Weapons

Russia's Cold War Super Weapon (Put Lasers on Everything It Can)

After more than a half century of development, the U.S. military is finally close to fielding an array of laser weapons for defense against missiles, drones and small vehicles. However, the Soviet Union also researched laser weapons for decades, and developed an astounding variety of them, ranging from laser pistols, threedifferent laser tanks and a laser-armed spaceship.

Lasers direct photons (light particles) into a coherent beam, and though most military lasers today are used to designate targets and measure distances and so forth, a sufficiently powerful laser can cause a destructive buildup of thermal energy. Depending on their design, lasers project may visible or invisible rays—the latter is typical for most combat lasers—though the point affected by a high-energy laser is likely to emit a visible effect.