Navy readies to deploy first warfare laser onboard USS Ponce this spring
- Thread starter Locutus
- Start date
Now? SLCMs with nuclear warheads been around for decades, and now a laser makes it death the destroyer of whatever?
Well, I guess now YOU are become death, destroyer of worlds.
Cool gig. How's the pay?
As you know the quote is attributable J. Robert Oppenheimer quoting the Bhagavad Gita. The ability to destroy worlds has existed throughout most of recorded history. It simply requires a very basic ability and determined ruthlessness. How did Carthage meet its end? How did the Abbasid Caliphate meet its end?
In its likely development trajectory this weapon is similar to the first aircraft. This is the beginning of an entirely new order of weaponry that is inexpensive and will become readily available to one and all. I think there may be a lower threshold for use of directed energy weapons than nuclear weapons. The day will come when directed energy weapons are based in low earth orbit and used to fry their targets which may be entire regions of the planet.
Haven't you seen the Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy or Star Wars?
