Let’s get straight to the point: Lasers are really cool. Or rather, they are extremely hot. The uses of Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation (LASER) technology have been speculated since Einstein’s reflections in the 1920s in a theoretical sense, and since the 1950s in the Bradbury-esque sense of space rays in science fiction. However, modern laser applications are incredibly diverse and of great benefit to humanity.
From laser ablation surgery to treat tumors, epilepsy, atrial fibrillation, kidney stones, eye problems, and tattoo removal, to laser cutting machines used in industry, even to surprising uses such as laser rust removal, it’s clear that today’s lasers have become useful for more than just reading ultra-high-definition movie discs and irritating George Costanza.
Yet, while the tactical and military use of “directed energy” weapon systems (especially those with a high-power laser at their core) is not a new concept, its real-world application certainly is.
In the 1951 science fiction movie The Day the Earth Stood Still, powerful ray weapons are shown vaporizing rifles and even tanks. In Star Wars movies, a wide variety of directed energy weapons are depicted, ranging from portable lightsabers to massive laser cannons mounted on spacecraft.
Are these weapons still science fiction, laboratory experiments, or are they real? How can they be used, and how disruptive can they be?
But What Exactly is a Directed Energy Weapon?
Directed energy weapons (DEWs) use concentrated energy from electromagnetic or particle technology, rather than kinetic energy, to degrade or destroy targets. DEWs have the ability to damage physical targets over long distances, with high precision and accuracy. As technology advances, armed directed energy (DE) systems are becoming more powerful, prevalent, and increasingly integrated into airborne, land-based, and maritime platforms.
According to the Department of Defense’s Joint Publication 3-13, Electronic Warfare, directed energy (DE) is described as:
“A generic term that encompasses technologies that produce a beam of concentrated electromagnetic energy or atomic or subatomic particles. A DE weapon is a system that uses DE primarily as a direct means to disable, damage, or destroy adversary equipment, facilities, and personnel. Electronic warfare (EW) is a military action that involves the use of DE weapons, devices, and countermeasures to cause direct damage or destruction to adversary equipment, facilities, and personnel, or to determine, exploit, reduce, or deny the hostile use of the electromagnetic spectrum (EMS) through damage, destruction, and disruption.”
DE weapons include high-energy lasers, high-power radiofrequency or microwave devices, and particle beam weapons, both charged and neutral. Microwaves and lasers are both part of the electromagnetic spectrum, which includes light energy and radio waves. The distinction between them lies in the wavelength/frequency of the energy. While both are part of the electromagnetic spectrum, laser and microwave weapons operate very differently and have distinct effects.
Pense na diferença entre um apontador laser e uma lanterna. A luz laser é coerente em uma única cor, enquanto uma lanterna emite luz de amplo espectro. Por causa de sua coerência, a luz laser pode permanecer focada em longas distâncias — até mesmo milhares de milhas no espaço. Mas com armas laser, em vez de pensar em termos de um apontador laser, a imagem mental deve ser mais como um poderoso maçarico de longo alcance!
Lasers can be categorized as gas, solid-state, or a hybrid of the two. Lasers on the current path to weaponization include solid-state fiber-combined and crystal plate lasers, as well as hybrid lasers. Fiber lasers are lasers in which the active medium used is an optical fiber doped with rare elements, most commonly erbium. Plate lasers represent a class of high-power solid-state lasers in which the laser crystal takes the form of a plate. Hybrid lasers, such as diode-pumped alkali lasers, use a combination of trace gases with semiconductor diode arrays for even greater power and efficiency.
The destructive power of directed energy weapons (its lethality) comes from the amount of energy transferred to the target over time. This concentrated energy can have effects across the spectrum, from non-lethal to lethal. For example, lasers can cut through steel, aluminum, and many other materials in seconds. They can be highly effective in causing the explosion of pressurized vessels, such as missile propellants and oxidizer tanks. They can destroy, degrade, or blind many other systems containing sensors and electronics. For high-energy lasers, lethality depends on the laser’s output power, the purity and concentration of the light (beam quality), the target’s range, the ability to keep the laser on target (jitter control and tracking), and the atmospheric conditions the laser travels through to reach the target. In the latter factor, the laser’s frequency and engagement altitude will significantly impact how the atmosphere affects the laser’s lethality. Laser energy can be generated as a continuous wave or in pulses, which also influences its lethality. High-energy lasers (HELs) can range from a few kilowatts to megawatts of average power. (Source)
They Are Already in Space, and China Is at the Forefront
In 2023, China developed a new cooling system that allows high-energy lasers to operate indefinitely without the risk of overheating, an innovation that could pose a threat to U.S. space dominance.
The South China Morning Post (SCMP) reported that scientists from the National University of Defense Technology in China, located in Changsha, Hunan Province, developed an advanced cooling system capable of eliminating the heat generated by high-power lasers, solving the overheating problem that previously limited their operational time and performance. The invention has several implications for the battlefield, including longer engagement durations, extended range, increased damage, and reduced maintenance and repair costs.
The report also highlights other advantages of laser weapons, such as immediate accuracy, virtually negligible cost per shot, and potential anti-satellite applications. These weapons can destroy satellites in a scalable manner with plausible deniability, as it is difficult to attribute a laser attack to a satellite orbiting hundreds of kilometers above Earth at thousands of meters per second. The temporary unavailability of a satellite could be interpreted as an accident or a difficult-to-detect attack.
In May 2023, Asia Times reported that China may have built ground-based anti-satellite weaponry at its secretive Korla facility in Western Xinjiang, with such weapons intended to conceal sensitive military areas from spy satellites.
Satellite imagery of the Korla facility by US geospatial company BlackSky shows two laser gimbals mounted in hangars with retractable roofs that open around solar noon when foreign imaging satellites are most active.
The satellite imagery also shows huge anti-satellite lasers close to the size of ship-mounted weapons alongside domed structures, likely containing tanks for the gas required to operate the lasers.
Apart from the Korla site, China may have another such facility at Bohu in Xinjiang, with satellite imagery of the Bohu site showing fixed lasers for satellite ranging and mobile truck-mounted lasers for dazzling.
Apart from ground-based weapons, China may already have developed space-based laser weapons. Space-based weapons have several advantages over ground-based systems, such as the shorter distances between orbiting satellites and the lack of atmospheric distortion that degrades laser range and power.
Asia Times reported in March 2022 that China had developed a satellite-mountable solid-state pulse laser capable of generating a megawatt laser light and firing 100 times per second for half an hour without overheating in space.
It is reportedly capable of blinding satellite cameras or permanently blinding satellites. Upon testing, the device reportedly generated a five-nanosecond beam, but it was powerful enough to blind human beings or vaporize target surfaces permanently.
Recent advances in laser cooling technology, including a new cooling device made of copper and indium to absorb excess heat, are what reportedly made this weapon possible. Thus, China’s laser weapons program may be an asymmetric response to U.S. space dominance, where the U.S. exploits the space domain for strategic missile defense, intelligence, and command and control, with its military and commercial satellites acting as early warning systems, eyes in the sky, or nerve centers for modern military operations.
The Chinese ‘Death Star’
In November of last year, Chinese scientists claimed to have made a significant discovery related to a real-life “Death Star” energy beam weapon, according to reports.
The new high-powered microwave weapon combines multiple smaller electromagnetic waves to create a focused laser beam — very similar to the Star Wars Death Star, which destroyed planets by firing a particle beam made up of several smaller sources. The breakthrough lies in the process of “ultra-high-precision time synchronization,” which allows the beams to merge and focus on a single point, as reported by the South China Morning Post. The Chinese research team is now able to achieve precision between the smaller lasers that exceeds the accuracy of atomic clocks, according to the Independent. The time separation between the smaller lasers cannot exceed 170 picoseconds — or trillionths of a second, as explained by the scientists, according to the South China Morning Post.
This achievement was made possible with the help of optical fibers, an innovation that allowed the weapon system to pass military testing, according to the publication.
Chinese authorities claim that the weapon could be used to suppress American GPS signals and other satellites, as reported by the South China Morning Post.
Surprisingly, the team of scientists states that the combined power of the beams may be greater than the sum of the individual beams, according to the Independent. These weapons are intended for space use — not for terrestrial, naval, or atmospheric functions, the publication added.
Trump Says ‘Something Caused the Fires in Las Vegas’
In an interview given yesterday to Fox News, President-elect Donald Trump made statements that put the community on alert. When asked about the fires in Los Angeles, the president said: “Something hit Los Angeles and caused the fires. It looks like… I don’t want to say what it looks like. We won’t talk about what hit it. It’s a bad, bad situation.”
Trump just admits on live tv that "SOMETHING HIT" LA and caused the fires
source:@Nostr_Adamhttps://t.co/b4oAqErorE pic.twitter.com/s1uP5cCmM1
— nikola 3 (@ronin19217435) January 25, 2025These insinuative statements have raised concerns. What did Trump mean by this? Who or what could have caused the fires? Directed energy weapons and their potential uses have been reported by the conspiracy community for quite some time. Could Trump be referring to the use of such weapons, for example, by enemy nations of the U.S., such as China?
Indeed, we are not sure or certain about what the president meant, but the fact is that they exist and could be used with elaborate intentions.
