{"id":17571,"date":"2018-07-02T21:50:01","date_gmt":"2018-07-02T21:50:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/c4isrnet\/uncategorized\/2018\/07\/02\/chinas-prototype-laser-rifle-is-a-dangerous-gimmick-at-best\/"},"modified":"2026-08-20T12:27:13","modified_gmt":"2026-08-20T12:27:13","slug":"chinas-prototype-laser-rifle-is-a-dangerous-gimmick-at-best","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/c4isrnet\/electronic-warfare\/2018\/07\/02\/chinas-prototype-laser-rifle-is-a-dangerous-gimmick-at-best\/","title":{"rendered":"China\u2019s prototype laser rifle is a dangerous gimmick at best"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In the fictional grim darkness of the 41st century, lasers guns are the standard infantry firearms. Lasers resonate in science fiction, whether that fiction is set in the future or long ago and far away, but infantry portable directed energy weapons remain solely the realm of fiction, even as nations move closer to deployable laser weapons on vehicles and ships. So what are we, the discerning public raised on a diet of rayguns, to make of the \u201cZKZM-500 laser assault rifle,\u201d a prototype of which was recently field tested at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Shaanxi?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWell, let\u2019s start with this: it is possible to pay me enough to hold it, but I\u2019d probably invalidate my life insurance policy by doing so,\u201d says Phil Broughton, certified laser safety officer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">As reported in the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.scmp.com\/news\/china\/diplomacy-defence\/article\/2153310\/china-brings-star-wars-life-laser-ak-47-could-set-fire\">South China Morning Post<\/a>, the ZKZM-500 is a 15mm caliber weapon that weighs 6.6 pounds, has a range of half a mile, is powered by a rechargeable lithium battery, and built to \u201cfire more than 1,000 \u201cshots,\u201d each lasting no more than two seconds,\u201d all for the intended production price of just $15,000 a rifle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This is a marked contrast from existing directed-energy weapons and prototypes, which require far larger power supplies, are typically mounted on ships or large ground vehicles and, most important, achieve their desired kinetic effect by holding a stead laser beam against a target (like a drone, or a rocket) until the laser has burnt through whatever it is designed to destroy. Firing bursts of lasers like bullets looks good in the movies, but simply doesn\u2019t match present capabilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cTo make this work, you need a serious battery pack, some even more serious capacitors, optics that can take all this without turning back into sand at these energy densities, and rugged enough that you can treat this like military hardware,\u201d says Broughton. \u201cThis is a \u2018best case scenario operation only\u2019 weapon if there ever was one.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Laser weapons designed for use against humans are <a href=\"https:\/\/www.c4isrnet.com\/electronic-warfare\/2018\/04\/27\/whos-testing-a-laser-in-djibouti\/\">prohibited by international law<\/a>, though the laws as written are less firm on incidental use in combat of lasers designed for other purposes. There\u2019s a long <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thedrive.com\/the-war-zone\/20615\/us-military-says-chinese-lasers-injured-pilots-flying-a-c-130-near-its-base-in-djibouti\">history of China<\/a> and other nations specifically designing lasers on the edge of these rules. The ZKZM-500 is officially classified as a being \u201cnon-lethal,\u201d though that designation doesn\u2019t take into account what would happen if a person actually tried firing on and it didn\u2019t work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cIf the battery pack, caps, or the optical train catastrophically fails during a shot,\u201d says Broughton, \u201cyou have a gravely injured soldier who is holding a small wrecked Tesla.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>China claims a prototype laser rifle could soon put directed energy in the hands of infantry soon, but the laser safety experts are skeptical.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":54947,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":12,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[106,12,29,32],"tags":[8477],"coauthors":[3021],"class_list":["post-17571","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-daily-brief","category-electronic-warfare","category-home","category-newsletters","tag-china"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"Y2S4D7XO7ZC65J5ZPPE63WDABE","arc_canonical_url":"\/electronic-warfare\/2018\/07\/02\/chinas-prototype-laser-rifle-is-a-dangerous-gimmick-at-best\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.0 (Yoast SEO v28.1) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>China\u2019s prototype laser rifle is a dangerous gimmick at best - C4ISRNet<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"China claims a prototype laser rifle could soon put directed energy in the hands of infantry soon, but the laser safety experts are skeptical.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"China\u2019s prototype laser rifle is a dangerous gimmick at best\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"China claims a prototype laser rifle could soon put directed energy in the hands of infantry soon, but the laser safety experts are skeptical.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/c4isrnet\/electronic-warfare\/2018\/07\/02\/chinas-prototype-laser-rifle-is-a-dangerous-gimmick-at-best\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"C4ISRNet\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-07-02T21:50:01+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-08-20T12:27:13+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Kelsey D. 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