US Army Eyeing 2023 Development For Laser Weapons

By Tactical-Life

The following is a release from David Vergun and the U.S. Army:

Responding to lawmakers’ questions about how close the Army is to developing offensive and defensive directed-energy weapons, Mary J. Miller responded: “I believe we’re very close.”

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Miller, deputy assistant secretary of the Army for Research and Technology, and other experts testified before the House Armed Services Committee’s Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities, Feb. 24. Miller’s topic was the Army’s Science and Technology, or S&T, Program for fiscal year 2017.

The Army’s S&T effort is committed to pursuing high-energy lasers, she said. That effort has been used in an analysis of alternatives for the Indirect Fire Protection Capability program of record.

Now, that effort has been “aligned to transition into a program of record in the fiscal 2023 timeframe,” she said. It’s already planned and funded.

“Why that long?” she asked rhetorically.

Because it’s being done in a “step-wise demonstration of capability,” she said. “We have to make sure the lasers work and do the full set of scopes against the threats we project. And those threats include the counter-rockets, counter-artillery and counter-mortar as well as [Unmanned Aerial Vehicle] and cruise missile …Read the Rest

Source:: Tactical Life