r/technology • u/carmensdiego • Jun 27 '12

US Army to rival powers of Zeus. US Army testing lightning gun.

http://rt.com/usa/news/laser-lightning-us-army-623/
59 Upvotes

84% Upvoted

22 comments sorted by

14

u/Ditrixgaming Jun 27 '12

red alert

9

u/Bugseye Jun 27 '12

I want Tesla Commandos now!

12

u/[deleted] Jun 27 '12

If I had this I'd be keeping it a secret, then when another country got all up in my grill I'd be like BAM!, LIGHTNING GUN BITCHES!!!

6

u/[deleted] Jun 27 '12

first rail gun, now this? what's next, BFG?

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8

u/thegreattacoking Jun 27 '12

Well that was rather shocking

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3

u/Kittil Jun 27 '12

Teslacoil technology has been around for a long time. But this is interesting!

6

u/Tacitus_ Jun 27 '12

Tesla troopers!

Damn, US is stealing Russias shtick.

1

u/TrainOfThought6 Jun 27 '12

Now that the beam is working correctly, the biggest questions surround the combat situations in which LIPC could prove useful.

So they made the damn thing because science is awesome, and now they need to figure out what they can use it for. That's pretty hilarious, actually.

1

u/quotemycode Jun 27 '12

Pretty much only on tanks, current tanks have reactive armor making it difficult to take them down with one blow. A weapon like this could take out the tank's electronics, and engine. It would be a one shot kill weapon, but less destructive.

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1

u/thegreatvortigaunt Jun 27 '12

Sometimes I think, whether they are efficient or not, that energy weapons would be bloody demoralising to the other side. You could win a war just by scaring them with crap electrolaser rifles.