The next generation of military drones, unveiled by a leading US manufacturer, will not just carry a limited supply of rockets – but will likely be fitted with an ultra-light laser, capable of repeatedly destroying objects at the speed of light. “It would give us an unlimited magazine,” a person close to the High Energy Liquid Laser Area Defense System (HELLADS) program told Time magazine. Over the past four years, the Defense Advance Research Project Agency (DARPA) has given contractor General Atomics over $60 million to develop and then scale HELLADS – a powerful 150 kW ray with a difference. Current lasers of that strength – enough to destroy an incoming rocket or plane – are bulky, citeste si comenteaza …

The United States Department of Defense is in the initial stages of creating unmanned drone submarines that will navigate the oceans, tracking and following enemy subs for months at a time. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), which is responsible for developing new military technologies, started the project because “the growing number of adversaries able to build and operate quiet diesel electric submarines is a national security threat that affects US and friendly naval operations around the world,” according to a statement on the DARPA website. Normally, anti-submarine warfare has been conducted by US Navy captains at the helm of ships, but humans will never board these drones, citeste si comenteaza …