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U.S. and Israel zap drones with lasers in plan for futuristic fights
Biden to view new tech during visit as Washington prepares for 2027 China threat


U.S. President Joe Biden will see a demonstration of Israel's laser defense technology during his visit to the country on July 13. (Source photos by Reuters and screenshot from Israel Ministry of Defense's YouTube page)
NESREEN BAKHEIT and KEN MORIYASU, Nikkei staff writersJuly 12, 2022 20:33 JST

TEL AVIV/TOKYO -- When U.S. President Joe Biden arrives in Israel on Wednesday, one of his first meetings will be with Defense Minister Benny Gantz at Ben-Gurion Airport. Gantz will show the president some of Israel's military technology, including the Iron Beam laser defense system.

The high-powered laser interceptor is the newest addition to Israel's multilayered missile defense umbrella and can target small threats like drones. The system can destroy an airborne target within two to four seconds at a range of up to 7 km.

In April, then-Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett tweeted that Israel had successfully tested Iron Beam and posted a video of the laser zapping rockets and drones.

"This is the world's first energy-based weapons system that uses a laser to shoot down incoming [unmanned aerial vehicles], rockets & mortars at a cost of $3.50 per shot," Bennett wrote.

"It may sound like science fiction, but it's real."




Directed-energy weapons like lasers are expected to be crucial to future battlefields. Biden's attendance at the Iron Beam demonstration signals that the U.S. and Israel will collaborate more on these technologies.

In a conflict with China over Taiwan, for instance, the U.S. would need to counter missiles re-entering from outer space, sea-skimming cruise missiles and drone swarms, the latter of which will be hard to intercept with traditional missile defenses.

Directed-energy weapons have the advantage of low operating costs and unlimited firings. The $3.50 per shot cost is negligible compared with the hundreds of thousands of dollars needed for a typical missile interceptor. Manpower costs are also significantly lower compared to an Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense destroyer with its crew of 300.

There is also the benefit of no debris from an interceptor -- an issue that has thwarted deployment of the land-based Aegis Ashore missile-defense system in Japan.

Iron Beam will complement Israel's previous missile defense systems such as Arrow, David's Sling and Iron Dome, which Biden will also inspect.

Uzi Rubin, founder and first director of the Israel Missile Defense Organization in the Ministry of Defense, told Nikkei Asia that while the U.S. is a powerhouse of military technology, Israel is a leader in other aspects. "The U.S. never built an Iron Dome because it never had any need for it," he said, referring to Israel's signature air-defense system designed to intercept short-range rockets and artillery shells fired from distances of 70 km. "Nobody is attacking U.S. cities with rockets. American wars are across oceans, not on American soil."

"With Iron Dome, we came up with something more advanced than what the Americans developed, as we needed to fight non-nuclear missiles," Rubin said. "We also have some models of our heavier missile defense, which is ahead of what the Americans have, simply because we have the problem of defending against non-nuclear weapons."


Streaks of light are seen as Israel's Iron Dome anti-missile system intercepts rockets launched from the Gaza Strip towards Israel, as seen from Ashkelon, Israel in May 2021. © Reuters

Rubin noted that the U.S. has been experimenting with high-powered lasers since the 1960s, while Israel has just entered the field. Israeli lasers have just a third of American firepower, he said.

But there is a sense of urgency on the American side as China hones its offensive capabilities. The Pentagon is working under the assumption that by 2027, the 100th anniversary of the founding of the People's Liberation Army, China will have the capability to successfully invade and unify Taiwan.

In January, Jin Canrong, professor at Renmin University's School of International Studies, told Nikkei that once the quintennial national congress of the Chinese Communist Party finishes this autumn, the threat of a military takeover of Taiwan will be closer to becoming a reality. "It is very likely that the leadership will move toward armed unification by 2027," the professor said.

The U.S. Indo-Pacific Command is especially concerned about the defense of Guam, where the U.S. military has its only submarine base in the western Pacific and where its strategic bombers are based.

China has already deployed its Dong Feng-26 intermediate-range ballistic missiles with a range of 5,000 km, dubbed the "Guam Killer."

In Israel, Biden will "discuss new innovations between our countries that use laser technologies to defeat missiles and other airborne threats," a senior U.S. official told reporters ahead of the visit.

New U.S. military programs are often not finished on time. Teaming up with tech-savvy allies like Israel -- which has vast experience in operating missile defense systems -- would be an option for the U.S. military as it speeds preparations for a potential showdown with China.


The amphibious transport dock ship USS Portland conducts a high-energy laser weapon system demonstration on a static surface training target in the Gulf of Aden in December 2021. © U.S. Marine Corps

The success of Turkish-made drones against Russian armored vehicles and air defense systems in Ukraine has heightened the need for the U.S. and Israel to prepare for drone swarms in future warfare. The demonstration video that former Prime Minister Bennett posted on Twitter shows Iron Beam lasers melting off one of the wings of a drone that looks like the Turkish Bayraktar TB2.

In the future, lasers could also be deployed against targets other than drones.

In February, the U.S. Navy finally succeeded in using a laser to defeat a target representing a subsonic cruise missile. A ground-based laser hit a target using a high-energy beam invisible to the naked eye, successfully disabling it. The weapon was designed and built by Lockheed Martin.

"It can counter unmanned aerial systems and fast-attack boats with a high-power laser and also use its high-resolution telescope to track inbound air threats, support combat identification, and conduct battle damage assessment of engaged targets," the Navy said.

But Israel's Rubin said many challenges remain.

"Laser technology is not like the Star Wars movie. Laser weapons work at the speed of light, but need a lot of time to pump enough energy into a rocket to terminate it," he said. "That takes time, and while you are trying to terminate one rocket, you cannot deal with other incoming rockets. If they fire hundreds of rockets at the same time, you can only deal with them one on one."

Weather also affects lasers, he said. "For example, in northern Israel we can have 60 days of rain during which laser weapon technology cannot work. During rain, lasers don't work."

And the technology still needs to be fully developed. Rubin, who was also involved in the development of Iron Dome, shared some insight into how the defense shield was designed. "Rafael Advanced Defense Systems recruited the best people from its workforce to build Iron Dome over a three-year period. They were told not to stop until it was ready."