Kurnool: India joined a select league of nations – including the US, China and Russia – on Sunday by demonstrating a 30-kilowatt laser-based weapons system capable of shooting down fixed-wing aircraft, missiles and swarm drones.
Designed by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), the capabilities of this Directed-Energy Weapons system (DEWs) was demonstrated in Kurnool, Andhra Pradesh.
The system is now ready for production and deployment across multiple military platforms.
“This is just the beginning,” Dr Samir V Kamat, chairman, DRDO, told the media as he unveiled plans for more futuristic weapons systems.
“As far as I know, it is the United States, Russia and China that have demonstrated this capability. Israel is also working on similar capabilities, I would say we are the fourth or fifth country in the world to demonstrate this system…,” he stated.
He also revealed that DRDO is working on other high-energy systems.
“We are also working on other high-energy systems like high-energy microwaves, electromagnetic pulse… What you saw today was one of the components of Star Wars technologies…There are many projects moving towards maturity – VSHORAD, MPATGM, LCA Mark II… In the next six months to one year, you will see many of our systems getting inducted,” he said.
