U.S. 'Star Wars' laser plane successfully shoots down ballistic missile for first time

Mail Foreign Service ^ | 12:09 PM on 13th February 2010 | Mail Foreign Service

[ASOC]

It would take at least 4, detonated exactly together, at a precise altitude and in a rough diamond formation. And a lot more than 10kT, the classic example, the Starfish test, was 1.something mT.

(for more, http://handle.dtic.mil/100.2/ADA009208 )

With the use of fiber optic cable in telecommunications, the EMP problem is less of an issue than it may have been even 10 years ago.

A more likely event is a CME that causes massive problems with the power grid. We got a taste of this Mar 13, 1989.

Tho I will be the first to say a nuke detonation in your city will ruin your day...

[DesertRhino]

Hmmmmmm,, a mirror finish,,, and the arms race spirals on,,,, engineers like you are exactly the problem! LMAO,,
theres always someone thinking of the next countermeasure.

[ROLF of the HILL COUNTRY]

“..10kt nuclear bomb going off at 400 mi. altitude over CONUS is in fact the end of the world,...”

Sorry, but that statement is so misinformed that I must say something. I presume you're talking about EMP effects, but a 10 kiloton bomb ain't going to do it! The sun sends more EM energy at that altitude! Just a reminder, Hiroshima and Nagasaki were taken out by @17-18 kiloton weapons.

They've THEORIZED that a 100 MEGAton could wreak havoc on our telecommunications and solid-state equipment, but that's NOT the end of the world!

[cyberbo2004]

Obama will level the playing field by selling the tech to China, Russia and other enemies.

[Fred Hayek]

Unless the physics package is a gun type assembly (Little Boy), detonation is unlikely, maybe a “fizzle” measured in tons. The laser need not vaporize the target, it could do even as little as damage the re-entry vehicle such that it breaks up when hitting the atmosphere. No explosion, but you do get a few kilograms of fissile dispersed in the atmosphere.

[chuck_the_tv_out]

I thought kt sounded like a small measure, so I took it with a pinch of salt anyway. Thanks for the confirmation

[chuck_the_tv_out]

"Obama will level the playing field by selling the tech to China, Russia and other enemies."

And cheaply too.



Democrats - a few million in campaign donations buys billions in defense R&D! If you want best RoI, you know where to come!

[ROLF of the HILL COUNTRY]

I guess I wasn’t clear. I didn’t mean to say that a nuke warhead would denotate when it hit the ground; just that it wasn’t going to be destroyed by the laser. As you said, our designs probably won’t give a nuclear yield, but who knows about Korean/Iranian technology?

[DesertRhino]

Good discussion too. And remember in the Gulf War, patriots actually hit several scuds, and their HE warheads then fell to earth doing damage.

That was presumably with more airframe damage than a laser would do. How much more sensitive a nuke is to damage like that, i just don’t know. Good question.

[MediaMole]

What happens if it’s carrying a nuclear warhead?

That’s why a boost phase defense system is alway the best option. The missile falls back on the country launching it.

If the missile is hit in space, it will burn on reentry.

Last ditch systems like the Patriot can still dump a lot of bad stuff on the target area

[PIF]

Program is canceled after 2 more flights this year - no funds requested for 2011.

http://closingvelocity.typepad.com/closing_velocity/2010/02/video-so-long-airborne-laser.html

[Hulka]

Mirror finish has no protection against this type laser.
None at all.

[Hulka]

Indeed.

Priorities are important, ya’ know.

[cmj328]

No, it’s kt. Fission weapons have a much higher E1 pulse than the fusion weapon used in Starfish.

Knocking out all the cars’ computers in the country along with all the telecomm would not make for a fun month. Food would flow...slowly.

[PapaBear3625]

I'll give you the correct answer. The target would undergo a mechanical/structural failure, break into pieces and fall back to earth. What would be left of those pieces after they hit the ground is anybody’s guess. The laser itself is not designed to melt or obliterate a target, just heat it up very quickly causing the failure.

You are correct. I'll also add that, for an object traveling at several miles per second, if its aerodynamic profile gets damaged, look for it to rip itself apart rather quickly.

[PapaBear3625]

A 10kt nuclear bomb going off at 400 mi. altitude over CONUS is in fact the end of the world, or a close approximation.

You would need multi-megatons, not 10 kt. A 410 kt detonation affected aircraft 190 miles away. Covering the whole US would need much more energy.

[cmj328]

The 410kt was a fusion device, and the primitive electronics were much more rugged in those days.

The EMP at a fixed distance from a nuclear weapon does not depend directly on the yield but at most only increases as the square root of the yield (see the illustration to the right). This means that although a 10 kiloton weapon has only 0.7% of the total energy release of the 1.44-megaton Starfish Prime test, the EMP will be at least 8% as powerful. Since the E1 component of nuclear EMP depends on the prompt gamma ray output, which was only 0.1% of yield in Starfish Prime but can be 0.5% of yield in pure fission weapons of low yield, a 10 kiloton bomb can easily be 5 x 8% = 40% as powerful as the 1.44 megaton Starfish Prime at producing EMP.

[ROLF of the HILL COUNTRY]

I don ‘t like to do this but.. less the other two viewers think what you're saying is true:

I'm a former missilier, we studied and planned for these things. Regardless of what your book says, 10kt won't do squat at 400 miles up as you said. To damage the whole USA’s telecomm, electric grids, etc they would need multiple 20MT explosions placed across the country, or as we said, maybe that was the Soviet's intended use for their single 100MT weapon. (It wasn't much good for anything else!)

This is a new bugaboo for the sky-is-falling sensationalists who've apparently just learned about EMPs. Just as nukes themselves made those types crazy, so too the EMPs will “Destroy the world”! Sorry, nukes won't destroy the world and neither will EMPs.

EMPs are something that can be, and are, defended against. Effective shielding can be as little as ordinary aluminum foil wrapped completely around an electronic device. The military has more extensive hardening systems for our critical assets. Yeah, electricity and phones will be gone for the citizenry, but that's what backup generators and stored, shielded radios are for. As for vehicles, replace the circuit boards and they're right as rain.

You might have to learn to live a nineteenth century lifestyle for a few months, but that's hardly the end of the world!

[chuck_the_tv_out]

“You might have to learn to live a nineteenth century lifestyle for a few months, but that’s hardly the end of the world!”

Might do us some good. I’ve always said the only way we can really get back on our feet is if the TV is turned off.

Did they really have a 100MT bomb, or was that just more pie in the sky from them

[cmj328]

10kt won't do squat at 400 miles up as you said

Just to be clear, you're saying that the EMP Commission is wrong?

You might have to learn to live a nineteenth century lifestyle for a few months, but that's hardly the end of the world!

I don't mind doing without my cellphone and car, provided the food trucks run, the hospitals are on backup generators, the pharma plants are operative, and our military retains the ability to obliterate the culprit and stop any major funny business that might be planned while we get back on our feet.

But if the hospitals are closed and the food trucks don't run and the heat is out for 24 weeks, my part of the country would be a total write-off.

Now the Congressional EMP Commission says that I'm right, and you're wrong. I understand that there could be some folks looking to scare us into spending trillions of $$$ on schemes that happen to get them rich quick (Gorebull warming, anyone?). I hope that people like you would do some serious work (papers, Congressional testimony, actual science, etc.) to debunk their claims.