Israeli defense company Elbit Systems received a contract from the U.S Department of Defense at the end of last year for integrating their laser weapons onto military aviation. Company president and CEO Bezhalel Machlis shared this information during discussion of Elbit Systems' financial results for last year.
As Breaking Defense reports, during the presentation one could see laser weapons for aircraft called XCalibur, as well as the Sting version adapted for helicopters.
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Moreover, as Elbit Systems' head confidently states, the company has supposedly managed to overcome all these difficulties that those attempting to create laser weapons, especially for combat aviation, usually face namely squeezing the laser into fairly small dimensions, which is actually quite a non-trivial task.
As the publication reports, video shown during the conference featured a series of different footage with their airborne laser weapons.
One shows an aircraft using a laser to destroy a missile, another demonstrates a laser beam hitting a long-range strike drone like a Shahed, while a third shows laser use directly from an open helicopter door.
It's worth noting that Israel is more familiar than anyone with how complex laser weapons development is it ultimately took almost 12 years to finally deploy a 100 kW laser system.
Integrating laser weapons on fighters is especially complex. Here one can recall the American example when in 2024 F-15 fighters were supposed to fly with the SHiELD laser system, but the project was ultimately canceled. However, they haven't completely abandoned laser development for aircraft.
Defense Express previously reported that India has been making laser weapons since at least the 2000s, dreams of shooting down drone swarms for low-cost, but what is the reality.
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