Air Force pushing for ground-based, satellite-killing lasers
By Evan Blass 
posted May 3rd 2006 4:03PM
posted May 3rd 2006 4:03PM
In a proposal that would surely bring a tear to
the late Ronald Reagan's eye, Air Force officials are attempting to co-opt $5.7 million from the 2007 budget for
developing high-energy lasers that could be used to destroy enemy satellites (because, you know, al Qaeda is launching
birds left and right). So far a subcommittee of the House Armed Services Committee has "shot down" the
program, which would build on a 1997 Pentagon study of a two-million-watt laser, although the full committee could
reinstate the provision following analysis of the entire bill. While certain military interests have pushed for
anti-satellite weapons since the Cold War, concern over the space junk that destroyed sats would create has kept the
international community from serious pursuit of any "Star Wars"-like programs. Although we're always keen on
new military tech (hey, it gives us something to write about), we're gonna have to side with the Doubting Thomases on
this one, because the impending "ROBO-ONE in the
Space" satellite is simply too important to risk even a single stray laser strike.
Considering the most powerful lasers currently in operation are in the fifty kilowatt range (Popular Science 48), it's going to be a long while till we get some multi-megawatt goodness.
Satellites are craze sensitive. They wouldn't have to destroy it outright (although that could be fun) they just need to disable it enough.
Why don't they just use the lasers to take out the space junk? At least the bigger pieces....
Does this make anyone else think of Torchwood?
They could use the laser from this movie:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089886/
Uh, most power laser in the world does petawatt (1.0x10^15 watt) pulses, not kilowatt.
This post has all the making for an Austin Power comment. Any takers?
Could be mistaken for a imperial hypervelocity gun in star wars empire at war.
This is not actually as impossible as it might seem. Firt of all, as ty noted, satellites are among the most sensitive pieces of equipment on the modern battlefield. It's not going to take a lot to heat and deform something that's important (like a reaction-mass storage tank, an antenna, lens assembly, etc). Secondly, the attenuation problems inherent to older carbon-dioxide lasers have largely been solved by using lasers that utilize other substances (iodine, I think). Since there's little iodine in the atmosphere, the wavelengths of laser light don't get absorbed like wavelengths from CO2. Increases the range to somewhere around 800 kilometers. They're set to use one on the Airborne Laser platform launching sometime in the next year or so. May sound cooky, but it's really pretty doable.
if you insist #6"
"Mini Me stop humping the laser!!"
wasnt this a clive cussler novel also? no no it was a clancy novel...
You know, I have one simple request. And that is to have sharks with frickin' laser beams attached to their heads! Now evidently my cycloptic colleague informs me that that cannot be done. Ah, would you remind me what I pay you people for, honestly? Throw me a bone here! What do we have?
Damn #5, you beat me to it. One of my favorite movies of all time (along with Better Off Dead.)
"A really big mirror makes a really big beam!"
"It's not revenge, it's a moral imperative!"
Mitch: "I had a dream last night..."
Chris: "Is it the one where you're on top of a huge pyramid, and there's all these half-naked women all around you throwing little pickles at you?"
Mitch: "No."
Chris: "Why am I the only one who has that dream?"
The modern lightsaber.
This makes plenty sense. Think how up a creek we (US) would be in a conflict w/o our satilites (GPS, COM, SURV). At one point there was talk of using ground based lasers for missle defense.
Is congress really going to do anything better with $5.7M? Maybe form some committee to research something completely useless?
$5.7MM is nothing. We probably spend that in 30 minutes in Iraq...
This is great idea. IMHO there should be a lot more defense spending and lot less spending in the other areas that are completely useless and a waste of tax payer dollars. You may say its far-fetched, but you probably would be surprised with some of the technology the air force already has that is not public.
I've always wanted to bring the Star Wars project back. It can only help our military. Reagan had the right idea; we just didn't have the tech at the time. I think the most realistic implementation of laser weapons is the very near-future anti-missile lasers that will be mounted on the noses of fighter-jets and use satellite data to target incoming projectiles. We'll probably see those within a decade.
^^ That was info from a Popular Science article a few years back, so I wasn't just blowing off smoke or wishful thinking. The timeframe prediction is from military researchers.
#3: Chances are, you'll break the junk into smaller pieces which become impossible to track.
Also, there's no oxygen in space, so a laser (even with infinite power) would just heat things up and not actually burn them. Unless you hit a hydrazine tank...
phasers are the answer.
Anyways, I'm still with getting space travel much cheaper and just launching all our non-biodegradeable trash towards the sun! woohoo clean up!
just don't do it too much, else we might have a matter shortage here on earth :/
mmmmmmm.........lasers
i say go for it
so the other countries can design it too and we can see who kills the most satellites
that would be fun to watch on tv
and you get extra points if the enemies satellite lands in their country
lol
Am I the only who thinks the military already has mirror satellites in space?
Forget ICBMs, friends
heavy duty... seems a bit risky...like accidentally beam through a plane or something :P
> Air Force officials are attempting
> to co-opt $5.7 million from the 2007
$5.7 million? That's not even enough for lunch. Better check your numbers - it should read $5.7 BILLION or more.
I want 5 megawatts by mid May.
Everyone says our ports are the most vulnerable aspect of our security.
"I have one simple request. And that is to have sharks with frickin' laser beams attached to their heads!"
...and maybe prarie dogs with frickin laser beams attached to their heads strategically placed on our Mexican border.
I think the comment in the article "because, you know, al Qaeda is launching birds left and right" is just a wee bit short sited. Have we lost sight of the fact that while Qaeda is a threat and occupies much of our thinking right now, they are not the only threat. China? Russia? To think we need a force or weapons only to fight the likes of Qaeda is like saying to China or a renewed Russia that we do not consider them a threat. I beg to differ. Moderation in all things, from high tech weapons, a standing army, special ops and reaction forces. The world is not comprised of a singular threat, nor must we set our course on a singular defense. If this laser is a viable option, then why not? Of course, on the personal side - I hope me and my plane are not in the way when they toast any space monkeys.
Are there that many threatening satellites in space, will there be in the future? Currently, it looks to me that only China might have the intention/capability of sending suspect satellites over our heads, if not now, maybe in the near future.
Now if they were to develop lasers that fired FROM space...well that'd be money well spent.
The Soviets successfully blinded several of our satellites in the late '70s using large-scale gas lasers. It's not particularly difficult to do. Just expensive.
Your friend today may be your enemy tomorrow.
Information is the key to any future conflict, and by eliminating the information gathering tools of future enemies, you gain an almost insurmountable advantage on the battlefield. I'm not talking about simply preventing your enemy from spying on you, but of preventing him from communicating with his troops at land, at sea or in the air.
Wow, whoever wrote the original post is a bit shortsighted. While Al Qaeda sure doesn't have the technology to launch sattelites, the Russians and Chinese do. The odds of either attacking us are a long shot. After all, why would China attack its most important trading partner? However, the Chinese and Russians are launching sattelites for other countries. Most recently, Russia launched Israel's first spy sattelite. While China and Russia haven't done so, they'd probably take Iran's money/oil to launch a bird, which clearly is why our military and intelligence community want to experiment with this tech. It makes plenty of sense -- especially if they plan on going to war with Iran in the next decade.
What if there's a mirror on the satellite and just refects the super-dooper laser back to earth =P