Israel has begun rapid deployment of the laser air defense system | Hacker News Reader

Israel has begun rapid deployment of the laser air defense system

bulgarianmilitary.com

17 pointsbelter18 comments

This may sound pessimistic.. nihilist (?) but I wonder if America's defense companies do not use conflicts in Ukraine, and elsewhere, as an opportunity to test weapons systems. Is there any country that has as much real world war data than America?

This goes for defense companies the world over. They more or less have to, if they don't then they'll be irrelevant the next time around.

I don't think so. America is sending lots of weapons to Ukraine, but as far as I can tell, all or most are decades old. You could test new stuff by sending it to a war zone, but there's no guarantee it won't get captured and then you are really worse off. For the US, with decades of a lead in weapons systems, the tradeoff is not worth it.

Woah.. Rafael is paying their lobbyist $60,000 a month to lobby the US government

https://disclosurespreview.house.gov/ld/ldxmlrelease/2023/Q1...

IRON BEAM - High Energy Laser Weapon System - https://www.rafael.co.il/worlds/land/iron-beam/

access denied, but i found these:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Beam

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light_Blade

Link is working, tested several times.

i get :

www.rafael.co.il | Access denied (403) Current session has been terminated.

For further information, do not hesitate to contact us.

Ref: ## ##

I tried it from USA, Europe and the Asteroid Belt. Working from all.

https://archive.ph/wip/6Hsnk

at times of conflict there are usually massive cyberattacks against israeli sites. so they tend to block a bunch of traffic from non-israeli networks. i for example can't open israel post website for a week already

Can someone with technical experience explain how this would work?

laser goes - pssssss

ordinance goes - boom

Terrorist sympatazer's brain goes - poof (if there was one in the beginning)

From the specs page: "...LITE BEAM is a 7.5kW HEL interceptor for C-mUAVs and ground targets such as IEDs and UXOs, neutralizing targets from a distance of a few hundred meters to up to 2000 meters. The first proven prototype of LITE BEAM is already available..."

If confirmed, it is notable for being the first Laser system deployed in combat anywhere.

you are talking lite beam which is mobile system. what is planned to be deployed in israel is iron beam which is 100kw https://www.rafael.co.il/worlds/land/iron-beam/

iirc it was planned to begin deployment later this year or sometimes next year with full "production" capabilities in 2025.

there were some news on israeli sites in last few days that they want to put to field whatever they have now, as every bit can help. also real life testing.

100 KW output or input?

Lasers vary quite a bit in efficiency so that is an important bit of information and I can't seem to find it on that website.

they don't really publish a datasheet. but enough to blow up mortar and artillery rounds with $1.5-$3 per shot. it's a steal compared to $50k iron dome interceptors

edit: from some israeli newspaper: The power of the beam is about 100 kilowatts and its diameter is about that of a 10 shekel coin. At the moment, its effective range is estimated at about 10 kilometers, but this is not a final number

edit2: also written that it cooks-off ordinance.

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