Re: The End of the Carrier Age?
I expect it will involve some technology about tieing a la
ser in to the X37s engine. I expect just to be used in space. Perhaps some small version of this system.
Also the fact that such weapons even MIGHT exist is a deterrent. Would a county want to risk war and retaliation by strikeing at US carriers if the attack may not be successful.
First off, laser is definitely a valid items for anti-missile shield and it had been demonstrated often. What I reply in your previous thread is that laser might not be placed on the X-37, unless it is officially reported and shown.
X-37 is an experimental concept, that is why it carried the letter 'X' on it. And what you expect, really have no ground on it.
That said, X-37 might only be the initial phase of what might be the future of US's military hardware. It prove that a satellite could change course and so will be very difficult to intercept.
As to arming a satellite with weaponries... it will be done... in the course of military hardware advancement.
I do agreed that laser system is a good anti-missile shield system... and that is something that we can all agreed upon.
Like what Siegecrossbow had said... Hurray.
It looks like you are a laser fan, so am I. I have great confidence in the potentials of laser weapons but space lasers (at least ones capable of physically harming other objects in space) are restricted by the two major factors:
1) Energy consumption: To be able to physically harm the enemy assets within a reasonable ammount of time you need a laser that is at least in the two digit kilowatt range (preferably megawatt). Huge amounts of energy are needed and you probably need square miles of solar panels, which is most often used to generate electricity by spaceships and satellites, to provide enough power for the weapon to fire in rapid successions. I expect nuclear power to be used by such weapons in the future.
2) Cooling: Lasers, as of now, are far from efficient. A great deal of heat is generated as the weapon is fired and in the near vacuum of space, you can only get rid of the heat through radiation. Massive radiators not present on the X-37b will be needed to cool the weapon for it to remain operational in a long time. A heatsink could definitely be used but 1) you will need to get rid of the heat eventually 2) the firing time of the laser is greatly limited.
Carrying an anti-satellite laser aboard a spacecraft definitely has its advantages compared to their ground-based counterparts. First and foremost the "weather" is always perfect in space and there is no risk of the odd chance that clouds will block the laser. There is also no atmospheric distortion/blooming that will alter the laser's path/reduce the beam intensity.
Looks like we are agreeing on something for once. Hurray.
Bro, what you say is true. The energy problem with the laser however would be solved quite easily. True, it would need huge number of solar panels when collecting solar energy on Earth. The reason is the layers of gases in all level of atmosphere that actually reduce the energy and by the time it reached the solar panel, only a few percentage of such energy still exist... plus energy lost along the way.
However, if the solar energy was to be collected when the spacecraft was in space, it would be a direct radiation collected on the solar panels, which will therefore collect more. Plus there will be very little wastage of the panel as the weapon might be very close to the panels.
When use against missiles it might be very useful because the laser (being practically a very concentrated beam of light) will burn through the metal skin of the missile and reach the interior of the missile. Its heat will detonate the explosive in it and destroy the missile.
However if it was use against a satellite, it might burn a hole through the satellite, but would not necessary destroy it... unless the hole is big enough to rip the entire satellite apart, acting like a kinetic round.
What I can see of the laser usage against satellite was by using the laser to fry the optic within the satellite, thus rendering some of its function useless and not to totally destroy the satellite.
Anyway, by looking at this example, I am not seeing a armed spaceship being able to replace a carrier...