. No, wrong, BS. Every one of your counter arguments are great, until you add the statement, "but so can your enemy." Fighting the unlimited dirty war you propose against a well armed, well financed opponent will earn you a massive ration of shit in a hurry, no matter who the opponent is. Sure. Nerve gas a city. You just signalled your willing to fight a no holds barred campaign. Your well financed opponent will likely get a lot nastier rather than pliable as you seem to hope. Contaminate Frances major water supplies. It'll hurt them, sure, but mark my words they will get a handle on the situation on come gunning for whatever weak-assed organization that launched the attack. Yes, even France.
On a side note, check out David Drake and his Hammer's Slammers series. He fleshes out anti-artillery and guide artillery systems quite well in his works.
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There was some confusion as to what value there was in shooting a hole in an artillery shell.
If you hit a rocket with a laser, your best shot would disable its guidance and control systems. This would quite possibly shut down its engine, but would certainly prevent it from hitting you at all. Secondary targets on a misile include control surfaces, engine, and fuel, all of which have the potential to destroy the misile before it reaches you.
Now if you are applying these countermeasures on a misile that is already very near you, another factor comes into play... what kind of a hit it is. If you're on an aircraft carrier and someone shoots an antiship misile at you from reasonably close range, and it's of a Russian design, it's going to fly up at 45deg, and then sharp down at 45 degrees at you, very fast. If you manage to detonate the propellant or disable the rocket, there's still a good chance it will hit you and deliver its full damage. (a "hard" hit) If you get luckier and detonate its payload, or destroy the control and detonation systems, you are still going to get hit, but this is a "soft" hit. The misile body, rocket motor, and all the other bits (in one piece or many) will still do appreciable damage, but at least it's not likely to sink the boat.
Shells are different. Major shells are going to have armor piercing or high explosive payloads, and C4 just doesn't blow up if you vaporize it with a laser... it burns. So you are not all that likely to detonate it. Shells are fired with great precision, and if all factors are known, they will land with that same precision. Your best hit on a shell is to damage it physically, and change its aerodynamic characteristics. Take a shell and scar the nose with a pocket knife, and it's totalled... you won't hit anything with it, it's not going to fly straight anymore. The laser just has to damage the casing. It's worth noting that if you punch a hole in it fast enough and start burning up the C4 inside, you might just plain burst the shell by simple gas expansion. In any event, it's effectively dealt with. It may still land and blow up, but it's not going to hit what it was aimed at.
Even changing the orientation of the misile/shell is very useful in countermeasures. Most of these have "shaped charges", where the explosive payload is directed in a very carefully engineered way to do maximum damage. When hitting a tank with an antitank round, having the "business end" hit the tank is the difference between destroying the tank (piercing the armor and sending chaff all around the cabin to kill the crew) or doing negligible damage by exploding harmlessly outside the tank. Misiles are essentially the same... a misile that would normally destroy a target may not even detonate if it's tumbling when it hits and contacts sideways, and if the target is even lightly armored, damage will be minimal rather than fatal.
I expect lasers to prove very effective as a projectile countermeasure.
I did have one curiosity about the shell test they did... does anyone know how long they "beamed" the shell before it was effectively dealt with? That's one thing that must be considered... if you have to hold the beam on the target for a considerable length of time, it may be much more difficult to get in a fatal shot. Misiles tend not to roll, so if you are shooting at it from the side, (i.e.you're not the target) you still can hit one spot continuously. Shells on the other hand, are usually designed to spin as they fly downrange, and so targetting the side is actually targetting a band around the shell.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
For that matter, what is this thing's power source? Granted, your laser only needs to be effective under a kilometer, but to intercept the amount of artillery in the average barrage is gonna take a butt-load of power. I remember in a popular science (heh) somebody was able to generate and ass-tonne of power using a C4 powered generator (no, really...) so I guess you could rig one to be powered off a belt of explossive ammunition? Sheesh...
As to the reflectivity, I just can't think of any coating that would survive that sort of abuse and be effective over a laser guarded target... At least it might take a longer "burn-time" to destroy it...
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Doesn't matter; if you can hit them they can hit you
Israel's been trying to make peace with those people since 1948. Every time any Arab nation is willing to make peace, Israel's right there. And they make serious concessions, too: They gave the Sinai, with its oil fields, back to Egypt. Israel has no oil of its own, you know. That's serious.
They tried like hell to make peace with Arafat, but when they offered him all the land he wanted and half of Jerusalem (Camp David, 2000), he turned them down flat and started a war.
Meanwhile, Hamas and Islamic Jihad aren't demanding that Israel just pull out of the West Bank and Gaza; they're demanding that Israel stop existing. The only outcome that the Islamic terrorists in the PA are willing to accept is the complete destruction of Israel. The secular terrorists (Fatah, Al Aqsa Martyrs, etc.) are harder to pin down on that point, but as long as somebody is murdering Israeli civilians on a wholesale basis, the war will continue. You can't ignore people blowing up your people on busses. Israel put up with a low level of terrorism through the Oslo years (average fifty Israeli civilians murdered per year by Palestinian terrorists during the "peace"), but there turned out to be no light at the end of that tunnel. No nation is obligated to accept having its citizens murdered. Does England put up with that from the IRA? No.
By all means, punish those who refuse to participate in peace initiatives. If Israel ever stops trying to make peace, punish them too. But don't punish them for shooting back when they're shot at. That's crazy.
You know he's right.
Israel is a terrorist state, and we fund it.
It really does not matter; If we can hit them, you better damn well know that they can hit you
Its only 300km/s in a vacuum!!!
In our atmosphere, light travels at approximately the speed of sound.
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Now if only it could shot down those AOL cd's on route to my house.
I'm suprised no one else caught this. The initial description of "concentrated light energy photons" made me a little wary, but then I noticed:
"the laser tracked, locked onto and fired a burst of concentrated light energy photons at the speeding shell... Seconds later, at a point well short of its intended destination, the projectile was destroyed"
I dunno what kind of crazy trajectory that laser had, but at 300km a second, this thing must have been pretty darn far away...
One would think that "instantly, the projectile was destroyed" would sound even better--and more importantly, have been accurate.
Do you know how this laser works? THEL tracks the target while firing the laser, which heats up the target. After a few seconds of illumination, the heat buildup is sufficient to detonate the warhead on the target, thus destroying it for us. It can't explode it instantly, because the target has to heat for awhile.
Russian missile bunkers may have been under-defended after the breakup of the soviet union, but this is no longer the case. The stories about being able to walk into a bunker, steal a missile and walk out are precisly that, stories. If you've ever been to Russia you will know that it is still a police state.
Peacefull coexistence is lost on you. It doesn't even occur as an option to you, apparently. That's just plain evil.
-- Waht? Tehr's a preveiw buottn?
If we don't know where the shells are coming from, what's the chances that this system will be able to realistically identify a genuine incoming round, activate (from idle) and reliably shoot it down in time?
:p
I'd imagine it'd be just like SAM site or Patriot missile battery. They aren't always on, but rather switched on if the situation warrents. On that note, I'd imagine you're right-- The average platoon soldier won't see it's benefit unless he is around a high value target or is part of a large scale action. I can't imagine this system being portable enough or cheap enough to guard anything less. I'm guessing vehical towed at least.
US has spent trillions to ensure that it doesn't have any more
Don't feel too bad. "They" don't have any money either so it all balances out
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better think twice about using those nukeys.
Local Arabs massacred Jews in Hebron in 1920, and again in 1929. There was a Jewish community in Hebron, continually, since Biblical times, but the massacre of 1929 finally put an end to it. From the 1930s on, there was a great deal of random Arab violence against Jews and against the English.
We're not just talking about "settlers" (though obviously the core Palestinian ideology is the same anti-immigrant xenophobia as the Ku Klux Klan); we're also talking about some people who were born there, and whose ancestors had been born there for a couple thousand years.
None of this has anything to do with "Babylon"; that's gibberish.
There was never any "Palestinian" government until the Oslo agreement in 1993. The Mandate of Palestine was administered by England from whenever (before England it was the Ottoman Empire and sundry Islamic empires back to Muhammad, etc. etc. back to the Romans) until 1948, when Jordan invaded and seized the West Bank. Jordan controlled the West Bank until they stupidly attacked Israel in 1967, thinking that Israel was too involved with Egypt to fight them at the same time. Israel stomped them and took the West Bank, saying that they'd give it back when Jordan was ready to make peace. So, no peace, no normalization, no West Bank (I don't recall whether Jordan signed the "eternal war against Israel" Arab League pact in Khartoum a couple weeks later; I do seem to recall that somebody sat that one out...). Let's not forget that the whole Arab League voted against UN 242, and they're still not willing to accept all of its provisions to this day (Israel is; 242 says, basically, "fair and just peace with defensible borders for all and a just solution to the refugee problem within the framework of previous UN resolutions" -- that's just what Israel's been trying to get since 1948). Okay. Then when Jordan finally did make peace with Israel about thirty years later, they didn't want the West Bank any more. Nobody else does, either, least of all Israel. They just want those morons to stop blowing up their buses.
>Are we leavin' every other country in the military dustbin or what? I can't think of any country that can wage war with America anymore.
No, it will just make the rest of the world feel even more threatented, i.e. make sure they can fight the USA. In the end, someone someewhere somehow will hit gold (or rahter Death) in the way of a radical novel technology. So overnight all your wonderfull battle tech isn's worth it's weight in scrap. This kind of shit always happens: you make the perfect sword and some yahoo invents the handgun. Happened many times in history; how many examples of UltimateWeapon® can you name in a minute?
When you have so many people feeling threatened and trying trying... Bingo! Eureka! Look, if you do [this] they die!
And then it's a new game altogether. You die.
Probably it will involve some kind of nanotech, and probably based on biology---not infectious agents, mind you, but some supertech based on the way life works. Think Alien meets the Borg. Are you scared already?
Rule of History: be overconfident and you're history. All your bases are rust 'n dust. Enemy archaeologists will have a field day.
All in all, I sure am glad I'm NOT an USAn.
``L'imagination au povoir.''
Most military electronics are shielded against pretty much any kind of electromagnetic pulse short of a nuclear blast. And if you're that close to a nuclear blast, you have more things to worry about than the EMP frying your electronics.
Now civilian electronics are something to worry about. However, I imagine that even civilian avionics are shielded from EMP. Most aircraft are designed to be able to withstand a lightning strike, which is an electromagnetic pulse, so I imagine their electronics would be sufficiently protected. And since electromagnetic pulses are a transient interference source, communications equipment shouldn't be too badly affected.
"It take 9 months to bear a child, no matter how many women you assign to the job."
Don't blame something that's clearly been developed for many years, including during Clinton's reign.
I don't know how expensive a tile is to produce, but you probably just stated the best material to counter this system. And all it does is have to survive for a few seconds, not a prolonged, gut wrenching re-entry, so you probably wouldn't need several inches. I'm guessing the lasers will "flash" the shell with thermal energy before quickly moving on to the next instead of riding it all the way to the ground. Likewise, I doubt the entire thing need be made of the stuff. Just enough to insulate the HE inside.
Combine those with chaff producing shells that explode high above the strike zone to confuse radar and you could probably render the laser well and ineffective.
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-> cooling ... sounds impossible ? it is. But it must be possible to withstand that kind of power for a second (and a supersonic missile could travel a mile in that second at mach 5).
... i know it sounds impossible to reflect light perfectly, but consider that the laser beem is monochromatic light. So what about a small expencive and perfect mirror at the top of the rocket that is kept clean by a small shield that evaporates upon contact with the laser)
... ever noticed some things get totally transparent under monochromatic light. Infrared shines perfectly through dark lenses without any burdon. It must be possible to find materials that the laser will simply not hit, as the photons would find nothing to interact with.
-> misdirection. If I read the article correctly, the laser needs several seconds to lock on. Let's say it takes two. If your rocket gets hit (you ought to be able to detect that and react to it) you immediately release the hull plate it contacted (an explosive between hull and rocket ought to do it, and provide a cooling border by rapidly expanding the distance between hit point and rocket), and will throw of the rocket's course (hopefully) off sufficiently to get out of harm's way. The target beam will continue on it's merry way and hit something else.
-> mirrors
-> refraction. Reflection is hard to do perfectly. BUT do you remember the way a prism reflects light ? You can combine a mirror and a refraction system all in one simple package. I have little doubt you could cover the whole rocket, so you should be able to take care of the beam at most angles (only those direcly on the refracion surface would pose a problem, and you can probably make those angles virtually impossible to hit)
-> transparency
-> people bring up that even slight imperfection in the material would become a serious heat source in laser light. That would not hurt much if the gas were to be transparent (and a substance that only evaporates at 5000 will not stay gaseous for very long unless under constant illumination), these people fail to take into account that the aerodynamics would remove those imperfecions in less than a millisecond at mach 5.
-> misdirection : detect the targeting beam (this weapon needs to use an active targeting beam), and start modifying your course randomly. Using wings at mach 5 you should be able to change course multiple times every millisecond), this would have the added advantage that the naked eye would simply not notice the rocket, nor would a normal camera. Given you can do it fast enough, it MAY be possible to fool a radar (ie, make sure you are in a totally different location each measurement interval, and the radar won't see you)
-> a plasma cloud would reflect light at any frequency, which would prevent the laser from impacting as long as you can keep the cloud from evaporating. More importantly it could block the targeting beam and deny the laser needed information (if it is totally black for the targeting beam the laser will not receive any light back and will be forced to conclude there is no attacking rocket at all)
-> the previous attack has a very low-tech version. Detect the targeting beam's frequency, and paint your rockets with the correct paint.
I have had thoughts about "lasers to take out stuff" especially after reading up on laser powered rockets, but havent seen it discussed here yet. What happens if you make your missile or plane highly reflective? or coat it in a mirror of some sought (if necessary). I would assume that it would just reflect all the light off in (maybe harmful) directions. And if this would defend against lasers, would it then adversly affect radar detection/stealth? It would also make VERY VERY COOL looking planes and missiles.
Shouldn't that be
"Laser shoots down. Artillery shell in flight!"
?
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
If all of a part of the world is populated by Muslim/Arab's, and the one place that the Jewish people can ever say is really theirs happens to be on the border of it, due to the fact that the father of Islam and Judaism was teh same person (Abraham), is it not fair that the Jewish people get approx. 1/100th of the land.
/This is My Sig\
The Palestinian people who inhabited the land for thousands of years treated it like shit, and the Jewish people come in and make the land prosperous in a matter of decades, and they should give it back.
The Palestinian people were given the 1/2 the land by the U.N and rejected it, and now they use terror attacks to try and get it back, over the dead body of every Jewish person around the world.
Now Israel is the only democracy in that region, and they are suppirted by the U.S., to defend themselves from terror.
How is this anything like the Native Americans?
Isreal shoots Terrorists, and their missiles, Native Americans shoot Craps.
Do not allow Pro-Palestinian propaganda take you over.
All Work No Play Make Jack Dull Boy
Anyone remember the urban legend about launching frozen chickens into jet engines to test them?
http://www.snopes.com/science/cannon.htm
Combine that with one of these lasers, and our military could deliver hot chicken dinners to men on the front lines with precision and accuracy! No more jokes about the slop in the mess hall. Our boys can chow down on instant chicken dinners just by calling in an order. Within seconds they could be litterally buried in tasty hot chicken. Yum yum!
Now you can attach a laser turret to your fire-finding radar and blow the shells down AND use your MLRS to destroy the artillery setup.
The face of war has changed quite a bit with this bit of technology.
-
Our obligation to the rest of the world, as American citizens, is to work to keep our Constitutional checks and balances in place so that our mighty power is used for worthy ends.
RIGHT ON man! I think the US Consitution and Bill of Rights are the most important documents in the history of mankind, and we must do our most to uphold them - for all mankind.
there are many places in the world today where things like free speech and freedom of assembly and freedom of travel are NOT a given. pardon my cultural imperialism, but these things should be givens.
It seems to me that a laser that can pump enough energy into a rocket or a shell to destroy it is going to pump enough energy into your face to melt it off. I really don't think being blinded is much of a concern. That's like saying, "watch where you point that shotgun! You could put someone's eye out!" Sure, their eyes come out the back of their head. They ain't blind... they dead.
"...and no lasers aimed at people"
Except that this system will be used principly for shooting down shells, not people. It'll most likely be aimed up, 24/7 to do it's job. If a Hind should wander into it's attack radius, maybe it'll lock on, maybe it won't, but I serverly doubt it will specifically target the people inside, just the big radar blob that represents the helo. Tough shit for them. If you could ban it on that point, well hell, lets ban all surface to air weapondry while we're at it.
As far as the ABL against terrorsists, sure, why not. That's why the white house has SAM sites and marines equipped with Stingers. Again, the effect is the same.
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Actually, right now china is way behind the US. My commanding officer used to refer to their Navy as the "5 minute" navy. This is the current US time estimates on how long it would take the US to entirely destroy or disable the Chinese Navy once committed. It would take a bit longer to achieve air superiority, but there is no doubt the US would emerge victorious there. After that, it doesn't really matter how many people they have. They are toast. (Except for the small matter of their nukes...)
That was at least worth a chuckle or two :p
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Nuclear and biological weapons as the proliferate not only to third world despots but fringe cult groups will render such technical advances somewhat useless. While you have your projectile interceptors place neatly around your borders some zealot sneaks a WMD into your downtown area or subway and in an instant you are either a hostage or toast.
I believe we (the US) will not be able to maintain a free and ethnically diverse society and while attempting to police the world, righting every wrong and trying to reason with religious imparied freaks. Most likely advance technology will be employed to spy, track and control our own population in order to "protect" ourselves.
Why not create a device that will capture the projectile, sealing the device and then add a filter in the system that prevented the sender and their network from that same attack permanantly :-)
I'm sorry, but what on earth are you talking about?
/. always screws up the Geneva Convention angle whenever a military laser story hits the frontpage, though I admit this is a new way to do it...the first Geneva Protocol on limiting weaponry was passed in 1899. I doubt that "military-industrial complexes" even existed then.
A gentleman's agreement between the respective military-industrial-complexes, really.
Why would any industrial interest *limit* the usage of new, advanced -- read EXPENSIVE -- weapons system? This is akin to Intel lobbying for a law limiting processors to 1 GHz.
Someone on
Good luck getting their half-billion man army across the Pacific, though.
Tim
Omnia vestra castrorum habetur nobis.
"that the only people who hates them are terrorists "
Actually, that is true.
Just "not liking us" is far different than "kill the yanks".
If you try to kill us, i believe we have the right to reduce your pathetic country to blackened glass. Shiny, and horrible, like the entrails of a dead animal in the dead of winter.
Don't like it? Who fucking cares? We kick your ass because we're smarter, better, nicer, funnier, wealthier, better looking than all of you put together.
Our women are the envy of the world. When you fuck an American girl its like going to heaven. She bathes, and shaves her pussy and pits. Sweet.
What have you got? Smelly, flabby girls who have more pubic hair than cousin IT.
We don't care if you're mad at us, but leave us the fuck alone or we'll kill you and your country.
Understand?
Good. Now get back to work polishing our silverware.
" So often you think Americans are being screamingly funny until you realize they are being absolutely serious."
Sure. The rest of world laughed while we invented 1) Aeroplane 2) Motion Pictures 3) Recorded music 4) Television 5) Radio 6) Fast Food 7) Personal Computers 8) The internet
For ever invention, you thought "What's the point? These Yankee Dogs are inventing stupid stuff. Why don't they just make The Buggy Whip better? Who needs anything else?"
So now when we say we're going to come up with the first significant battlefield advance in 1000's of years, your response is "Those silly yanks, its hard to tell if we're joking or not".
Well, we're not.
We win again, because we smarter, funnier, richer, better looking, and just plain nicer than you and your sad little country.
Bow down to me, or move to France. Your choice.
OF COURSE THEY KNEW THE FLIGHTPATH, DUMBASS.
Artillery shells are ballistic objects, travelling mostly in a parabolic curve. Get a little bit of that curve and the speed of the shell with radar, and it's just a math problem to find the entire flightpath. The problem is doing the math quick enough that the shell hasn't hit you, and making a laser responsive enough to be in the right place at the right time.
Tim
Omnia vestra castrorum habetur nobis.
Anyone who has served on board ship in the US Navy since 1980 knows just how good our targeting systems can be. Ever heard of the acronym CIWS? It stands for Close In Weapons System. It was designed to take out inbound projectiles such as cruise missiles between 10 km and 1 km from the ship. It is still actively deployed on many US ships.
The system consists of a tracking radar system with enough computing power to track up to 150 threats at once. It prioritizes the targeting system based upon inbound speed, size of the object, IFF status, and distance from the ship. Once this sucker is enabled, you'd better hope your planes have their IFF turned on, or they'll be shot down quicker than you can blink.
The system did all this using a Vulcan cannon, which is a gatling gun design throwing depleted uranium rounds downrange. The system was designed to fire and correct inflight to hose down a target until it dropped out of the sky. The system's biggest weakness was the fact that it went through rounds so fast (up to 6,000 rpm theoretical, 2,000 rpm typical) that the magazines had to be HUGE. I once saw a picture of the USS New Jersey after its refit. The 4 magazines on board held enough rounds to fire for a grand total of 15 minutes without stopping. The smaller ships that had the system frequently were limited to less than 2 minutes. A decent laser system's power plant occupying the same space would solve this problem.
This system was successfully demonstrated almost 25 years ago. Its first active deployment was in 1980 or 1981. And you "experts" are trying to tell me that the targeting technology hasn't improved enough since to take down an artillery shell? Oh, please. Go do some very basic research on what's in use TODAY before hollering about weapons tests for stuff that might be deployed tomorrow.
The only question in my mind is the size of the power plant necessary to drive a powerful enough laser to be useful. Can it be mounted on anything smaller than a ship? Anyone know?
I see this a lot. Yes the laser travels to the target instantly. But the aiming servos do not. The best you can manage is to point the laser at a point, then make last minute decisions on when exactly the laser fires. I was also under the impression that there was a slight delay from the moment of pushing the big red button, till the laser energy actually starts. Chemical lasers and all that.
After being in the Arty for ten years and thinking about how to deploy this weapon system. I come to the conclusion that it is a neat parlor trick but not much of a defensive system. So What?
--my point was merely owning the highest tech is not the exact equivalent of "victory always" in all situations. It helps, and it can hurt as well. As long as there are human beings who act unbalanced as an agressor, the person(s) defending themselves will come up with something that could very well work as a defense or deterrent. That's the nature of assymetry, and it's something our own high tech government studies and uses as well, it's not "either-or" as you suggest I said or implied, I was just doing a little light wargaming.
Yes I know artillery shells are low tech more or less and common. If it becomes useless to use them other means of counter attack will be developed. As the nature of the size and superiority of the attacking force becomes more readily apparent, so will the rise of the creativity of the victims counter attack rise, that was really the point I was making, as humans have this "revenge" gene, if if it isn't overwhelmingly and immediately effective, they still use it. Warsaw ghetto? Ya, they lost eventually, but made a good point. Dien bien Phu, no way them little "gooks" (note popular term used at the time for demonization and de-humanizing purposes) could get advanced artillery over those impassable mountains, was there? Not possible, why they'll get bombed from the air and wiped out! whoops.... Ragtag rebel colonialists against the official organized colonial army, low tech disorganized militioa of farmers and tradesmen against the higher tech, richer and more organized regular and mercenary armies of kingus georgy, well, a way was found to win eventually, to neutralise the higher tewch and superior army, because the will and necessity was there.
And ya, if nation A with icbm nukes knew that much smaller and poorer nation B with hidden portable nukes had them spread out around their nation, well hidden - we'll call it non-findable for theory and conversational purposes - there very well could be a stoppage put to nation A's ICBM aggression by merely knowing they wouldn't get off totally scot free in an attack. They just might not attack. Or do ya feel lucky today? Semi MAD is just about as effective as a full MAD doctrine, wouldn't you say?
Anyway, a year and change ago a dozen dudes with 2 dollar wimpy knives and really a simple basic plan took out billions in infrastructure, hit the main militaryHQ hard of the worlds biggest and highest tech nation, killed thousands, and suceeded. Satellites didn't stop them, lasers, intel agencies, fighter planes, stealth bombers, abrahams tanks, nukes, zip nada stopped them. 2 buck knives and determination (and some collusion in high places but that's a different argument for a different time) took that particular day. Ya, they suffering now, but it ain't over yet either, is it?
Anywho, to me it don't really matter. My best guess is the electronic flashy stuff won't be the last weapons invented and used by man, my loot is on racial specific genotype biologicals that will be slightly flawed and/or mutate and basically wipe out humans across the planet. They'll be a flurry of nukes and lasers and whatnot, but the slow, steady and quiet biologicals will "win"-for the germs, that's who's gonna win, the germs. Humans ain't gonna make it. We're too stupid and arrogant. *Most* of our so called leaders-across the board, all the nations I mean-are clinically insane megalomaniacs. Total bonkers, loop de loops. They control use of weapons, weapons are all morphing into being variants of WMD. It's the largest growth industry on the planet, every ounce of high tech ability is being thrown at it.
That suckah gonna pop one day, 999 to 1 odds, IMO.
There's never been any weapon system of note invented that hasn't eventually been mass deployed and used in warfare, zero exceptions. The timing for this or that gadget or technique is different, but so far human's basic track record in history is "if they build it, it eventually gets used a lot". The temptation is just too great. Human nature hasn't ever changed since jawbone of an ass days. It'll happen.
I thought it was because the mayor's an insane, racist nutjob. Turns out all our problems are related to "Mama Mia!"
Mel, you need therapy.
Sorry, I don't waste time trying to understand inferior savage cultures anymore. Cultural relativism and wooly-minded 'diversity' worship died on a sunny September morning last year. It's might-makes-right from here on out.
We are great! We are Americans!
Yes we are. The best there has ever been, by practically any measure.
Tremble before our might!
Yes. Please do, and learn to live with Pax Americana. And thank your lucky stars it's us and not the Nazis or the Chinese that will be calling the shots from here on out.
-ccm
Too much Law; not enough Order.
Most military electronics are shielded against pretty much any kind of electromagnetic pulse short of a nuclear blast.
This IS compatable to the pulse from a nuclear blast -- just localized in a small area, and only in microwave spectrum.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
s/compatable/comparable/
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
the first Iraqi action would be launching its entire chemical arsenal at Jerusalem,
Not too bright. Jerusalem also contains the holiest place in Islam outside of Mecca and Medina -- the Dome of the Rock.
Now if you had said Tel Aviv... but then of course, Baghdad would become a radioactive parking lot from Israeli nukes.
Fascism starts when the efficiency of the government becomes more important than the rights of the people.
My experience on Slashdot is that it has been far from Americentric. In fact I've seen far more criticizm of the U.S. than support. Most of it from the EU. Take this article for example - it's about an amazing feat of engineering - so amazing that I'm almost tempted to believe it is a hoax - but all anybody can comment on is how much they hate the US
Just for the record - we know you hate us - in general. We know you especially dislike the fact that we're projecting our power around the world right now. Hell, even I get a little uneasy about it - and I'm as American as they come. But remember, we're in the midst of a well-earned temper tantrum. Pretty soon we'll be satisfied that we killed or captured enough of the bastard-scum that helped to murder our innocent people. After that, the political pendulum will swing back the other way here - as it always does - and the doves will be in control again, which should please the rest of the world.
Also remember, the US is currently the biggest baddest dude on the block - by a long shot - but it won't always be that way. Someday our power will wane. it has to. I don't know who will be in the catbird seat then, maybe the EU, maybe the Chinese, maybe something entirely unexpected, but it WILL happen. Remember the 80's? The Japanese were kicking our butts all over the place. Now China is making a go of it. That the U.S. is the economic powerhouse of the world is by no means a fait acompli. I'm actually suprised that our influence has lasted as long as it has - face it, what does the US have that Europe doesn't? Why is the US so influential?
South Korea sounds like a pretty good place, or even Japan. You do remember how North Korea shot missles over Japan and into the sea don't you? How about Taiwan? That might further discourage invasion/reuninification. If I were a "grunt" in a hot zone, I'd sleep better knowing one of these was defending the fort.
Don't moderate flamebait as Troll. Know the difference or you will be Meta-moderated.
America will build thousands of these. For every "dummy" nuke, we'll have nearly 5 of these things, and will outnumber anything anyone launches at us by a huge number. Outbuild and outlast is something the USA military takes pride in, and for good reason. You can come up with more whacked theories, but in the end, when you have literally thousands and thousands of these laser cannons, we can all sleep at night and not have to worry about nukes.
quite a few innocent bystanders in Afghanistan, for instance.
Over three thousand civilians.
Quick clarification to my post:
Artillery does reach muzzle velocities that can exceed the speed of sound, but the time of flight at that speed is short.
The average velocity of the round is subsonic, and to put enough energy behind the round to have a supersonic average velocity is dangerous and unnecessary, not to mention prohibitive when considering a ton of other variables, too. (Tube length, wall thickness, weight, shockwave near crew members, etc.)
"Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives" should be a convenience store, not a government agency.
"[...]and fired a burst of concentrated light energy photons at the speeding shell over the White Sands test range in New Mexico.
"Seconds later, at a point well short of its intended destination, the projectile was destroyed," the Army's Space and Missile""
What do they mean with _seconds_ later?!
Here's a short video showing some Laser action (in Quicktime and Windowsmedia).
:)
That would be sooo easy to fake though.
US-Israel Test Laser Destroys Artillery Rounds In Flight
DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
WASHINGTON (AP)--A military laser cannon destroyed two artillery rounds in flight Tuesday at White Sands Missile Range, N.M., in a first for the experimental defense system, the Army said.
In tests, the experimental system called the Mobile Tactical High Energy Laser tracked each of 2-foot-long artillery rounds and burned them with a laser beam, heating them until they exploded, Army officials said.
The laser was built as a joint project between the U.S. and Israeli militaries. Officials hope it will provide a defense against short-range rockets and artillery rounds.
It was conceived to destroy the Katyusha rockets fired by Hezbollah guerillas into communities in northern Israel from Lebanon. The laser destroyed several 10-foot-long Katyushas during previous tests.
The experimental laser is mounted on a building at the White Sands test range in southern New Mexico. Officials hope to make it small enough to fit on vehicles.
Updated November 5, 2002 5:41 p.m. EST
Woopty Doo Basil, what does it all mean?!
Is it only me or are most of the slashdot geeks some kind of army/weapon lovers?
Everyone is drooling over the new weapons, but do you realize that the only purpose of weapons is WAGING WARS. Even defensive weapon just rises the odds that a country with powerfull army like US will attack some other and leave thousands or hundred thousands dead?
No ethical problems with that? Too many slashdotters come from westeren world i see... If you lived on the other side of the devide you could realize why USA is hated so much (not that i hate it, i just hate ignorance of its people and of its leaders, that will cost them a lot in a long term)
WAKE uP!
You take some Apache and Kiowa Warriors (soon RAH-66s) and swoop in Hellfiring the crap out of the tanks, then you zap some of the supporting infantry and softer AAA and mobile SAMs with Hydra-70 rockets while the A-10s Maverick the advancing line and F-16s throw HARMs at the AAA and SAMs dumb enough to light up thier radars.
OK, now consider that until the very 80s, when TOW units were shipped, there were not enough NATO anti-tank weapons in Europe to eliminate all deployed Warsaw Pact tanks. Consider that most of the Soviet artillery (including all heavy artillery and rocket units) was self-propelled and mobile. Consider that USSR has huge air fleets matching those of US in number, quality and pilot training. Consider that the Soviet Army experienced an order of magnitude more intense and bloody fights than all other allies combined during WWII, and managed to win.
You also seem to underestimate the effect of some million tons of munition falling on your lines continiously.
The only thing that could match W.P. superiority was nuclear power. And it did, effectively saving the free world (no irony here).
M-1A2, M-2, AH-64, H-56, A-10, F-16, M-109, MLRS, MAV, M-60A3, M-113A3, F-117 and F-15E are all desgined/upgraded to exploit faults in Soviet Doctrine as illustrated in Korea, the Golan, Sinai, Inter-Germany observations and Iraq.
Comparing the lesser regimes with USSR is plain silly. Do you *really* think that Seoul, Israel, West Germany alone or Saudi Arabia armies could stand a chance against the Soviets in a confilct?
Also, I see no mention of Cuba and Vietnam on your list.
Lisp is the Tengwar of programming languages.
It will shoot the bullets out of the air before they hit you.
Tampa, Israel? So THAT'S why there are so many Jews in Florida...
If you were a soldier on a mission to catch terrorists, would you prefer to enter by foot or with buldozer?
Why taking risks when they can be avoided?
That's more of a K5 discussion...
girl
.. is work out a way to avoid an incoming bucket-full of molten metal.
Get yer asbestos umbrellas at the ready lads!
You fool! You've given cheese to a lactose intolerant volcano god! Do you know what that means?
make your missile reflect the laser. that will reduce the effectiveness of the laser I would say.
that's my first impression after reading the article.
Privacy is terrorism.
Whats to stop any body using a shoulder lanched missile weapon against an airliner ?
NOTHING EXECPT THE WILL TO DO SO
They tech to do this has been around for 20 years and you are worried about something has has not even been properly invented yet > ?
Sheesh, good luck getting to sleep at night !
No shit. Could you imagine some of these people as parents?
"Great job Timmy. Of course next time, instead of just riding your bike without the training wheels, you should try it no-handed with your eyes closed on the half-pipe."
Casca
I want one of these "Lasers" for my "Moon base" on the dark side of Youranus.
Eat at Joe's.
The 'success' of the star wars program was not that the thing worked. It did not. It was an environmental nightmare.
But it was a success. Why? Because it bankrupted the Soviet Union. They were fooled into thinking that star wars could work. And so they spent all of their money chasing things that would not work.
The real reason that the rightwing antimissle people want this program isn't that the believe that such a program will work. The reason is JOBS. If we provide jobs for all of the people who could work on such a project (that will never work) then those people will not work on missles for our enemies.
Missle defense is a waste of money if you think that it will every work. But it does provide jobs for people who, if they don't have jobs, can make things that would harm us. Witness North Korea. They only make missles because they use them to blackmail us.
Really?
Isn't the real reason that if you have a weapon then the chances are that bad folks will be less likely to F with you?
If not having weapons worked, then NOONE would have them. Most people are peace-loving.
Everyone who has a weapon is not a villan.
Not everyone is a powerful sage like Jesus or the Budda who can use their power of mind to stop bad people from being bad with their positive mental additude. Even Jesus told his disciples to bring their swords. When they used them, he healed the ear of their victum.
The article is insane...
quote :
"Israel has most probably conducted several nuclear bomb tests"
ha-ha... Where exactly Israel could have done this ? Look at the map !!! Try to find Israel. If you succeed - try to find a place to make a nuclear test !
As for stealing the technology, etc... Israel has a highest percentage of scientists and engineers in the world. We just don't have to steal technology - we can develop just about anything with much less effort.
One deserves evything he can make by himself. And if you did not notice, Israel is participating in the project. Since Israel can not be possibly providing the funding it's obvious that Israel is providing the technology.
Imagine the precision electronics and mechanics required to shoot a bullet out of the air. Computer scientists normally side with military deescalation, peace, and love, but the most exciting areas of their business are in military technology.
In that case you do not support American agression in Afganistan ? And all the steps US has taken against Al-Qaida ?
I spent a little time in a tank unit (as a medic, so I didn't really pay attention) and I seem to recall the commanders discussing the importance of retaining at least a 1:12 ratio of Nato forces vs Soviet - at least as far a tanks were concerned.
That's not a typo - they figured we needed one tank for every 12 of theirs - at least to hold the red army until a complete REFORGER (REturn of FORces to GERmany), which is supposed to be a 48 hour operation.
They most definitely were counting on air superiority, and the fact that a good rule of thumb is that you can defend a position with a force about a third the size of the attacking force.
But how they got from one third to one twelfth was that they assessed that Nato equipment is that much better. An example would be that our M1 Abrams can pretty much fire dead-nut accurate at a full run, over fairly rough terrain, whereas the soviet tanks had to basically stop before it could hope to hit anything. Their newer tanks were better, but they had very few of those, their main battle tanks were mostly built in the sixties. They were truly counting on overwhelming numbers to break the back of the NATO defense (that is, assuming they ever were thinking of attacking NATO, their strategy may have always been focused on the assumption that they were the defenders).
We also had LOTS of fancy tank-busting toys: wire-guided dragon missiles, apache hellicopters, those ugly A-10 fighters, jeep mounted rockets that can take out tanks from safe distances.
I always had my doubts about the 1:12 ratio, but it was comforting to know that NATO was that confident
Textbooks and Open Educational Resources
How far out does the laser go before it's no longer effective against a hit? If you're aiming at a projectile, chances are pretty good that you're aiming up, right? If you miss (for what ever reason), how far past the target does the effect of the laser become negligable? Geosynchronous orbit?
It seems to me that there are a lot of sattelites in orbit that stand a good chance of being knocked out or are the orbits of all the sattelites taken into account by the targetting software?
Fine, your worried about the media in this country?
Let's lay it out.
I LIVE in Israel.
I see what goes on every day. My friends are in the army, and it's my family that lives with the fear that for no good reason, we could die at any moment.
Sure, there are kids in the Israeli army that act like jerks. And it happens... in every military. Remember the IDF is compulsory, not voluntary. Everyone servers, and that meens the jerks too.
There are few extremists who want to see dead Arabs. But I have to say.. there are an awfull lot of Arabs that want to see dead Jews.
I've seen these setelments... I just don't get the fuss. With a few exceptions the setelments are usually seperated by over a kilometer from palastinian setelments (yes they have setlements too).
And while were talking about arab setelments, what
about Hebron? It was a major jewish city until 1928, when arab rioters just ran through town killing thousands. The british solution to the problem was to make it illegal for jews to live in Hebron.. Now, for the first time in 1600 years, all religions are allowed to visit the holly sights in Hebron.
BTW: before you decide that Arafat deserves his nobel prize, keep in mind most palastinians don't want him. There terified of him. He's killed more of his own people in this last 3 months (political purges) than the IDF (by more than twice)!!
Go to Israel. Walk thorugh the forests, and the parks. Go pray at what ever church, mosqe, or synagog you like. Then realize that this wasn't possible before 1948. There were no forests. There were no jobs. And if you weren't a particular kind of Muslim, you were likley to get linched.
I would rather be ashes than dust!
OK, they've blew a standard artillery shell out of the sky. How about a chromium armored shell? What happens when you reflect the energy away from the
shell? In this case the shorter the wavelenght of light the better, but you are still going to be able to reflect Infrared - Ultraviolet radiation away!
I believe the countermeasures are easy to deploy.
And, of course, Paul Kennedy's Rise and Fall of the Great Powers: Economic Change and Military Conflict from 1500 to 2000 in which he argues that a power is a result of the ability or inability to finance war. This book is a must read for anyone interested in the topic of history repeating. Ask yourself this question: how long does it take for another country (say, France) to duplicate what the US has shown to be achievable and how much does the US have to spend remaining on the cutting edge? As cutting-edge weapons systems become more expensive at a greater rate than US economic growth, how long until the cost of being the sole world power sinks the country so deep in debt that it has to retreat to isolationism?
Or, an alternative and simpler question: who was the last sole world power before the US and why did they lose that position? (Hint: they spoke the same language.)
Milo
Oh, read the comments....I just read one exclaiming a missile is easier to destroy than a slug. Because a slug has a steadier trajectory.
.44 round in flight and shoot it with a BB. Even if the BB hit, it will have minimal effect.
Well, frankly, I think some of you should read Harry Turtledove World War Series.
Take a big slug, say a real big on like what's launched from the U.S. Iowa class. Fire anti-missiles at it....hey, if you're luck you're knock it of course a bit. But there is so much inertia that it just keeps going.
Another way to describe it. Say you could track a
The issue at hand is that this was the first successful (publicly announced) test that succeeded in stopping a traditional artillary SLUG.
Missiles are often used in artillary due to a higher accuracy and laser-guided controls. Slugs, one advantage had been near instoppability. This is why Iowa class battleships are still used as super-longe range artillary platforms.
This enables the destruction of a solid slug (probably by superheating)...
Now, when these are reduced to fit on a main battle tank or troop transport (like the M-1 Abrams or M-3 Bradleys) you give your vehicle the ability to be immune to other tanks.
Imagine what a single division of M-1 Abrams could do if they had a system that neutralized the effectiveness of the enemy's main battle tanks, anti-tank missiles, etc. They would cut thru like butter...
And as someone else stated, in 30 yrs, when this technology is increased in effectiveness it might be possible to disable large armies with minimal casualties.
Imagine units controlled and linked to a satellite, instead of killing the men they target the weapons...literally melting the AK-47's in their hands.
Wouldn't a bloodless war be nice.
As for the comments on the previous election...I am frankly sick and tired of the people claiming Bush stole the election. First off those recounts WERE finished. Every single re-count I read about concluded in the end that Bush still won.
So please, and that was in the light of college students voting twice for Gore (yes, in many states college students were voting twice thru loop-holes), the fact that that a lot of DEAD people some how manage to make it to the polls to vote for Gore. I mean, come on....enough.
...is like saying Stalin was successful in Soviet Union. Ask any Chilean what he feels about Pinochet. He would probably kick your ass for making that comment.
It is very comfortable for being an armchair analyst in the United States suburbia making policy decisions on places and people whom you dont even know.
And how can you forget the tragedy of the millions who had to suffer the consequences of the so-called wrong policy decisions you yourself admit to. You may have a convienient word for it...Collateral Damage.
Tat Tvam Asi
I'm not American, and after seeing the results of the last election, I have serious doubts about Americas system of checks and balances
I *am* American, and I have serious doubts about America's system of checks and balances.
The really frusterating thing is that the executive branch (and specficially the President) has consistently taken power away from the legislative branch for two hundred years. The recent introduction of the massively powerful and almost unrestricted Office of Homeland Security and USA-PATRIOT is uncomfortably close to the point where it would be easy to pull a transition to a dictatorial-like government, a la the Nazis. The way the Nazis worked:
* Economy was slumping, people were worried and looking to anyone with a solution (not there yet...our "recession" is actually pretty minor).
* Physical intimidation of opposition politicians (again, not there yet).
* National security issues (the Reichstag Fire) that was "dealt with" (immediately taken advantage of) by suspending many civil rights and granting unprescedented power to the government. USA-PATRIOT isn't as strong as this -- it isn't full martial law -- but most people are willingly allowing the elimination of many once-strongly held civil rights to "stop terrorism". Search and seizure, free speech...
* The establishment of powerful organizations like the SA and the SS that operated with few restrictions. This is where the Office of Homeland Security comes in -- it has more funding than even the FBI. It has zero of the restrictions that were placed on the FBI (like inability to pull things overseas, spy on overseas nations, etc), none of the restrictions on the CIA (can't spy on domestic citizens), has many of the powers of the INS. It's quite similar in name to the KGB, and essentially forms a "domestic monitoring and early response" organization. The integrity of something like that is very fragile, and could be used to pull off too many unpleasant things. It is not subject to an amount of oversight anywhere near proportional to its powers. It is, in essence, a "secret police".
Other interesting bits was government-induced imperialism and expansion (not necessarily supported by everyone involved). As we wipe out Afghanistan's government and set up our own puppet government, and start actively threatening more governments than we had for a long, long time (Iraq. North Korea. Indonesia.), we're trying to exert a significantly increased control over other countries (though not occupy them).
Also, America would make an awful world cop. America does what's in her own interests, which is at least somewhat her responsibility to her people. However, America (unlike most other countries) has been *firmly* opposed to a world court or global police system, because it would be a challenge to her own power.
I don't see overwhelming strength, used at will against other nations, as a long term path to world peace
Yes, but conflict does work well for rallying and unifying your people behind you. Hitler knew it. 1984 knew about it. If Bush didn't know it before, he does now from his massive ratings spikes (from his earlier pathetic ones). Nationalism was at its strongest during the World Wars. Nothing like a good war to secure your position.
America has little interest in world peace. At the very least, maintaining a divided, weakened Arab region (at least until the oil is gone) is very much in her interests.
May we never see th
DUM-DUM-DUM-dum-DUH-dum, dum-DUH-dum. Didn't the Repblic eventually become "The Empire" through the the deception of doing good?
Location: Pleiades cluster. Time: approx 350-400 years ago.
Scene: main deck, Star Orbital Ultimate Laser.
Commander Azgota, "@#$%^$#[1]! Some @%@# idiot mixed the measurement units! Recharge and fire at corrected coordinates ASAP! @#$^$@@#".
[1] Many subtle nuances lost in translation from the original Z'k.
---
Nov 2002, half of the earth was reduced to a molten slag by a laser beam.
Surviving astronomers have traced the beam's origin to somewhere around the Pleiades cluster.
Exact reasons for the bolt are unknown.
---
Theories such as the beam being a collateral effect from a possible interstellar war in the Pleiades cluster are being shot down by sceptics.
A while (year or so) back on Discovery Channel I saw a documentary that had an item about sniper detection. It appeared to use a continuous feed of, I assume, stereoscopically arranged cameras, and was able to see a bullet whizzing past. Very quickly afterward, it could give a guesstimate of where the bullet was fired from.
This is obviously somewhat limited, in that you do need to know roughly from where the round is going to come. Ballistic weapons do have the benefit of generally being slower and bigger than bullets.
Does anyone know any more about this? Links, and all that? Or was I dreaming?
What about all the rockets Israel Shoots into crowded Palestinian streets, killing and injurying so many innocents?
Nobody can invade America. They'd get wiped out. No other country has the arial capability it takes to gain an invading edge. And a ground war would be suicide for whatever country tried it.
USA didn't use everything it had in Vietnam.
Israel hasn't tried to conquer the Palestine's, just co-exist (not very well).
Russia could wipe Chechnya off the map if it really wanted to.
In Iraq, the USA wiped out the world's 3rd largest army in 3 days. 3 days!
In Afganistan, the USA wiped out a 500,000 thousand man army with only 3,000 ground troops in 2 months.
So uh...what was your point.
BTW: before you decide that Arafat deserves his nobel prize, keep in mind most palastinians don't want him. There terified of him. He's killed more of his own people in this last 3 months (political purges) than the IDF (by more than twice)!!
mmmmm, what's that I smell? hmmm, is it roses? no...hmmm... is it a burger? no...hmmm... is it BULLSHIT? yes it is!
It will stop Tank shells and infantry fired missiles. This sort of weapon will likely become key, especially as the US military becomes more of a "light" worldwide expeditionary force. This provides a lot of "armor" without a lot of weight!
Lot's of innocent bystanders in manhatten too. Over 3,000 thousand of them as well. War is hell, welcome to Earth.
It is virtually impossible to parade infront of you the Chilean family living next door to my apartment. What I know about Chile under Pinochet is from their experience...a Chilean nationals experience, not a westerner living in Chile during that period.
But your comment of the righteous Pinochet who is revered by Chileans is laughable to say the least.
Why dont you just google on Pinochet and look at the results?
Also please dont assume that corruption is the root cause for the ills of many developing nations. Look at Saudi Arabia...though it is not one of the developing countries, it is largely immune from corruption due to its barbaric justice system. The examples you give supporting dictatorial regimes and lack of corruption are best comparable to the present environment of Saudi Arabia.
I also hope you are not one of those oil company executives who lived in Saudi Arabia who knows the "ground reality" and is not an armchair analyst.
Tat Tvam Asi
From the LASERS perspective, all it has to do is go:
found an object moving through air.
object is moving at this speed.
shoot object for one second.
It doesn't have to calculate where its going to land, only where is it going to be in the next part of a second.
Size and propellent doesn't matter the the LASER because its relative. If it knows where the object is, and knows how fast its moving, then it can acquire.
Now, if your the guy trying to hot an object with that shel, then yes, you MUST know that to have any hope of decent accuracy.
also, if you the guy firing the shell, I suggest you fire a lot of them at the LASER first...;)
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Mount the on ship. you can protect the landing party from artillary as the swarm up the beach.
You can protect the tranportation of the grunts with these.
Ship will allow you to deploy them on a resonably quick basis.
Sub-marinse could use them. they surface, the shoot down missils as they are launched out of enemy submarines.
If the wrong person become the leading power of China, we will need al the tech we can get.
I don't see that as a likely or reasonable way for China to exert its influence, but dictators are rarely reasonable.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I would suggest to the murdering Palestinian terrorists that they not hide amongst the innocents.
Surprise! You get to kill innocents if that is the only way to stop your attacker. You are under no obligation to not shoot back if someone is hiding behind an innocent and shooting at you. The deaths of innocents are morally and ethically on the heads of your attackers, not on yours.
[A HREF="http://foo.bar.com"]link text[/A]
Now if I could remember how to escape-character the greater-than/less-than symbols... (thought it was > / < but that doesn't seem to work)
-SablKnight
So what does the interface to this system look like, Missile Command?
They've developed quite a bit of their own stuff, not just hardware but proceses and intelligence sources.
...I wonder why none of the talking heads have come up with this idea, perhaps it is part of the plan...
Ever since the "axis of evil" I have thought that the best way to defeat Saddam was to goad/coerce/fool him into attacking Israel. We of course would not stand in the way of any Israeli retaliation since we strongly support the concept of self defense and there would not be any coalition of arab states that we would have to protect. Anyway, after SH attacks Israel and we get out of the way, he's toast.
Cheers.
Good judgement comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgement.
- W. Wriston, former Citibank CEO
...we are trying to build stuff like this
No reason such a weapon can't be scaled to appropriate targets. It is already a scaled up version of the MTHEL.
Good judgement comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgement.
- W. Wriston, former Citibank CEO
You are forgetting the human cost of a dictatorial regime. What you are worried over is the economic cost.
When you worry over only economic cost (this happens till you or someone of your family 'disappears'), Pinochets of the world are entirely palatable.
Corruption is not crime on the streets, glad you know that...in a developing nation it happens in your daily life for mundane activities. Take an example of India - you probably give baksheesh for getting a drivers license, a telephone connection etc. You probably wont encounter these issues in Saudi Arabia.
If we have to follow your advice, what India needs to get out of the developing nation/third world status is a Pinochet or a group of Mullahs who will stamp out corruption.
It would be much better if Western Democracies supported that. But hey, they were doing that all along. It was not corruption they were after, but oil or bananas.
Tat Tvam Asi
It's okay, they're a figment of your imagination so unless you head on over there and imagine yourself under attack by imaginary magic rockets and manage to convince yourself that you're dead, there shouldn't be any casualties caused by such weapons and thus little need for defense against them.
You yourself say that Chile was lucky with Pinochet but paid a huge price. And luckily for you, though you were living in Chile, you or someone you knew did not pay part of that price.
Are you looking for a friendly neighborhood dictator who stamps out corruption and has decent human rights record?
I understand what you were meaning by the Pinochet treatment...but you have to note that this particular treatment has very bad side effects. And if we believe in humanity, we cannot account for those side effects as collateral damage.
Tat Tvam Asi
The USA doesn't even have the majority of good scientists and engineers. What one team has done, another can do. Everybody will have these systems a few years after the US deploys them, and probably cheaper than US DOD contractors are selling them for to the US government.
All this means is that energy weapons are about to enter the military bag of tricks. So our future battlefields will have that lovely "Star Wars" look to them, but people and vehicles will be vaporizing for real, not as special effects.
The real bad news for Americans is that the USA seems to be on the edge of giving up its technological leadership.
Education is suffering. The entertainment industry is getting a stranglehold on US technology in both hardware and software, and no effective opposition is coming forth.
South Korea was merely ahead of us in broadband development. Not content with only having 60% of households broadband-wired, they're about to put another few billion dollars to pick up the rest. Where are the new services going to come from to take advantage of this? From the USA? Don't bet on it. What is the US doing to catch up? "Leaving it to the free market" that tanked on this to begin with. The US may be the last industrialized country where broadband replaces dialup, and the ability of individuals to figure out how to come up with useful products and services around broadband in the US runs straight into bandwidth and usage limits dreamed up by the cable companies and to a lesser extent, telcos.
I'm not trying to start any Libertarian theological debates here, so I'm not saying whether this is good or bad. Just stating what we know to be true.
Military technology used to drive civilian R&D. Now, it's the other way around. When high-technology companies leave the US in search of better regulatory climates and most of us go with them, will the ability to create the best military tech go with them and with us?
For better for worse, the lack of leadership our government and business leaders are providing us means that for better or worse, a Pax Americana will be a very temporary thing. Perhaps it'll last long enough to get George Bush re-elected and the current generation of Fortune 500 CEOs into a profitable retirement.
Tech Public Policy stuff
Speaking of which, the Q-36 can track up to 14 taqrgets simulatneously. This is usually used for counter-bat work, but I wonderif instead of guns it could be jury-rigged to a new laser, or maybe a whole battery of them. Interesting possibilities. BTW, traditionally, units are referred to as OPFOR when they are in training exercises where friendly units are called "BLUFOR".
I'm an OPFOR soldier at JRTC, if you're interested, and the Q-36 fucks up our world on a regular basis; it's always one of our HPT's.
The real way to make it not "suicide" as you put it is to use mortars with quick setup and pack-up capabilies. You can use these to take out the counter-bat batteries. If you're good (which we are).
"He's more machine now than man, twisted and evil."
The French also have quite a powerful SSBN force. They currently have 2 Triomphant and 2 Roudoutable class boats, each with 96 warheads. Carriers look pretty academic when your 384 biggest cities are radioactive cinders.
I agree... The US would be REALLY hard to invade. In the future it will be tougher - the current generation is learning military tactics playing Armica's Army.
Jeruselam, Bet Hakerim. I'm a 1st year yeshiva student.
And I'm to far from the Arab quarter to smell sh!t. (seriosly, they just deficate in the streats it's nasty)
Sheesh... I hate anonymous posters.
I would rather be ashes than dust!
"an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind"
- Mahatma Gandhi
Will the US military killing 3000 foreigners make the world a better place?
I know many people that live in Isreal, and have had lengthy conversations with them about what it's like to live there. I'm not saying that you aren't scared, but do you think that Palestinians feel safe? You are concentrating on playing down what Isreal does to the Palestinians, while quickly pointing out that you are afraid. Those kind of politics don't negate the fact that everyone has reason to be scared. All I'm saying is that if there is ever going to be any kind of peace, you need to stop and take a look at the other side, and how they feel.
BTW: I actually think Arafat is a behind the scenes sponser of terrorism, and would not feel bad if a new leader arrised from the group to take control.
Be a man! View at -1
acm.cs.uwec.edu
You missed my point. What should it matter if 3,000 people died here or there, what color they are, or the justifications for doing it. You seem to think that human life has different values depending on were you come from. It needs to be stopped. They killed our people, they want to die doing it, how else are we going to stop them if they don't value life?
it's a LASER you fucktard, not lazer. It's an acronym, look it up.
And I'd say that if the democracies' citizens did not manage within those 50 years to convince their governements to stop the current arms race and solve the problems at the source of wars and terrorisms instead (that is poverty and inequalities as any ethno/socio/scientists and honest statisticians will tell you) the world will most probably be a smoking ruin.
If you want to get rid of a growing tree you do not try to wipe out each of the leaves individually hoping that it will eventually die, you target the roots, it is both faster and easier.
Feeding the poors and providing them with education would cost us much less than conceiving and producing weapons to endlessly fight them.
The Buddha, the Godhead, resides quite as comfortably in the circuits of a
digital computer or the gears of a cycle transmission as he does at the top
of a mountain or in the petals of a flower. To think otherwise is to demean
the Buddha -- which is to demean oneself.
-- Robert Pirsig, "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance"
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