Boeing 12,000lb Chemical Laser Set to Fry Targets

coondoggie writes "Boeing this week completed work on and installed a 12,000-pound chemical laser in a C-130H aircraft. Boeing's Advanced Tactical Laser (ATL) which is being developed for the Department of Defense, will destroy, damage or disable targets with little to no collateral damage, supporting missions on the battlefield and in urban operations."

Comments

Re:Targetting

[weighn]

Little or no collateral damage? Depends on the accuracy really. I reckon that GE, Boeing, or whoever happens to be marketing these less-than lethal weapons goes light on accuracy and draws attention more to the style associated with having such items. You know, like in marketing, but concerning less-than lethal weapons.

Remember, it ain't the laser that kills you, its the sudden stop as you hit the dirt beneath what was once the building you were standing on.

Re:Cool but...

[Hal_Porter]

Well, that's just dandy if you're an American. But if you lived in Taiwan, South Korea or Israel, or Japan then America having the ability to shoot down ICBMs might come in handy.

Because at the moment all those countries are menaced by a neighbour who is kept in check largely by the US. And all those neighbours either have or are very close to having ICBMs. And some of them are maybe crazy enough to threaten the US with those ICBMS or their neighbours. Now if the US can shoot them down there's much less incentive for them to do that. So missile defense is actually a geopolitical stabiliser.

Come to think of it, even if you're in America it's far better that America is far ahead of any conceivable rival, because that deters them from a sprint to parity and then a Pearl Harbour style attack on the US or even engaging in brinksmanship and messing it up so that they end up swapping ICBMs with the US. Which would be far more expensive than current US defense policy, even ignoring the fact that millions of innocent people would die, many of them Americans.

Most of these regimes seem to engage in brinksmanship with the US all the time. It seems likely that they view ICBMs as a tool to strengthen their hand, rather than just a defense to hunker down behind. And most of them have little or no understanding of US politics, so it's quite likely that they would miscalculate and get into a war with the US even if it were to make concessions to them. Arguably starting to make concessions to appease them would simply embolden then and make them start to demand things which the US cannot concede.

So if I were you I'd vote to keep spending on defense. Come to think of it, the good old US military industrial complex will probably managed to get the dollars somehow regardless of how you vote.

Re:Military Budget *isn't* the problem.

[billcopc]

However that same military is the reason why we can bitch about the state of our country and the world with near impunity

I don't think many Americans are worried about being invaded by foreign armies. They're mostly worried about being invaded by their own government.

Bush may have killed a bunch of arabs, but he killed a ton of Americans too. The ones that lived, he made their lives just a little more miserable every few months. Keep going with this government, and soon it's the Americans that will seek political refuge abroad.