Lasers and ICBMs

[Petro]

At 11:39 PM -0700 7/26/01, Alan Olsen wrote:
>On Wed, 25 Jul 2001, Eugene Leitl wrote:
>> On Wed, 25 Jul 2001, Tim May wrote:
>> > A lot of the calculations being sketched out here, of watts/cm^2,
>> > dwell times, gold coatings, etc. are slightly off-base. We've known
>> > for 20+ years that the kill method is to use a short pulse to "push"
>> > (not from the photons' momentum) in the thin wall of an ICBM's fuel
>> Explosive ablation sounds like giant pulses, and chemicals lasers (the
>> only ones known to provide lasing output in the ballpark) don't do these
>> very well. So either you have to fire synchonously from many platforms, or
>> have a veritable Death Star out there in LEO. Several of them, in fact, to
>> maintain an umbrella at all times.
>Why is this reminding me of some of the activities of local Law
>enforcement?
>All of this talk of multiple shots fired, but no mention of what happens
>to those that miss or continue on past the target after hitting it.
>I expect that if they ever do test this thing in low earth orbit or any
>other space bound platform, we may see a few "accidents" that were not
>counted on.  
>"Oops! Accidently hit that communications satilite. Sorry!"
>"Oops! Accidently hit that densely populated urban area!"
>Oops! "Accidently" hit Tim May's house!"

	Big sky, little bullet. 

	Meaning those will happen, but won't be accidents.