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Royal Navy Deployed Laser Weapons During the Falklands War

Posted by Unknown on from the zap-zap-you're-dead dept.

Zothecula writes "Despite recent demonstrations by the US Navy, we still think of laser weapons as being things of the future. However, previously-classified British documents prove that not only were the major powers working on laser weapons in the 1970s and 80s, but that they were already being deployed with combat units in war zones. A letter from the Ministry of Defence released under the 30-year rule reveals that laser weapons were deployed on Royal Navy ships during the Falklands War in 1982, and that the British government was concerned about similar weapons being developed behind the Iron Curtain."

12 of 139 comments (clear)

  1. Yes, but... by Guspaz · · Score: 5, Informative

    They were only strong enough to "dazzle" pilots, not do any actual damage.

    1. Re:Yes, but... by 0123456 · · Score: 4, Informative

      Supposedly the RAF tactics were to let the Argentine fighter bombers complete their attack runs while the ships were defended with chaff and decoys.

      And who, exactly, claims that?

      I'm not aware of any Harrier pilot who's ever said they deliberately let the Argentinians attack ships before they engaged. Nor was speed a big issue when they were primarily using Sidewinder missiles, and the Argentinians didn't have enough fuel to fly supersonic for long and still attack.

    2. Re:Yes, but... by Sir_Sri · · Score: 5, Informative

      You have to remember this was back when the pickets ships were the primary means of defence of the fleet still, you don't want your own ships accidentally shooting down their own air cover, so they positioned the picket well forward. Not necessarily the best plan, but you can see the problem - ultimately the goal is to defend the carriers, not the picket ships. The picket ships actually took out a number of enemy aircraft with missiles because that's their job.

      No one likes to say 'sorry, but your job is to get killed before someone on a bigger more important ship' but that's very much the job of destroyers and frigates. You force the enemy to destroy the escorts first, or take the risk of flying over them and getting shot down.

      The royal navy suffered very much from several problems, one of having some engineering problems with their ships (turns out aluminium can catch fire), two that they couldn't lock on to ships coming in low, and three couldn't deal with exocet missiles.

      The royal navy faced the unenviable challenge of not having enough aircraft (only about 50 total). The Argentine situation meant they could (early on at least) put 30 or 40 aircraft anywhere in a large area of operations. That's a serious problem. You can't have too wide an air cover, you'd have too many aircraft spread out and not be able to defend, and you can't risk a carrier. That problem is overcome by defeating the enemy in detail in small pieces until he doesn't have the force to concentrate. Which is what the royal navy did essentially, they traded destroyers and frigates for aircraft kills until the Argentinians didn't have enough aircraft or exocets, at which point the british had air superiority for a ground invasion.

    3. Re:Yes, but... by edwartr · · Score: 5, Informative

      The Argentine subs 'wreaking havoc'?!!? Argentina had TWO subs total. The 1st sub, the ARA Sante Fe was used to land some commandoes then later was caught on the surface by a helo and was too stupid to dive and so damaged by the helo's rockets and depth charges that it had to be beached on the coast with the crew later being captured. The 2nd sub, ARA San Luis, did patrol and did make three attacks on British ships but never hit ANY targets and were counter-attacked for over 20hours. The sub was in bad shape as its fire-control systems were completely down requiring all attacks to be calculated and launched manually. There were problems with torpedoes, equipment, etc. Argentinian submarines didn't do much and didn't effect the outcome of the war at all. Now the British had three subs in the area with 2, the HMS Spartan and HMS Splendid being mainly used as successful scouts of the location and movement of Argentinian naval vessels. And the 3rd sub, the HMS Conqueror, not only engaged but also sunk the Argentine Cruiser ARA General Belgrano with heavy loss of life. It did this using WWII vintage straight-running torpedoes instead of modern torps. It easily left the scene while the Belgrano sank. After the loss of the Belgrano, all Argentinian Naval ships stayed within 12 miles of the Argentine coast for the rest of the war. The Argentinians on the Belgrano and escorts had no idea the Conqueror was even there until her torpedoes stuck. Where as the British surface ships could detect and defeat the Argentine subs and were not detered by them at all. Argentinian subs - did nothing to really help their side and in fact lost half of their sub fleet while doing no damage to any British vessels but British subs had no losses, sank an enemy cruiser after which the entire Argentine Navy stayed within 12 miles of their own shores never venturing out to even hint at engaging the British. British subs sinks one cruiser and the Argentinians give up the entire naval engagement/war. Heck, just the threat of British subs in the area of the Falklands kept Argentine merchant vessels from the area denying any sea-lift / support from Argentine ground forces. Source: http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA279554

    4. Re:Yes, but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      You show how little you know about the situation by using the term 'RAF'. All of the air fighting was done by Fleet Air Arm squadrons - The RAF squadrons were for ground attack only.

    5. Re:Yes, but... by Cochonou · · Score: 3, Informative

      It is unknown how much information the French gave about the Exocet missile and how effective the jamming was, especially given that there has been two other British ships killed by Exocets missiles after the Sheffield. However, what is very well known is that once the war started, there was a world-wide cooperation between the French and the British to prevent the Argentinians from procuring additional Exocet missiles from every weapon market, effectively leaving them with a very limited supply of Exocets. There were a lot of behind-the-scenes negotiations (sometimes quite rough) between the French and the British to make this happen.

    6. Re:Yes, but... by Richard_at_work · · Score: 4, Informative

      I will bet they didn't, due to lack of air to air radar - the RAF operated the GR-type Harrier, suitable for ground attack and recon only, while the air defence force was made up of Royal Navy FRS Harriers, which were equipped with radar as part of their fleet defence ability.

    7. Re:Yes, but... by jklovanc · · Score: 3, Informative

      from this;

      If most of the Sea Harriers had been lost, the GR.3s would have replaced them in air patrol duties, even though the Harrier GR.3 was not designed for air defence operations; as such the GR.3s quickly had their outboard weapons pylons modified to take air-to-air Sidewinder missiles.

    8. Re:Yes, but... by hawkinspeter · · Score: 3, Informative

      Just looked it up, it was a housewife called Diane Gould. http://news.bbc.co.uk/player/nol/newsid_6460000/newsid_6467800/6467889.stm?bw=nb&mp=wm

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    9. Re:Yes, but... by iainr · · Score: 3, Informative

      No, The Fleet Air Arm tactics (calling navy pilots RAF will result in mild joking/ verbal abuse at best) varied throughout the war, before the landings they were part of a standard layered defence and were usually deployed up threat of the radar pickets which in turn were up threat of the carrier battle group. After the landings the Navy effectively defined a large rectangular box around the landing site and declared this a free fire zone for ships missile/gun systems and a no-go zone for aircraft. again Harriers were employed up threat but the lack of AEW meant that they often had to fly round the "box" to catch incoming raids. Also there was a significant difference in experience and performance in the use of the blue fox radar in the SHAR between 800 (Hermes) and 801 (Invincible) squadrons that meant that the 801 pilots could be more effective in the air defense role (see Sea Harrier Over The Falklands: A Maverick at War by Cmrd Sharkey Ward)

      The fact that ships carried LDS is not news, it's mentioned in Woodwards book and various other Falklands war literature and when I went aboard HMS Plymouth in Glasgow in the 1990's they had some details about it on dispay boards. AFAICR it was mounted in the bridge wing and was on the "wrong side" of the ship when she was attacked. Most publications I've seen LDS mentioned state that it was never actually used.

    10. Re:Yes, but... by jareth-0205 · · Score: 5, Informative

      The Captain of the Belgrano has publicly declared that he thought the attack that sunk his ship was legitimate. I don't know why we're still talking about this.

    11. Re:Yes, but... by maroberts · · Score: 5, Informative

      i think that's unlikely, personally.

      I believe the Argentine navy would, had it not been savaged earlier, parked its carrier within operating range of the Falklands as soon as the landings started. Some loss of life was inevitable from the moment the Argentinians decided to invade the Falklands and not agree to leave. Also the Argentine submarine San Luis fired a torpedo at British ships the day before the sinking, so both sides were on the same page as far as hostilities were concerned.

      The Sun headline is agreeably controversial. Whilst regretting the loss of life, I think it expressed some relief that we were on the right side of the scoreboard.

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