They call it asymmetric warfare: our highly sophisticated interceptor missiles – Patriots, THAADs – against Iran's low-tech drones, made of materials you can largely get at your corner hobby store.
While attacks by Iranian drones were down this past week, the amount of damage they have done has come as a jolt. An Iranian drone attack caused the first American casualties of the war when it killed six soldiers in Kuwait. Iranian drones are a drain on the U.S. weapons stockpiles and a threat to the Strait of Hormuz. We have found that in the race for a counter weapon, there are contenders that look like science fiction. Lasers that focus on zapping drones out of the sky.
This is Iranian propaganda footage of its arsenal of drones – that have been menacing the Gulf states: blasting apartment buildings, airports, oil refineries.
These Shahed drones are getting faster, stronger, they can move in swarms, and there are tons of them. Perhaps their greatest advantage – how cheap they are, often made of flimsy plastics. One costs as low as $20,000. To shoot them down, the U.S. is using anti-missile interceptors that cost millions. A possible solution? Lasers.
Wahid Nawabi: It changes the economics on how we can actually defeat and defend against these targets that are now being deployed and produced by tens of thousands.
Wahid Nawabi, is CEO of American defense contractor AeroVironment — AV — that makes lasers that he says solve the money disparity.
Wahid Nawabi: So let me give you an example, a real example. A Patriot missile battery costs about $1 billion to procure one system. Each missile costs about $4 million a shot.
Compare that to a laser:
Wahid Nawabi: The cost per shot goes from $4 million a shot to less than $5 a shot. In most cases about $3 a shot.
That's shocking! The price difference of firing a missile or a laser is like buying a mansion versus a cup of coffee. We visited AV in Albuquerque, where their laser system, called Locust, is built. The top part that looks like Wall-E is the beam director. the deadly ray blasts out of one of the eyes. The base contains batteries as the power source and a cooling system. Each unit costs roughly $8 million – and can be stationary or installed in the back of a truck.
Lesley Stahl: Has it ever been deployed in battle?
Wahid Nawabi: Absolutely, yes. Multiple battles in different theaters around the world.
Lesley Stahl: Can you tell–
Wahid Nawabi: Including against Shaheds.
Lesley Stahl: Are you telling us that it has been deployed in the Middle East?
Wahid Nawabi: Yes.
He said he's not allowed to tell us exactly where, but it is not being used in the current war. That drones have become so pervasive in the war brings up the question: why didn't the U.S. have a cost effective solution ready?
Mara Karlin: They went into this war prepared for certain threats, like missiles. They did not go into this war prepared for other threats like drones hitting soft targets.
Mara Karlin worked at the Pentagon in both Democratic and Republican administrations. Her last job was assistant secretary of defense for strategy, plans, and capabilities.
Lesley Stahl: Is Iran doing anything that surprises you?
Mara Karlin: Not really. If anyone were to war game this out, you knew there were a couple things the Iranian regime would do. They would always look at how to use cheap, tough to counter capabilities like drones in as many spots as possible.
Lesley Stahl: Is there anything within our arsenal to confront the drones?
Mara Karlin: So I can't tell you that there is one magic solution that will do it. And frankly, that's kind of the history of warfare. You find multiple ways to counter different challenges, and then your enemy either catches up or they then get a counter to that counter.
While AV is not a household name, it's a leader in developing drones as well as lasers. But their lasers face stiff competition from some of the giants, including Lockheed Martin and Raytheon. Countries are in the hunt as well: Israel has Iron Beam, part of the Iron Dome. Ukraine has a system. And China just revealed its lasers in a large military parade.
John Garrity: You're going to start tracking it.
John Garrity, who's in charge of the Locust program, showed us how it works. First, Locust's radars find the enemy drone up to seven miles away - as it moves toward the target. Then an operator – in this case: me – locks in on the drone by clicking an ordinary X-Box controller.
John Garrity: I'm gonna have you tap that bumper one more time.
From that point on, the laser tracks the drone as it approaches – using AI.
Lesley Stahl: I don't have to touch anything? It's going to follow the drone wherever it goes, correct?
John Garrity: Yes, exactly. Yup. And that's the beauty of a laser weapon system, that ability to track and take that overhead burden off of the operator.
As it gets 2-3 miles from the system, the final step: destruction.
Lesley Stahl: Tell us about the kill.
John Garrity: So imagine if you will, you're taking a beam of light, or a flashlight and pushing that out several miles away. And that creates enough heat to melt through the plastics or what the material is that these drones are made of.
For a closer look, he had a drone placed in a hangar. The door was bolted, and we observed on monitors outside. John showed me what an operator would do.
John Garrity: Alright Lesley, what I'm going to ask you to do right now is go ahead and pull the trigger.
Watch closely: because the invisible beam travels at the speed of light. Here's the replay. The beam went right through the drone.
John Garrity: You can see there, instantaneously flames. look at the flames coming out of there. That is out of the sky. It is no longer a threat.
This is what the drone looked like afterward.
John Garrity: And so let's go ahead and fire again.
We were able to see the beam through cameras sensitive to infra-red light.
John Garrity: Look at that - isn't that cool! And so what you're seeing there is effectively clear light that's traveling across the sky and hitting the target that you intend.
John Garrity: So the benefit of a laser system is you can just keep on lasing at that target until it goes down.
Lesley Stahl: Can this shoot down 100 drones at the same time?
John Garrity: Because you're only taking one second or less to kill some of these drones, depending on the range.
Lesley Stahl: Oh, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom—
John Garrity: You can quickly go through and complete your mission.
Lesley Stahl: Right now today, is it strong enough to shoot down the Shahed drones that Iran is sending in?
John Garrity: So we've had a lot of great success with those types of drones, and our new Locust system is directly intended to get after that Shahed fight.
As drone technology keeps evolving, lasers have to keep up. Laser technology overall is still relatively young, and experimental.
Ongoing military tests have raised concerns about performance, accuracy, how heavy the battery is, how much energy is required and how effective the beam is in certain weather conditions.
Lesley Stahl: I'm told that there's a lot of trouble with these systems if it rains, if it's humid, if it's sandy like in the desert, if there's fog, if there's dust.
John Garrity: Now when you're talking about does the system operate in rain, well traditionally drones aren't flying in rain.
Lesley Stahl: What about sand and fog and dust?
John Garrity: You know, I won't get into our deployments but I can tell you that our systems have been actively deployed and placed at their battle stations and never had to come inside during any weather events.
We asked Mara Karlin, the former Pentagon official, how laser technology should fit in the U.S. arsenal.
Mara Karlin: That would be an element and has clearly been an effort that has gotten some investment, though surely not enough. But even for the lasers, you've got to be able to figure out where the target is coming from. So do you have sufficient intelligence along those lines? Are you able to make the physics work in terms of what you're actually aiming towards?
Lesley Stahl: So you don't think lasers are a magic bullet?
Mara Karlin: So at this moment in time, they are very valuable. When we are sitting here six months from now, I don't know that will be the case.
But as the war enters its third week, there's an alignment of moments: with laser weapons maturing exactly when less powerful, less expensive military hardware is needed.
Lesley Stahl: Is the U.S. military right now procuring Locust?
Wahid Nawabi: Yes, Lesley. Just this fall, the United States Army requested from us to deliver about $100 million worth of Locust laser directed energy systems.
Turns out, the lasers have been in use since last month - not in the war in Iran, but in the war on drugs at home. We have learned that the Army is routinely shooting down drones operated by cartels along the Mexican border.
Lesley Stahl: Drug smugglers are sending the drugs in by drone?
Wahid Nawabi: Not just one direction. It's a lot easier to fly cash via a drone than to dig a tunnel and then transport it underground.
Lesley Stahl: So it's the Army that is conducting these operations using Locust on the border area?
Wahid Nawabi: I believe the United States Army is working in cooperations with Customs and Border Patrol.
But after Locust was used near West Texas, the Federal Aviation Administration, the FAA, shut down the airspace near the border – twice, causing flight cancellations and cargo diversions.
Lesley Stahl: Do you know why the FAA shut down the airspace over El Paso?
Wahid Nawabi: Because there were some concerns that these systems can interfere and-- hurt commercial airplanes--
Lesley Stahl: Can they?
Wahid Nawabi: --which is not true.
Lesley Stahl: It's not true?
Wahid Nawabi: It is not true.
Lesley Stahl: Well, how do you know it's not true?
Wahid Nawabi: The FAA just this past weekend conducted a series of tests to ensure and demonstrate that the type of system that we've developed cannot and will not defeat or harm a commercial airliner.
Lesley Stahl: So if you aim this beam at a Delta flight it won't burn through it and disable it and crash it?
Wahid Nawabi: The system is designed to not make mistakes like that.
In order for the lasers to be sold to the Gulf states, the Pentagon and the State Department would have to approve the sale because of the national security aspect of the technology. And then there's another issue:
Lesley Stahl: Let's say Bahrain wants 500 of these to protect-- their hotels and all the other targets. Could you send them 500 tomorrow?
Wahid Nawabi: Not tomorrow. Remember, there's a chicken-and-egg thing in here. So far, we've only been authorized and allowed to provide this to the U.S. military. So I cannot go at risk and build $1 billion worth of this stuff when I don't have a contract in place that allows me to have a security or guarantee that somebody's gonna buy it.
The reality is that even if the government gave the go ahead for a sale to the Gulf states tomorrow, it would take months for AV to scale up its laser production.
Produced by Shachar Bar-On and Jinsol Jung. Broadcast associate, Aria Een. Edited by Matthew Lev. Assistant editor, Aisha Crespo.
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