Lockheed Martin announced that it has delivered HELIOS or High Energy Laser with Integrated
Optical-dazzler and Surveillance to the U.S Navy.
The long-awaited seaborne defensive laser weapon system will be tested by U.S Navy this
year.
As per reports, the 60 kW HELIOS will be integrated into a guided-missile destroyer assigned to
the Pacific Fleet.
It follows a 2019 demonstration of laser weapon capability aboard the amphibious transport
dock USS Ponce.
Importantly the power of the latest system is twice that of the earlier one.
In this video Defense Updates analyzes how the new 60 kW HELIOS will change naval warfare?
Let's get started.
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Laser is one of the systems being developed to meet emerging threats.
The Congressional Research Service said in a report that the US Navy is developing 3
new ship-based weapons: lasers, an electromagnetic railgun, and a gun-launched guided projectile.
As per the report, these weapons "could substantially improve" the ability of surface ships to defend
against small surface craft, unmanned aerial vehicles and eventually, anti-ship cruise
missiles.
The report states, "Any one of these new weapons, if successfully developed and deployed, might
be regarded as a 'game-changer' for defending Navy surface ships" against enemy missiles,
The research service noted that the U.S Navy has made "substantial progress" toward deploying
lasers on ships.
Viewers may note that the U.S Navy had awarded Lockheed Martin a $150 million contract in
2018, with options worth up to $943 million for the development of high power laser systems.
The program aims to develop 2 prototypes - one for land and another for destroyers.
As per Lockheed Martin with the HELIOS system, it will "help the Navy take a major step forward
in its goal to field a laser weapon system aboard surface ships.”
The HELIOS effort is focused on rapidly developing and deploying a 60-kilowatt high-energy laser
with "growth potential" to 150 kilowatts.
Essentially a laser-beam weaponry hits a target with a train of brief pulses of light.
The rapid evaporation and expansion of the surface cause shockwaves that damage the target.
Lockheed Martin had earlier stated that it demonstrated that a 10-kilowatt system can
defeat small airborne targets with the "speed of light" capability and that a 30-kilowatt
system had disabled a stationary truck target.
HELIOS has an expandable design.
According to Lockheed officials, the scalable laser design architecture combines multiple
kilowatt fiber lasers to attain high beam quality at various power levels.
HELIOS will be integrated with U.S Navy's AEGIS Combat Systems.
The system will have multiple usages as the full name suggests.
HELIOS was primarily designed as a weapon capable of taking out small missile boats
which are being deployed by some rival as part of asymmetric counter against U.S Navy
HELIOS will be effective against drone swarms too.
It can also be used to merely "dazzle" a UAV's electro-optical sensors.
This could damage the sensor and prevent a UAV from navigating ultimately disabling it.
HELIOS has a long-range intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capability.
Though Lockheed Martin hasn't revealed the details, indications are that the aiming system
of HELIOS is cable of high-definition, high-powered digital magnification.
This will allow the crew of the ship which has the system installed to properly inspect
the threats in its vicinity.
Lasers system like HELIOS have several very important advantages.
The speed of light enables them to hit their targets almost instantaneously.
Laser weapons also don’t need to carry ammunition like traditional systems and hence they will
be able to take out a much larger number of threats constrained only by the power supply
limit of the platform.
With further development, lasers can be used to save costly defensive missiles for the
most sophisticated threats.
Where a laser weapon like HELIOS is particularly compelling is its ability to fire a theoretically
unlimited number of shots using the destroyer’s onboard electrical generation systems.
This is not the case with current defensive weapons.
Phalanx Close-in Weapon System is limited to 20 to 30 seconds of continuous firing,
while Rolling Airframe Missile or RAM is limited to 21 missiles aboard the Mk. 49 Guided Missile
Launching System.
But everything is not cozy, there are challenges too - the most basic is that the power source
in the warship will have to be scaled up as additional power will be required for the
functioning of the lasers.
Small missile boats or fast-moving crafts laden with explosives are a potential challenge
to U.S Navy
While the threat that small boats pose to major warships has been apparent for some
time, the Pentagon’s Millennium Challenge 2002 exercise brought the issue to mainstream
attention.
In that controversial exercise, small fast boats carrying suicide payloads inflicted
heavy damage on U.S. naval forces.
This kind of craft lack the range to find and successfully attack aircraft carriers
or warships in the open sea but can be deadly in certain constrained spaces like the Strait
of Hormuz.
Also, drones are no longer just being used as harmless hobby systems.
These are being employed as weapons to strike targets at long standoff ranges.
Drone technology has become very advanced and relatively cheap.
The conflicts in Iraq and Syria have shown that this kind of capability is within reach
of even non-state actors.
In January 2018, a mass drone attack was witnessed on Russia’s main outposts in Syria – the
Khmeimim airbase and the naval base in Tartus.
Though the damage from the attack was insignificant as per Russia, it clearly displayed the potential
of drones in warfare
On September 14, 2019, the facilities of Saudi Arabia's oil company Aramco located in the
east of the country came under attack.
As per reports, the raid began around 4 a.m and 18 drones, as well as 7 cruise missiles,
were used.
These were able to penetrate hard-kill interceptor based air defense including American made
Patriot.
It remains to be seen how the latest variant of HELIOS works but the move is certainly
in the right direction.