Sci-Fi Ray Gun Debuts in Iraq

The ray gun has finally become a reality.

At least that’s what the Economist reports. It says a “directed-energy weapon” named Zeus (presumably because of his fondness for hurling lightning bolts) has been deployed in the back of a Humvee in Iraq. It’s being tested by soldiers who are using its laser beam to detonate roadside bombs from a safe distance of 300 meters.

Yet now, if the Zeus prototype works in Iraq, a dozen more will introduced within a year, according to the Economist, and bigger versions of the ray gun are in development. There’s the Laser Area Defence System (LADS — for once, a good military acronym) for blowing up incoming shells and rockets with laser beams. Boeing is working on a similar weapon, and a consortium of companies is developing an airborne laser strong enough to disable missiles from several hundred kilometers away.

And there’s also been testing of a smaller, non-lethal weapon using a “a focused beam of millimeter waves to induce an intolerable heating sensation on an adversary’s skin,” as my colleague Tom Zeller Jr. reported in The Lede.

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