Fighter jets with laser weapons set to take to the skies in 2021 as Lockheed Martin wins $26 million 'Lance' high-energy laser contract

'LANCE' contract will build on technology from the Athena and Aladin lasers $26.3m contract aims to design, develop, and produce system for fighter jets. An airborne platform is smaller, presenting more of a challenge, experts say
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencete...aser-jets.html



Anyone remember the last time the USAF traded up for shiny new weapons systems?


“There was this strange idea in the Department of Defense that the gun was passé,” says military aviation historian Richard P. Hallion. “And the gun has never been passé.” Compared to the missiles of today, he says, the air-to-air missiles arming F-4s and F-8s during Vietnam were primitive and unreliable.