Laser shots and shock waves: the future of weapons is approaching killer robots

The DragonFire, a high-power laser capable of reaching a coin located a kilometer away and costing less than 12 euros per shot, is the latest weapon model that the British Ministry of Defense has successfully tested.

The current wars have accelerated military technological developments to bring them closer to autonomous weapons or killer robots.

Today, the soldier can be thousands of kilometers from the objective and become a secondary actor in a deadly action.

The industry of death is becoming more sophisticated and incorporating hypersonic missiles, unmanned ships or kinetic cannons while the powers repeatedly evade the regulation of weapons.

“States are literally still trapped in a diplomatic process in the midst of arms competition.

They make things dizzy by delaying decision-making.

There is no transparency or true exchange of information about the research and findings they carry out and they are dedicated to distracting themselves to keep us distracted,” says Reyes Jiménez, professor at the Pablo de Olavide University and member of the United Nations group on lethal autonomous weapons systems ( LAWS).

This “arms competition” has shown an accelerated race in the last year.

These are some of the developments:

Directed energy weapons

.

The DragonFire, in which 117 million euros have been invested, is an example of energy weapons that, according to the British Government, “can attack targets at the speed of light and use an intense beam to pass through them, causing a structural failure or more shocking results.”

Its low cost, “equivalent to using a domestic heater for one hour,” makes this technology a candidate to replace missiles.

High energy laser developed by Lockheed Martin for the United States.Lockheed Martin

“This type of next-generation weaponry has the potential to revolutionize the battlefield by reducing reliance on expensive munitions and the risk of collateral damage,” says UK Defense Secretary Grant Shapp.

The North American Pentagon is also researching these technologies for attack missions and against cruise missiles.

The Navy of this country has tested several directed energy systems and prototypes, but they have only been installed on some ships on an experimental basis.

Hypersonic missiles.

Hypersonic

Attack Cruise Missiles

(HACM) are capable of flying at speeds exceeding Mach 5 (five times the speed of sound or 6,174 kilometers per hour) and maneuvering while traveling through the atmosphere, making them much more difficult to detect and intercept in comparison with traditional ballistic missiles.

Oleksandr Ruvin, director of the Forensic and Scientific Research Institute of Ukraine shows remains of a Russian hypersonic missile (Kh-47 Kinzhal) on May 12. VALENTYN OGIRENKO (REUTERS)

The United States Air Force has awarded a contract worth 1,407 million dollars (1,291 million euros) to the Raytheon company for its development and first delivery.

“The new funds will allow the company to carry out complementary research, development, test and evaluation work for the HACM program through 2028,” a military spokesperson tells

DefenseScoop

.

Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov has admitted using Kinzhal hypersonic missiles to attack “key elements of Ukrainian military infrastructure.”

China also claims to have this weaponry and has simulated a naval attack complemented by the use of satellites to interfere with the action of radars and make them undetectable.

More information

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Electromagnetic attacks

.

This latest Chinese test shows a new strategy aimed at electromagnetic systems.

These attacks, according to a recent document from the United States Air Force, “seek access to communications, navigation and location systems” to “detect, exploit, degrade, disrupt and circumvent operational capabilities.”

General Atomics Electromagnetic Systems (GA-EMS) prototype railgun based on electromagnetic launchers that use electricity instead of chemical propellants to fire projectiles at high velocities.General Atomics Electromagnetic Systems

Kinetic energy

.

Using the same electromagnetic technology, but with other applications, China is also experimenting with weapons based on non-explosive projectiles that reach hypersonic speeds and convert kinetic energy into destructive shock and heat waves.

According to the

South China Morning Post

, Huang Jie, from the China Aerodynamic Research and Development Center, has carried out simulations that show that a 20-kilogram solid sphere at four times the speed of sound can disable a tank weighing between 40 and 60 tons. .

This is because the shock wave generated by the impact travels through the vehicle, concentrating stress on critical structural areas and causing distortion and fractures.

The United States has also investigated this type of development proposed by General Atomics Electromagnetic Systems.

Low-altitude stalking and attack artillery

.

Known by their acronym in English as LASSO, these weapons are lethal unmanned systems designed to be carried by troops.

They consist of a short cannon for launching, a drone with a deadly payload, sensors and precision flight controls.

They have the ability to fly, track and attack non-line-of-sight targets and armored vehicles.

Todd Hinning, CEO of AeroVironment, presents the LASSO Switchblade 600 model. AeroVironment

Subsonic drones

.

The use of swarms of drones is already familiar in war scenarios.

Now the aim is to provide them with greater destructive capacity.

The Anduril company has presented a drone designed to intercept and destroy enemy aircraft before returning to its base to be reused.

“The unmanned system, called Roadrunner, is an autonomous aerial vehicle powered by two jets that can take off and land vertically and fly at high subsonic speed,” according to the company.

Image of an Anduril Roadrunner during a vertical takeoff.Anduril

In this field, but with another strategy, the Air Launched Effects (ALE) program seeks small drones or payloads that can be launched from the air by larger aircraft, whether manned or not.

Vessels without crew

.

Similar to the well-known aerial drones, the so-called Unmanned Surface Vessels are autonomous vessels designed for anti-submarine and mine warfare missions.

The United States has four units and has already tested them in maneuvers recently developed for five months in the Pacific.

Delivery of the first Orca unit developed by Boeing.Boeing

“One of our goals is to put the ships in as diverse situations as we can.

We want to explore where the limitations are, and in doing so, limit the risk associated with unmanned operations,” says Captain Scot Searles, head of the Unmanned Maritime Systems Program.

Last December, the Boeing company delivered the first unit of Orca, an 85-ton, 26-meter long, high-strength underwater drone with a modular payload bay.

It can navigate long distances autonomously and lay mines or perform other missions without a crew on board.

Artificial intelligence

These are just some examples of recent weapons developments, accelerated by the incorporation of artificial intelligence tools, which have been added to all areas of warfare, from system design, including cyber attacks, to the manufacturing and operation of devices.

Joaquín de los Santos, head of Technology Management at Navantia – the second largest company in the Spanish defense industry after Airbus – summarizes this growing incorporation of artificial intelligence during a meeting at the IBM laboratories in Zurich (Switzerland): “First it was used for human resources and the financial and legal departments.

Then in industrial processes, with the creation of digital twins.

Now it has been incorporated into defense scenarios, where quick decisions have to be made, with little data and in isolated and potentially hostile conditions.”

The technological conjunction has led to the development of systems close to those of lethal autonomous weapons, also known as killer robots

,

which worries the international community.

In the last Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons, held last November, more than 100 States have unsuccessfully requested a legally binding instrument on them.

UPO professor Reyes Jiménez is pessimistic after a decade as an observer and participant in attempts to control the risks that the development of robotics and emerging technologies pose for the stability of international security and compliance with human rights.

The majority's proposals go against the rule that any decision be adopted by consensus that the great arms powers prevent time and time again.

“We can say that there has been no significant progress, zero progress,” she laments.

The main obstacle, “the impossibility of formulating a common definition of this type of weapons,” serves as an excuse to “trap States in a vicious circle,” says Jiménez in a work published in the

Electronic Journal of International Studies

.

Some States (United Kingdom, United States, Russia, France, Italy, Japan, Israel, China or South Korea) hide behind the fact that the defenses currently deployed do not cause legal, ethical and humanitarian problems as they cannot be considered autonomous. plenary or LAWS.

These are the ones that, once activated, can select and attack targets without the intervention of a human operator.

However, for a large majority of States and organizations, current weapons already have sophisticated levels of autonomy in some of their critical functions.

Reyes supports the definition of the International Committee of the Red Cross and other Governments and entities.

This considers an autonomous weapon system to be one “that can select (search or detect, identify, track, select) and attack (use force, neutralize, damage or destroy) targets without human intervention.”

Current weapons come close to this definition due to the technology applied to some of their functions.

But, in addition, Jiménez defends its regulations because they also fail to comply with fundamental principles established in international conventions, such as the obligation to distinguish at all times between combatants and civilians (principle of distinction).

Reyes gives as an example HARPY, a weapon that was designed to attack radar systems: “It can recognize them, but it is unable to appreciate if the target is surrounded by people or civilian objects.”

They also violate the principle of proportionality, which prohibits launching attacks when deaths and injuries are expected among the civilian population or when they are excessive compared to the opponent's warlike capacity.

The daily news about wars clearly demonstrates their non-compliance.

In the same sense, the current weapons ignore the precautionary principle in the attack, which must be carried out preserving the population and civilian property.

International conventions establish that combatants do not have an unlimited right to choose their means and methods of war.

Reality shows the opposite.

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