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Would be nice if the Pentagon had a Death Star, so Putin could come with his Su-57 and fire a Grom into the ventilation shaft.
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Peresvet laser complex
Hole- Posts : 10722
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Hole wrote:Would be nice if the Pentagon had a Death Star, so Putin could come with his Su-57 and fire a Grom into the ventilation shaft.
F-22 has already ventilation issues. Death star woukdn't be better
no need for grom 
LMFS- Posts : 5102
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@Militarov: man, Mindstorm was providing valuable data and got back mockery... no need for that IMO
@PapaDragon: why do you think it is a fantasy to use lasers against hypersonic targets? Maybe not immediately but that should be the aim. Fast, manoeuvrable targets are the most problematic to intercept and the ones that can motivate the development of countermeasures based on new physical principles
@GarryB: First of all, welcome back!
I disagree that a laser is needed for easy targets. Of course it is "cheap" to shot, but very expensive to develop and build (and probably maintain). It is a new technology and all the existing know-how for SAMS simply does not apply. It is going to take many decades and billions to reach that level with lasers. So I would think it is not worth it unless you are capable to target threats that would be problematic by other means
@PapaDragon: why do you think it is a fantasy to use lasers against hypersonic targets? Maybe not immediately but that should be the aim. Fast, manoeuvrable targets are the most problematic to intercept and the ones that can motivate the development of countermeasures based on new physical principles
@GarryB: First of all, welcome back!
I disagree that a laser is needed for easy targets. Of course it is "cheap" to shot, but very expensive to develop and build (and probably maintain). It is a new technology and all the existing know-how for SAMS simply does not apply. It is going to take many decades and billions to reach that level with lasers. So I would think it is not worth it unless you are capable to target threats that would be problematic by other means
PapaDragon- Posts : 13272
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Hypersonic targets are designed to be resistant to heat by design, add to that insane speed and there is no way any laser current or planned would be able to touch them
And by the time they make one, missiles will get even faster and more durable
So yeah, it's a fantasy
Guest- Guest
LMFS wrote:@Militarov: man, Mindstorm was providing valuable data and got back mockery... no need for that IMO
Data? What data? There was no data in that post. It got equally stupid reply. Well... its like... your opinon, all i care you can go and praise Shiva too.
GarryB- Posts : 38981
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@GarryB: First of all, welcome back!
Thanks...
I disagree that a laser is needed for easy targets.
From Verba, to TOR and Pantsir/Tunguska and S-350 and BUK and S-300/400 and S-500 they already have most types of targets covered, but there are a few that could still be problematic... swarms of tiny threats is one, and targets that require the wrong weapon to engage.
An example is the drones in the Georgian invasion of South Ossetia... a small UAV flying at 4km altitude is really too high for MANPADS or ZU-23 or other ground based cannon fire, so the weapons they ended up having to use were BUK which is enormous overkill, and a MiG-29 likely with an R-73, which is also massive overkill.
Now Tunguska or Pantsir would have been the ideal choice had they been available, but it is still not cheap or cost effective when you consider they could have launched dozens of those things to spy or to drop small weapon payloads.
57mm guided shells are a solution... cheap short range missiles like Kornet-EM and SOSNA-R are also good options, and indeed some sort of jamming EM weapon would also be useful, but a laser also offers further options that can also be used against a wide range of optical observation platforms in the air and on the ground.
I am sure you would appreciate that an air defence battery would be a serious target during war, so enemy special forces sneaking in and looking at the equipment present would be an issue... a laser beam that goes through his binoculars and out the back of his skull would be useful...
These laser systems can fill certain roles, but as they get more powerful and more capable the options in their use and their range of targets will only increase.
The enemy will develop countermeasures... but making anti tank missiles is no reason to stop making tanks.
Of course it is "cheap" to shot, but very expensive to develop and build (and probably maintain).
Lasers have a broad range of applications and uses... developing them will only expand the options and make them more affordable.
Against super fast targets they will be the only option... interceptor missiles are not able to accelerate fast enough to intercept high speed targets that manoeuvre... a laser on the other hand has no such issues.
It is a new technology and all the existing know-how for SAMS simply does not apply.
Actually the target detection and tracking and engagement management all apply... the only difference is the delivery and form of interception.
It is going to take many decades and billions to reach that level with lasers. So I would think it is not worth it unless you are capable to target threats that would be problematic by other means
Light cheap simple structured targets like UAVs would be obvious targets for Lasers already. As the power increases and the range increases then the range of effective targets will increase.
An IR laser might not burn a hole in your head, but will pass straight through your eyelids and blind you instantly... what sort of war fighting performance do you expect from your soldiers then?
You might say that is inhumane... it is much better to send a missile and shred his body like mincemeat and kill him outright.
Laser weapons make perfect sense.
Hypersonic targets are designed to be resistant to heat by design, add to that insane speed and there is no way any laser current or planned would be able to touch them
Hypersonic weapons will have heat resistant noses and leading edges, but they wont be able to resist infinite temperatures.
If the missile or weapon is heading right at the laser even just super heating the nose could cause a failure and the targets own speed will destroy it.
Most of the time the target wont be heading directly at the laser position... especially when there are more than one laser positions, and the side or wing structure can be targeted to cause a failure to destroy the target.
And by the time they make one, missiles will get even faster and more durable
To get faster they need to be light... and the speed it will be travelling means there is plenty of energy present to destroy the target... if damage can be applied to the weapon.
LMFS- Posts : 5102
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Ok then. That post contained quite a lot of information as far as I can see and was definitely not stupid but we can see it differently. Just would encourage that we treat each other with respectMilitarov wrote:
Data? What data? There was no data in that post. It got equally stupid reply. Well... its like... your opinon, all i care you can go and praise Shiva too.
LMFS- Posts : 5102
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GarryB wrote:
From Verba, to TOR and Pantsir/Tunguska and S-350 and BUK and S-300/400 and S-500 they already have most types of targets covered, but there are a few that could still be problematic... swarms of tiny threats is one, and targets that require the wrong weapon to engage.
An example is the drones in the Georgian invasion of South Ossetia... a small UAV flying at 4km altitude is really too high for MANPADS or ZU-23 or other ground based cannon fire, so the weapons they ended up having to use were BUK which is enormous overkill, and a MiG-29 likely with an R-73, which is also massive overkill.
...
These laser systems can fill certain roles, but as they get more powerful and more capable the options in their use and their range of targets will only increase.
The enemy will develop countermeasures... but making anti tank missiles is no reason to stop making tanks.
Yes of course, lasers can be useful for many things. But the impulse to develop them will most probably come from actual defensive gaps. For the UAV example 57 mm autocannons, small SAMs and radiofrequency weapons together with ECM should do. Of course lasers too, agree.
Lasers have a broad range of applications and uses... developing them will only expand the options and make them more affordable.
Against super fast targets they will be the only option... interceptor missiles are not able to accelerate fast enough to intercept high speed targets that manoeuvre... a laser on the other hand has no such issues.
Yeah, agree. DEW are probably the best bet against super fast, manoeuvring targets
Actually the target detection and tracking and engagement management all apply... the only difference is the delivery and form of interception.
I meant outside existing detection means. Still tracking needs means to feed data to the adaptive laser optics which are not normally needed for other AD systems.
Yes, as said above these things are a serious technical challenge and so they would not be developed if not considered strictly necessary.Light cheap simple structured targets like UAVs would be obvious targets for Lasers already. As the power increases and the range increases then the range of effective targets will increase.
An IR laser might not burn a hole in your head, but will pass straight through your eyelids and blind you instantly... what sort of war fighting performance do you expect from your soldiers then?
You might say that is inhumane... it is much better to send a missile and shred his body like mincemeat and kill him outright.
Laser weapons make perfect sense.
Agree on the rest
KomissarBojanchev- Posts : 1429
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If the peresvet is only used to blind seekers of PGMs why not just call it a ground based DIRCM?
x_54_u43- Posts : 336
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KomissarBojanchev wrote:If the peresvet is only used to blind seekers of PGMs why not just call it a ground based DIRCM?
Because it isn't a ground-based DIIRCM, but a full blown DEW system. And by no means the first in the USSR's/Russia's history.
Hole- Posts : 10722
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According to a video from russian TV Peresvet is part of the space forces.
GarryB- Posts : 38981
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Yes of course, lasers can be useful for many things. But the impulse to develop them will most probably come from actual defensive gaps. For the UAV example 57 mm autocannons, small SAMs and radiofrequency weapons together with ECM should do. Of course lasers too, agree.
This is not their first air defence laser... it is the first one going into operational service.
I meant outside existing detection means. Still tracking needs means to feed data to the adaptive laser optics which are not normally needed for other AD systems.
The requirement and mechanisms needed to point the laser at the target are not really that much different from the need to be able to point a fine radar beam at a moving target to track it...
Yes, as said above these things are a serious technical challenge and so they would not be developed if not considered strictly necessary.
With any technology the first generation are not going to be examples of the future potential of the system... a case in point was the ABM system proposed for europe... the first system looked rather poor but the third stage upgrade expanded requirements to something that was not something the Russians could ignore.
Any first gen laser system is hardly going to be some super death ray that obliterates everything from the sky... for a start it is large and bulky compared with something like TOR or Pantsir. But with time performance will improve... in semi urban settings external power could be received from the local power grid for instance... protecting a dam or a nuclear power plant for example could have local fixed defences using locally generated power.
If the peresvet is only used to blind seekers of PGMs why not just call it a ground based DIRCM?
The laser system on the A-60 is intended to blind optical sensors in weapons and on satellites in orbit. We have not been told what this system is for but I would expect over much shorter ranges targets can be physically destroyed...
Repeat, this is not the first Soviet or Russian ground based laser system... it is the first air defence weapon to enter service, but they have had anti sniper systems for ages... they have a set of binoculars that can detect the optics of a sight and direct a laser beam to do damage... so I rather suspect this system can do rather more than that.
According to a video from russian TV Peresvet is part of the space forces.
So it could be a ground based A-60, to keep strategic sights hidden from view by satellites... it might also have a backup feature of point defence against cruise missile attack...
Hole- Posts : 10722
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Blinding satellites or ABM. Shooting down of small drones is of the table, i guess. If that was the target of the system it wouldn´t belong to the space force.
LMFS- Posts : 5102
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That seems correct, thanks for pointing it out. I would have thought this was too ambitious but if the system enters operation it means they have managed a remarkable performance. The goal of blinding satellites with DEW was already stated previously by Russian officials but I thought this would not be realistically achievable through the dense layers of atmosphere.Hole wrote:Blinding satellites or ABM. Shooting down of small drones is of the table, i guess. If that was the target of the system it wouldn´t belong to the space force.
Do you mean an electronically scanned radar? In that case the aiming systems differ notably from a laser...GarryB wrote:The requirement and mechanisms needed to point the laser at the target are not really that much different from the need to be able to point a fine radar beam at a moving target to track it...
Yes, and that would mean that fixed, less space and power constrained versions of this thing can perfectly exist already as point defence of very strategic targets. Only wonder if a nuclear warhead can be effectively attacked already with this kind of weapon, that would be a very major developmentGarryB wrote:Any first gen laser system is hardly going to be some super death ray that obliterates everything from the sky... for a start it is large and bulky compared with something like TOR or Pantsir. But with time performance will improve... in semi urban settings external power could be received from the local power grid for instance... protecting a dam or a nuclear power plant for example could have local fixed defences using locally generated power.
GarryB- Posts : 38981
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Blinding satellites or ABM. Shooting down of small drones is of the table, i guess. If that was the target of the system it wouldn´t belong to the space force.
Why do you say that?
A large MALE drone could deliver a swarm of small drones to attack a strategic missile base... either silos or truck based systems... or indeed OTH radar positions would be critical targets that all sorts of US and NATO weapons could be directed at at the first stages of an attack... nuclear forces are top priority targets for both sides, so shooting down drones and aircraft and cruise missiles and other weapons will be critical...
The goal of blinding satellites with DEW was already stated previously by Russian officials but I thought this would not be realistically achievable through the dense layers of atmosphere.
An airborne version will always be better at that... it can operate above most of the weather at 10,000m...
Do you mean an electronically scanned radar? In that case the aiming systems differ notably from a laser...
The PESA in the radar on the MiG-31 uses a mirror to direct the beam at targets, so unlike the mechanically steered radar of the F-14 it can engage targets anywhere within its field of view... high up above the aircraft and down at sea level...
Yes, and that would mean that fixed, less space and power constrained versions of this thing can perfectly exist already as point defence of very strategic targets. Only wonder if a nuclear warhead can be effectively attacked already with this kind of weapon, that would be a very major development
I am no nuclear scientist but rather than a laser there is probably an energy beam you could use to render a nuclear warhead inert...
Or even better, one that will set off a nuclear weapon... and put it in a satellite over enemy territory...
Last edited by GarryB on Mon Jul 30, 2018 9:44 am; edited 2 times in total
LMFS- Posts : 5102
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Maybe I am not understanding you right but electronically steered radars operate as far as I know by managing the phase difference between the individual emitting elements so that constructive / destructive interference of the individually created fields shapes the global EM field in the desired way, not by mirrors.GarryB wrote:
The PESA in the radar on the MiG-31 uses a mirror to direct the beam at targets, so unlike the mechanically steered radar of the F-14 it can engage targets anywhere within its field of view... high up above the aircraft and down at sea level...
KomissarBojanchev- Posts : 1429
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PapaDragon wrote:
Hypersonic targets are designed to be resistant to heat by design, add to that insane speed and there is no way any laser current or planned would be able to touch them
And by the time they make one, missiles will get even faster and more durable
So yeah, it's a fantasy
No material is infinitely heat resistant.
Isos- Posts : 11301
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KomissarBojanchev wrote:PapaDragon wrote:
Hypersonic targets are designed to be resistant to heat by design, add to that insane speed and there is no way any laser current or planned would be able to touch them
And by the time they make one, missiles will get even faster and more durable
So yeah, it's a fantasy
No material is infinitely heat resistant.
Modern military lasers are good against small things like UAV or shells. Against ICBM they are useless unless you connect them directly to a nuclear power to have the max energy you can have.
Singular_Transform- Posts : 1032
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KomissarBojanchev wrote:PapaDragon wrote:
Hypersonic targets are designed to be resistant to heat by design, add to that insane speed and there is no way any laser current or planned would be able to touch them
And by the time they make one, missiles will get even faster and more durable
So yeah, it's a fantasy
No material is infinitely heat resistant.
It has to be heat restenosis not for infinitely, but only for no more than five seconds.
LMFS- Posts : 5102
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Isos wrote:
Modern military lasers are good against small things like UAV or shells. Against ICBM they are useless unless you connect them directly to a nuclear power to have the max energy you can have.
I am not sure how far the current laser technology is from being usable against ICBM in any of their flight phases to be honest. The key is not only the amount of energy you put in the target but also the time you need to deliver it, in other words power versus energy. A very short pulse of extreme intensity can be more destructive than a longer pulse releasing a higher total energy since thermal conductivity of any object is limited and therefore even small amounts of energy can produce very high temperature increases if delivered very fast. Short pulses are also important against a moving target since they allow the energy to be concentrated in a small part of the target despite the inherent tracking tolerances the system will have, further contributing to unacceptable temperature rise at a certain spot and hence malfunction or destruction of the target. So the issue is the capacity of the laser system to handle very high power, not to have an unlimited energy source.
Of course, once the such laser would exist (and who says they don't, given the levels of secrecy that would surround them) the race to make the warheads more resistant would be on. Interestingly I read some days ago about laser resistance being a characteristic for some new military development in Russia, sadly I do not remember for which device this was stated...
High reflectivity, plasma layers, high thermal conductivity, sacrificial materials etc. together with the inherent resistance of the casing to high temperatures can be used to make it hard to destroy such targets.
GarryB- Posts : 38981
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Maybe I am not understanding you right but electronically steered radars operate as far as I know by managing the phase difference between the individual emitting elements so that constructive / destructive interference of the individually created fields shapes the global EM field in the desired way, not by mirrors.
The electronically scanned radar on the MiG-31 does not have multiple elements... it is not an AESA, it is a PESA.
Beam steering is not done by turning elements on and off.
No material is infinitely heat resistant.
Exactly... even using ablative material you work out how much it will need for normal operational flight and then you add a margin to allow for longer periods of operation or some failure or something... you would not be able to allow for an external laser adding 2,000 degrees to one point on the munition/aircraft.
Even one point of failure will destroy the entire vehicle... look at the re-entering space shuttle with a few failed heat tiles... once fire gets inside the structure the structure is rapidly destroyed and the entire vehicle is destroyed by the enormous forces created in such a flight profile...
Modern military lasers are good against small things like UAV or shells. Against ICBM they are useless unless you connect them directly to a nuclear power to have the max energy you can have.
Even re-entering nuclear warheads have heat shields to prevent the entire weapon burning up... damaging the heat shield and making it fail would be enough to destroy most items designed to re-enter safely... you don't need to blow the whole thing to bits.
With a UAV damaging a wing is good enough to make it crash... you don't need to target engines or shields to blow it to bits...
I am not sure how far the current laser technology is from being usable against ICBM in any of their flight phases to be honest.
Like any technology... it will only get cheaper and smaller and much more powerful over time...
So the issue is the capacity of the laser system to handle very high power, not to have an unlimited energy source.
I agree, but having a ground source means you can continuously fire at lots of targets without worrying about generating enough power per shot.
It is a bit like the difference between a fire engine with on board water, and one connected to a water main...
You can use more energy at each hot spot because you know there is more available energy...
You can worry about putting out the fire (ie dealing with the air threats) rather than managing the limited available water/energy to make sure you can deal with new fires/targets.
High reflectivity, plasma layers, high thermal conductivity, sacrificial materials etc. together with the inherent resistance of the casing to high temperatures can be used to make it hard to destroy such targets.
Clear glass or glass like material with coloured liquid behind it... the laser penetrates the outer surface but is absorbed by the liquid... which is super heated and boils, but largely stops the laser penetrating into the object. In addition to that make the rocket spin so the laser cannot concentrate its energy on any one point for very long...
LMFS- Posts : 5102
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The individual radiating elements in a PESA are connected to phase shifters, see below (from Wikipedia):GarryB wrote:
The electronically scanned radar on the MiG-31 does not have multiple elements... it is not an AESA, it is a PESA.
Beam steering is not done by turning elements on and off.
GarryB wrote:
Even one point of failure will destroy the entire vehicle... look at the re-entering space shuttle with a few failed heat tiles... once fire gets inside the structure the structure is rapidly destroyed and the entire vehicle is destroyed by the enormous forces created in such a flight profile...
Exactly. Re-entry vehicles are subject to extreme efforts, a damage to their protection would lead to total failure of the vehicle.
Of course a huge energy source would be one concern less but I still consider the power handling capabilities of the laser itself to be the bottleneck of the system. For instance, if you would have a 1 MW power source and you were to release its energy with blasts of 1 ms duration each second you would need to be capable of converting and handling 1 GW power with your laser... the technical challenge would be serious.GarryB wrote:
So the issue is the capacity of the laser system to handle very high power, not to have an unlimited energy source.
I agree, but having a ground source means you can continuously fire at lots of targets without worrying about generating enough power per shot.
It is a bit like the difference between a fire engine with on board water, and one connected to a water main...
You can use more energy at each hot spot because you know there is more available energy...
You can worry about putting out the fire (ie dealing with the air threats) rather than managing the limited available water/energy to make sure you can deal with new fires/targets.
True. Also low reflectivity to lidar would make difficult to concentrate the power on the target. Or using heat pipes or thermoacoustics for heat distribution under the skin. A true hi-tech arms race between the laser and the warheadGarryB wrote:
Clear glass or glass like material with coloured liquid behind it... the laser penetrates the outer surface but is absorbed by the liquid... which is super heated and boils, but largely stops the laser penetrating into the object. In addition to that make the rocket spin so the laser cannot concentrate its energy on any one point for very long...
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Militarov wrote:Data? What data? There was no data in that post.
Obviously no data from me, Militarov; do you know those little numbers can cause A LOT of problems......
About the overall info ,that like more "hard" data are publicly delivered only when our happy partners of the "Situational awareness TM" and "Joint-anything TM" over-ocean team become in any way aware of them or have zero potential impact on security, you can sign and control in the time where the correctness stand
Hole wrote:According to a video from russian TV Peresvet is part of the space forces.
Is sufficient to notice where "Пересвет" has been placed to deduce its overall tasks.
As already pointed out by Виктор Мураховский at now the system main role is protection of the main centers of strategic forces in particular neutralizing the optical based ealy warning, tracking and aiming systems of potentital opponents and not......here we do not talk of some UAVs or aircraft ISR going at subsonic speed for some thousand of km in Federation's airspace up to said area but of something a bit.....a lot bit.....higher that would be critical in those few unlucky minutes to provide target position and correction updates.
About of the effects of the system's attentions on targets some hundreds of Km lower in the atmosphere i will not elaborate.
Isos wrote:Modern military lasers are good against small things like UAV or shells. Against ICBM they are useless unless you connect them directly to a nuclear power to have the max energy you can have.
None has ever proposed since mid of '60 years to destroy incoming ICBMs with lasers (except space based ones, but this is all another history....), there exist a rich experimental basis proving the inefficiency of this approach; even more i can add that none, since then has ever proposed to destroy those strategic offensive means with direct beam contact; contemporaneously almost all involved domestic Institutes still and above all today ,with the next advent of in-atnosphere manouevrable hypersonic missile, agree that ground-based DEW (HPM particularly) will be in perspective by far the most efficient approach for mass neutralization of those threats ; the important difference is in the defeating mechanism.
It is not like НИИРП achievements in this field disappeared or even only stopped since В.Николаева and Р. Авраменко breakthroughs ,to the contrary
; in the same way neither have the unique domestic acquisitions related to atmosphere-attuned soliton's generation in laser and HPM pulses, critical for counteracting medium-induced dispersion (and here the data coming from the unique ЦИЭС program will further widen the gap with foreign institutions).
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@Mindstorm: many thanks for clarifying! Is there anything that can be said as to why ground-based lasers are considered ineffective against ICBMs? I can assume, since they will probably be restricted to attacking the RVs after separation, that the speed and number of targets can make eliminating all of them quite difficult whereas HPM as an area weapon can deal with MIRVs more effectively. But on the other hand, RVs electronics are extremely hardened against radiation and EMP for obvious reasons. Maybe the radar fuzing / sensor ports can be targeted?
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The individual radiating elements in a PESA are connected to phase shifters, see below (from Wikipedia):
There was a book about the MiG-31 that described what it called mirrors to expand the volume of the beam angles.
The scanning volume of the Zaslon was enormous... especially compared with the limited performance of the F-14 equivalent with its mechanical scanning...
For instance, if you would have a 1 MW power source and you were to release its energy with blasts of 1 ms duration each second you would need to be capable of converting and handling 1 GW power with your laser... the technical challenge would be serious.
I would suggest that capacitors are a large part of temporarily storing and releasing power in bursts and that having an external mains method of charging those capacitors would be a good thing.
Regarding bottle necks... having more than one power connection to the system including its on board power generation system would deal with that...
True. Also low reflectivity to lidar would make difficult to concentrate the power on the target. Or using heat pipes or thermoacoustics for heat distribution under the skin. A true hi-tech arms race between the laser and the warhead
One particular heart problem involves the thickening of the heart muscle which reduces the internal capacity and therefore also its ability to pump blood in useful volumes. One solution is to open the chest and expose the beating heart and blast a laser beam through the outer surface of the heart muscle.
It burns a hole straight through the thick muscle but the internal pressure inside the heart turns the straight tubular hole into a cone shape with the narrow end of the cone on the outside... the surface of the tube is cauterised by the heat of the beam but the beam does not go right through the beating heart... the centre is full of blood which absorbs the beams energy so it does not burn right through to the other side... the blood is simply heated slightly by the energy of the beam.
After burning multiple holes the cone shape of the cavities increases the internal volume of the heart and solves the problem...
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