Dollar store balloons the world over trembled in fear.
What's exactly the purpose of a laser rifle? Unless you get extremely high amounts of energy in there, I don't think it's close to the lethality of a conventional rifle. I guess the travel time and bullet drop are practically non-existant.
God I really hope it's fake. It looks hideous.
because it's cool... basically
China's resorting to flashlights now, eh?
Seeing how China's active military is friggin huge and now they supposedly have battery powered rifles, first thing that came to mind were the Imperial Guards. I really need to lay off 40k.
Isn't this against like, several conventions due to it not having the power to kill, only to maim(at best), and would also blind the target?
I guess if you really, really need to hit a target a kilometer away and you absolutely cannot miss the first shot due to air conditions, melting their face, eyes, and giving them severe brain damage is the next best thing
You think China gives a shit?
Hell, no major power actually gives a crap about conventions.
AFAIK all the laser sights that most militaries use can EASILY cause permnant eye-damage.
Before people start trying to dive into absolute fantasy territory to try and explain how this one might be possible despite all logic you might also want to consider that China was once caught trying to pass off "Top Gun" footage as being from their military
They're probably using narrowband IR if this is real (it probably isn't), as it'd be the only thing that can propagate well enough through the atmosphere without much scattering/absorption:
http://www.kcvs.ca/martin/astro/kingsu/unit2/51/chp5_1_files/window.jpg
Plus IR lasers have much higher power densities and efficiencies than visible light lasers.
I'm willing to bet this is really only as a dazzler which already has several lighter weight alternatives. Plus if you wanted to deliver an amount of thermal energy, you'd have a better bet of a microwave cannon which we already have in the form of the Active Denial System.
Read that as "Lancer Assault Rifle"
https://orig00.deviantart.net/c822/f/2011/341/1/6/gears_of_war__mk_2_lancer_assault_rifle_by_fpsrussia123-d4ig1ao.jpg
The most used laser sights only output 4.0 mW for a visible aiming laser, 0.6 mW for an IR aiming laser on lowest output, and 25 mW for an IR aiming laser on the highest output.
Staring directly into it isn't recommended, but it hardly "EASILY causes permanent eye-damage".
Did they weaponize one of those flashlights that make kids go blind
Lasers at around the 65nm frequency can turn the air it touches into a conductor.
Don't lasers dissipate in intensity over distance? Also that thing looks like a flashlight in a plastic box with a digital egg timer as a display.
From the second article:
For instance... law enforcement could counter “illegal protests” by setting fire to banners from a long distance.
It
also says protest leaders could be targeted by setting fire to their
clothing or hair which, the document says, would mean they lose “the
rhythms of their speech and powers of persuasion”.
But one
Beijing police officer said he would prefer to stick to more traditional
crowd-control methods such as tear gas, rubber bullets or electrical
stun guns, such as tasers.
“The laser burn will leave a permanent
scar,” he said. He said it would be a “horrid sight” that risked
causing panic or transforming a peaceful protest into a riot.
China gonna China.
Electrolasers. Wavelengths like that are far from being portable, you'd need to build a free electron laser involving a relatively serious vacuum chamber in order to create an electron beam in along with a serious power source to deliver that energy all the way down to the target as it'll just be absorbed by atmo (And free electron lasers typically only peak at ~10-12% efficiency).
Also good luck building a vacuum chamber that could take the bumps, shakes and bangs of any combat situation. Literal glass cannon.
It's better than using the laser as a weapon
I feel like you'd have to hold the laser on the target for a while before any sizeable damage could be done and thus you'd lose any time advantage. Also, people would just move away or hide when they noticed they were being burned. You'd probably also give away your position quickly the moment you fired the thing.
Pew pew
It could be useful in dealing with small quadcopter drones if it is powerful enough. Infantry in Iraq, Syria, and Ukraine had hard time shooting them down with their conventional rifles and machine guns so a laser that travels at the speed of light would make it easier to down or at least disable their sensors. Currently jammers are used in the C-UAV role.
Right, but so far I haven't seen any reason why it needs to be in a rifle package. You're not going to be able to shoot down a UAV by hand. Just put one in a turret and you'd have a far more effective weapon. No worries about batteries, since it's not carried by a person. No worries about the aim either, we can already shoot down missiles at mach 2 using a conventional cannon on a turret and good sensors.
Why is it a "Laser AK47"
Like what does it have in common at all?
If you ask a journalist what type of gun a rifle is 9 times out of 10 they will call it an AK-47. The other 1 time they will call it an AR-15.
No, now it's just "assault weapon"
Laser weapons really shine (heh) as anti-missile tech because you no longer have to calculate a big target lead, you pretty much just point and shoot to melt the missile apart. There was also a project to develop a maritime weapon against somali pirates that basically snipes the weapons on incoming boats and melts their barrels without damaging the boat or the pirates themselves.
Obviously a laser rifle can do neither of these things though.
Yeah, I know all of that. But why would you ever want it in a rifle package? It limits the power because you need to carry the batteries with you, and you can't reliably hit targets like you can with an automated turret.
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