First full-power firing of airborne laser anti-missile system

Boeing announced the first full-power firing of its jumbo-jet-mounted, ICBM-killing ray cannon — the Airborne Laser (ABL). The system was unveiled in September (see 3 September 2008 HS Daily Wire), but Lewis Page writes that this is the first time the big laser’s knob has been turned up to full. “This test demonstrated that the Airborne Laser missile defense program has successfully integrated the entire weapon system aboard the ABL aircraft,” said Scott Fancher, who oversees the program at Boeing. “The team has now completed the two major milestones it hoped to accomplish in 2008, keeping ABL on track to conduct the missile shootdown demonstration planned for next year.”

Boeing will now carry out further ground blasts, gradually extending the amount of time the beam is kept on. Provided that there are no problems with these, flight tests will be the next step — culminating with a shootdown of an actual intercontinental missile.

The ABL uses a large, chemically-fueled laser in the rear half of its 747-400F freighter airframe. The beam generated there passes through management machinery in the forward half of the plane, and then through a swiveling turret in the nose which aims it at its target. The Missile Defense Agency envisions the laser plane to aim its deadly ray on the fuel-packed rocket stacks of enemy ICBMs as they boost upward from their launch sites. Supporters of ballistic missile defense argue that this is an especially good time in the missile flight trajectory to blast WMD-tipped missiles: Each missile carries several warheads, so a destruction of one missile will kill multiple targets; the missile itself, as it rises from its silo, is relatively slow; it is also a large target, and it is not yet accompanied by thousands of decoys — as warheads in space would be.

There is a downside, though. Critics point out that a large fleet of extremely expensive jumbo-blasters would be required to maintain patrols within striking range of likely launch sites. Moreover, as Page notes, any silo or pad located deep within a national interior would require the ABLs to intrude on hostile airspace, possibly precipitating the very attack they are designed to prevent.

The chemical fueling requirements of the laser fleet would be a daunting logistic problem, as the fuel is highly corrosive and toxic — as are the waste products produced during firing.

Still and all, the ABL program is nearing a test at long last, following years of delays. The future of the program is less certain, as the Democratic majority in Congress has declined so far to provide the funding that the Missile Defense Agency has requested for its initial planned ABL fleet, and the program is something of a lame duck compared to more popular efforts like the Standard SM-3 naval missile — which successfully shot down a malfunctioning U.S. spy satellite this summer.

“With a new and less hawkish president shortly to take up office,” writes Page, “and U.S. government finances headed for a particularly bad period in the near future, the ABL may be going nowhere no matter how well its test program is proceeding right now.”