Tag: Soviet Union

It smells of higher politics

On By gyonas1 Comment

The Soviet military fascination with death ray weapons dates back to the 1920s with the publication of the science fiction novel, “Garin’s Death Ray.” The Alexi Tolstoi Garin Death Raystory about the genius inventor Garin described a weapon with pinpoint, but still incredibly destructive, capability. This prophetic novel not only predated by decades the invention of the laser, but it also quoted Garin’s detractors as claiming, “This invention smells of higher politics.”

Two of the three Nobel Prize winners in 1961 for the invention of the laser were Russians and they were instrumental in launching an enormous laser weapon program. Eventually the program struggled with many failures and was only revived in response to Reagan’s Star Wars program in 1984. This effort became a crash program to launch the Soviet Union’s laser Death Star.

On May 15, 1985, the Soviet Union for the first time tested the world’s biggest space Polyuslaunch vehicle Energia. The payload for the launch was the 80 ton Polyus experiment dedicated to the development of a space control laser weapon. Polyus was a giant risk that was characteristic of the Soviet experimental technology philosophy of try it, learn from failures, fix it and try again. The huge gamble had been in the works as a multiyear high power laser program that was already underway but became a crash program in response to Reagan’s SDI initiative.  Instead of trying to compete with their own space-based missile defense program, they decided that laser-based space control would be the most logical path to defeat the SDI. Gorbachev knew that even a minimally successful deployment and test would lead to a space weapon race with the United States. He knew that his failing economy and inferior computer and electronics technology would certainly just accelerate the Soviet path to failure. Fortunately Polyus failed to orbit because of a software problem, and a real star war was avoided.

Boost Phase Intercept (BPI) with high power lasers could defeat North Korean missiles

On By gyonas6 Comments

In order to achieve an effective defense against an all-out ICBM attack from the Soviet Union, the Fletcher Study, that in 1983 created the plan for the SDI, reported that Boost Phase Intercept would be needed. I explore this in great detail in my new book “Death Rays and Delusions” available now at Amazon.com. We believed the midcourse and terminal phases could overwhelm the defense with countermeasures if a large fraction of the boosters were not destroyed. Burning boosters provided a bright target that was easy to find and the thin missile skin made them relatively easy to kill. Missile vulnerability was demonstrated with a high power laser directed at a mock-up of a booster subjected to its acceleration and pressure stresses. The test was described by one of the technical skeptics as a “strapped down chicken test.”

Laser destruction of liquid fueled booster
Laser destruction of liquid fueled booster

Although the booster was very vulnerable to attack, intercepting the booster required deployment of either space based missiles or lasers. The lasers were far off in the future, and the numbers of missiles appeared to require a prohibitively large launch capability, unless the missiles were miniaturized, eventually resulting in the “Brilliant Pebbles” concept. This concept was seriously pursued for five years and then canceled when the Soviet threat disappeared in the ‘90s. Small interceptor missiles, however, did appear to provide a realistic path to BPI based on advancing missile technology.

The preferred approach in 1985, however, was the ground based laser (GBL) with only relay mirrors in space, and substantial efforts were begun to develop enormous free electron lasers to produce beams of the required power and wave length. A significant development was the invention of optics that could correct for sources of beam distortion. A remaining problem was the need for multiple high altitude locations to deal with clouds. In addition, the laser technology and physics did not cooperate, and for want of a laser, the GBL was dropped, but development of aircraft based lasers continued.

laser relay
Artists concept of space based laser relay mirrors http://spie.org/newsroom/4853-did-adaptive-optics-end-the-cold-war?SSO=1

Chemical lasers on 747s enjoyed $5 billion of support for dealing with the evolving North Korean ICBM threat, but the concept was dropped by the Secretary of Defense as impractical, expensive and easily defeated. So the quest for a laser remained until recently with the development of short wave length, efficient, rugged, light weight, fiber lasers. Such lasers could be based on aircraft and be used to directly intercept boosters or relayed from space or possibly drone based mirrors to their targets. Nevertheless, this development is still many years away. So what about the near future? With the recent North Korea tests of a very high yield nuclear device and an  ICBM, the threat demands that we get very serious about deployment of an effective missile defense.

For short range defeat of boosters launched from North Korea, it is possible to utilize aircraft based very fast small missiles, and drone platforms have been proposed, as outlined in this column: http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/military/guest-voices/sd-me-herman-northkorea-defense-20170816-story.html. So BPI, which was from the beginning of the SDI thought to be desirable or even necessary, seems to be emerging based on drone based fast missiles,  and could evolve eventually to laser weapons. To learn more, check out “Death Rays and Delusions” now available on Amazon.com.