Laser

Laser Guns in Xinjiang—China’s Futuristic Anti-satellite Weapons

Indian news site ThePrint published an article by retired Col. Vinayak Bhat highlighting China’s recent military advances. Open source satellite images in the article show China’s experimentation with electromagnetic pulse weaponry and mobile pulse generators, aimed to disrupt and disable enemy electronics. Most notably featured in the article is a satellite photo of a directed energy weapons (d.e.w.) facility in China’s northwestern province of Xinjiang. Bhat, a satellite imagery analyst, explained the significance of these futuristic weapons.

The d.e.w. facility in Xinjiang contains several buildings with sliding roofs, underneath which are “laser guns.” Supplied with data from satellite tracking facilities, Bhat wrote that these d.e.w.s can be “used individually or in conjunction with each other, depending on the effect desired on the target satellite—it can be dazzled, disabled or destroyed by high energy lasers from these ground-located d.e.w.s.”