The US is pushing to develop a new ground-based laser weapon. It sees the technology as the future of air and missile defense against proliferating artillery, drone, missile, and possibly hypersonic weapon threats.
This month, Breaking Defense reported that the US Army had selected Lockheed Martin to develop a new high-energy laser prototype to defend fixed and semi-fixed sites from air attack under a US$220.8 million contract.
The source says the contract mandates Lockheed Martin to “develop, integrate, manufacture, test and deliver” an Indirect Fire Protection Capability-High Energy Laser (IFPC-HEL) prototype weapon system.
It notes that, at present, the US Army has provided Lockheed Martin with $154 million in fiscal 2023 funding, and the remaining funds could be redirected toward the effort between now and mid-October 2025.
While Breaking Defense says Lockheed Martin deferred questions about the contract to the US Army, the company has been working on HEL projects, including a 300-kilowatt laser under the Pentagon’s High Energy Laser Scaling Initiative (HELSI).
However, the source notes that it is not clear if other companies are competing for the project, as the US Army’s Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office (RCCTO) issued a request in March for white papers on 100-kilowatt lasers and shed some additional light on program plans.
More bang for the buck
Regarding ground warfare, IFPC-HEL may be the future of counter-rocket, artillery, and mortar (C-RAM) capability.
Michael Libeau notes in a 2012 article for the Naval Surface Warfare Center (NSWC) that lasers have a greater magazine depth than gun and missile systems, since they only use electricity for operation, giving them a potentially unlimited magazine.
Libeau also notes that lasers have a cost advantage over the latter systems, with the low cost per kill matching the low cost of most C-RAM threats.
Laser weapons have several advantages over traditional projectile weapons, such as instantaneous hits, scalable shot power, and low cost per shot. However, they also have drawbacks, such as bulky power sources, high energy requirements, sensitivity to atmospheric conditions, weakening over distance, and hardening of aerial threats against lasers.
Not to be left behind, the US Navy reported in April 2022 that it had successfully tested an all-electric, high-energy weapon to defeat a drone target simulating a cruise missile in February.
The source identifies the weapon used in the tests as the Layered Laser Defense (LLD), built by Lockheed Martin to counter unmanned aerial systems and fast attack boats using a high-powered laser. It also says the LLD can use its high-resolution telescope to track inbound aerial threats, support combat identification, and conduct battle damage assessments of engaged targets.
While the US Navy has not released plans to field the LLD, the project offers a glimpse into the future of laser weapons. It notes that it is compact and powerful but more efficient than previous weapons systems. It says the LLD uses specialized optics to observe a target and focus laser beams to maximum effect while incorporating AI to improve targeting and tracking.
Although the LLD is just a prototype, it may be the future of ship-based point defense. Alex Hollings notes in a January 2023 article for Popular Mechanics that nuclear-powered aircraft carriers can be equipped with point-defense lasers that can be fired tens of thousands of times at incoming munitions without worrying about running out of ammo or missiles.
Hollings also notes that the low cost of a laser shot, ranging from $1 to $10, makes them an ideal weapon to fight off cruise-missile saturation attacks or drone swarms. However, he cautions that kilowatt-range lasers may not be enough to stop hypersonic anti-ship missiles flying at speeds of up to Mach 10, as those weapons are designed to withstand temperatures up to 925 degrees Celsius, necessitating megawatt-level lasers to counter those threats.
In addition, Asia Times reported in June 2022 that Lockheed Martin last February delivered the first fighter-mounted laser for the US Air Force, known as the Laser Advancements for Next-Generation Compact Environments (LANCE) airborne laser weapon.
LANCE is one-sixth the size of Lockheed Martin’s previous laser weapons for the US Army and has reduced power requirements so it can be mounted on a fighter jet’s belly pod. Although LANCE’s power output is unknown, it is estimated to be in the 100-kilowatt range, insufficient for missile defense but enough to burn out the seeker heads of incoming air-to-air missiles.
The LANCE is a significant improvement over older types, such as the Airborne Laser (ABL), which failed because of its impractical size and weight, coupled with beam jitter issues stemming from atmospheric distortion, leading to its early retirement in 2014.
However, technologies such as laser fiber optics that are more efficient in converting electrical power to laser power and spectral beam combination that involves focusing multiple smaller laser beams into one powerful beam has enabled the miniaturization of laser weapons, enabling them to be mounted on vehicles, aircraft and ships.
Work in progress
Asia Times reported in May 2022 that future missile defense plans might focus more on protecting small, specific areas instead of large regions. This is because hypersonic weapons can avoid current missile defenses designed to intercept them mid-flight, and it’s hard for existing space- and ground-based radars to track these fast-moving, low-altitude gliders.
However, hypersonic gliders are much slower than intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) during the terminal stages of their flight, opening a possible window for interception.
In line with that, missiles still have an advantage over lasers, as they destroy their targets instantaneously on impact, compared with lasers that must be focused on the target for a few seconds to destroy it. That may be a severe drawback when defending against a target moving at thousands of kilometers per second.
That means gun- and missile-based defenses will not become obsolete overnight, and they can be augmented with numerous point-defense lasers that can shoot down such targets during their terminal phase.
While laser weapons are still in their relative infancy, improvements such as AI-assisted beam modulation and miniaturization of power sources and critical components can make the idea of numerous, low-cost, and dispersed laser-based defenses a reality.