Laser

U.S. Marine Corps legacy F/A-18C/D Hornets are in line to add air-to-air optimized versions of the 70mm Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System II (APKWS II) rocket to their arsenal. This will give the jets an important, lower-cost boost in their ability to take down drones, as well as certain cruise missiles. APKWS II has already become a principal air-to-air counter-drone weapon for the U.S. force, which began using the rockets in this way on F-16 Vipers back in 2024, and has now extended the capability to the F-15E Strike Eagle and A-10 Warthog.

The recently released 2026 Marine Corps Aviation Plan highlighted a “high-density low-cost counter-Unmanned Aerial Systems (C-UAS)/cruise missile capability” as a top funding priority for the service’s F/A-18C/D fleet. The Marines currently have some 125 legacy Hornets in service, which have been receiving other key upgrades and additions to their arsenal in recent years to help ensure their relevance ahead of their expected retirement around the end of the decade.

“The Legacy Hornet continues to generate increased lethality, relevance, and survivability through its final fit,” a Marine Corps spokesperson told TWZ when asked for more information. “Addressing the C-UAS and Cruise missile capability, the F/A-18 has a previously funded, U.S.C. Title X-compliant requirement to incorporate the APKWS in an air-to-air mode and LAU-115/LAU-127 [missile launch rails] to integrate with the AIM-9X.”

Marine legacy Hornets already have the ability to employ the AIM-9X Sidewinder, so it is unclear exactly what changes are being made in this regard, and TWZ has reached back out for details. It is possible that this could entail work to increase the total number of AIM-9Xs the jets can carry at once. The U.S. Navy pursued a similar crash upgrade program for its F/A-18E/F Super Hornets back in 2024 in response to an urgent need for increased capacity to shoot down drones being employed by Iranian-backed Houthi militants in Yemen.

The decision to integrate the air-to-air APKWS II capability onto Marine F/A-18C/Ds is more clear cut, and is a logical development. The Air Force has already proven that the rockets are capable anti-air weapons against drones in real combat, which TWZ was first to report. The service initially disclosed that it was experimenting with using APKWS II in this role back in 2019. This is a capability that may also now be in service in Ukraine on that country’s second-hand F-16s, and could be set to appear elsewhere globally. The laser-guided rockets have separately demonstrated their ability to knock down drones when used as surface-to-air weapons in the course of the ongoing conflict in Ukraine.

APKWS II was originally designed as an air-to-surface weapon, and Marine legacy Hornets can already employ them in this mode. The rockets also have a demonstrated surface-to-surface capability. Each one of the rockets has three main parts: a 70mm rocket motor at the rear, one of several standardized warhead options at the front, and a laser guidance section in between.

APKWS, The Innovation Continues

The air-to-air optimized variant, designated the AGR-20F and also referred to as the Fixed Wing, Air Launched, Counter-Unmanned Aircraft Systems Ordnance (FALCO), incorporates a proximity fuze and changes to the munition’s guidance and sensing algorithms.

In the air-to-air role, APKWS II offers valuable cost and magazine depth benefits. The unit cost for the APKWS II guidance section has historically been between $15,000 and $20,000. 70mm rocket motors run in the $1,000 to $2,000 range. The price point for warheads fluctuates more widely, given the breadth of options available, as you can read about more here. By comparison, current generation AIM-9Xs each cost around $450,000, while the latest versions of the AIM-120 Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile (AMRAAM) have price tags around $1 million.

For tactical jets like the Marine Corps’ legacy Hornets, APKWS II rockets also come loaded in seven-shot pods. At most, an F/A-18C/D can carry up to 12 traditional air-to-air missiles at once, spread across its wingtip, underwing, and intake stations. However, many of those stations are often taken up by range-extending drop tanks and/or podded sensors. Substituting just one seven-shot pod for a single air-to-air missile would give a jet six more engagement opportunities during a sortie. Multiple pods can also be carried on certain pylons, further increasing the aircraft’s magazine depth.

U.S. operations in recent years against the Houthis in Yemen, as well as in the defense of Israel from Iranian drone and missile attacks, have underscored the importance of more total anti-air capacity, as well as capability. Complex attacks involving large volumes of disparate threats present a real danger of simply overwhelming defenders. This was made clear during Iran’s strikes on Israel in April 2024, when American fighters had to land to rearm and refuel after running out of missiles, all while threats were still passing overhead. In that instance, Air Force F-15E Strike Eagle crews had also unsuccessfully attempted to down Iranian drones with Laser Joint Direct Attack Munition (LJDAM) precision-guided bombs – something else TWZ was first to report – and their aircraft’s built-in 20mm M61 Vulcan cannon.

The specific pairing of air-to-air optimized versions of APKWS II with Marine legacy Hornets will also benefit from the new AN/APG-79(V)4 radars that those aircraft have been receiving in recent years. The APG-79(V)4 is an active electronically scanned array (AESA) type that can ‘see’ further, scan faster, and spot and track targets, even smaller ones, with greater accuracy compared to the previous APG-73 type on the Marine jets.

In their current form, FALCO rockets still have to be guided to their target via laser. This, in turn, requires the active lazing of that target throughout the entire engagement cycle, either by aircraft launching the rocket or another platform. This imposes limits on how fast a launch platform can move on from engaging one target to the next. BAE Systems, the APKWS II’s prime contractor, is now working on a new dual-mode guidance system that adds in an imaging infrared seeker. What this will allow for has been described as a pseudo-fire-and-forget capability, as the rocket would still have to be cued to the target initially via laser.

It should also be stressed that the APKWS II is not a dogfighting weapon. The drones and subsonic cruise missiles that the rockets are capable of engaging are relatively steady, non-reactionary, low-performance targets.

Still, APKWS II has clearly emerged as a valuable, if not increasingly critical, lower-cost companion to traditional air-to-air missiles. As already noted, other countries are beginning to at least take notice. For instance, consideration is being given to adding them to the arsenal of the Eurofighter Typhoon.

More platforms are likely to gain this capability in the future. Given the Navy’s own experiences in operations in and around the Red Sea against the Houthis, it is increasingly curious that there has been no announcement of adding air-to-air versions of the APKWS II to the arsenal available for that service’s F/A-18E/F Super Hornets. The discrepancy is even more pronounced now in light of the Marine Corps’ plans for its legacy Hornets.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

An AeroVironment LOCUST laser directed energy weapon owned by the U.S. Army was central to the chain of events that led to the recent shutdown of airspace around El Paso, Texas, according to Reuters. Though many questions still remain to be answered about how the flight restrictions came to be imposed, LOCUST was designed to respond to exactly the kinds of drones that regularly fly across the southern border from Mexico.

Readers can get caught up on what is known about the clampdown in the skies above El Paso on Wednesday in initial reporting here.

Multiple outlets had already reported yesterday that the use of a laser counter-drone system was a key factor in the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) sudden decision to impose the temporary flight restrictions over El Paso. Reuters‘ report says “two people briefed on the situation” identified the laser system in question as LOCUST. TWZ has reached out to AeroVironment and the U.S. Army for more information. U.S. Northern Command (NORTHCOM), which oversees U.S. military operations in and around the homeland, declined to comment.

Last July, the U.S. military released a picture, seen below, showing Army personnel assigned to Joint Task Force-Southern Border (JTF-SB) conducting sling-load training with a LOCUST mounted on a 4×4 M1301 Infantry Squad Vehicle (ISV) at Fort Bliss. This had prompted some speculation that LOCUST systems might be in use along the U.S. border with Mexico. JTF-SB was established in March 2025 to oversee a surge in U.S. military support to the border security mission. Fort Bliss, situated in El Paso, is a major hub for those operations. It is also home to the 1st Armored Division and a significant number of Army air defense units.

As of December 2025, the U.S. Army was known to have taken delivery of LOCUST systems in at least three different configurations, including the ISV-based type. The service has also received 4×4 Joint Light Tactical Vehicles (JLTV) equipped with the laser and a palletized version. In 2022, the Army confirmed the operational deployment of two of the palletized systems to unspecified foreign locales. The full extent of the service’s operational use of LOCUST since then, abroad or at home, is unclear.

The U.S. Marine Corps has also moved to acquire JLTV-based LOCUST systems, and other configurations have been put forward in the past. AeroVironment completed is acqusition of BlueHalo, the original developer of LOCUST, last year.

At LOCUST’s core is a 20-kilowatt-class laser directed energy weapon. This is at the lower end of the power spectrum for this new era of laser directed energy weapons, and the system is explicitly geared toward the countering small drones mission set.

The turreted system also includes built-in electro-optical and infrared video cameras for target acquisition and tracking. It can be cued to threats by tertiary sensors, including small-form-factor high-frequency radars and passive radio frequency signal detection systems mounted on the vehicles themselves, as well as traditional radars, and other capabilities positioned elsewhere. The Army’s ISV and JLTV-based configurations both feature small radars.

LOCUST Laser Weapon System

As a relatively small system itself, LOCUST offers additional benefits in terms of mobility and flexibility. Road-mobile versions can readily deploy and redeploy to different locations in response to shifting threats. As the sling load training picture shows, versions of the system can be readily airlifted by helicopters, allowing for rapid movement to remote locales. Palletized configurations offer different types of flexibility for providing point defense at sites on land, and could potentially be installed on ships, as well.

In general, laser directed energy weapons offer the promise of functionally unlimited magazine depth, as long as there is sufficient power and cooling capacity. They also present a drastically lower cost-per-intercept proposition compared to traditional anti-air interceptors. This is all advantageous for engaging drones, particularly smaller and cheaper designs that can still present very significant threats. The dangers posed by uncrewed aerial systems are only set to grow as networked swarming and automated targeting capabilities, enabled by advances in artificial intelligence and machine learning, become more accessible. Defenders already face real risks of just being overwhelmed by attacks involving volumes of drones.

Depending on their power level, laser weapons are envisioned as being employed against larger, as well as higher and faster flying targets, such as cruise missiles, in the future. As already noted, LOCUST is not in that power category and is focused on going after small drones, like quadcopter.

With these promised benefits in mind, the Army has been very active in its pursuit of multiple tiers of ground-based laser directed energy weapon systems, with power ratings ranging from 5 to 300 kilowatts, for years now. This includes the 50-kilowatt Directed Energy Maneuver Short-Range Air Defense (DE M-SHORAD) system based on the Stryker light armored vehicle and a truck-mounted 300-kilowatt design for the Indirect Fires Protection Capability-High Energy Laser (IFPC-HEL) effort. Many of these systems have been primarily intended to serve as stepping stones to future operational capabilities. In recent years, there have been a number of additional laser directed energy development efforts, often focused on the counter-drone mission, across the U.S. military, and for use in the air and naval domains, as well as by forces on land.

As mentioned, the Army received its first versions of LOCUST in the early 2020s, as part of a rapid prototyping effort called the Palletized-High Energy Laser (P-HEL). The service tested multiple laser weapon designs under P-HEL. The Army has acquired the ISV and JLTV-based configuration through a follow-on effort called the Army Multi-Purpose High Energy Laser (AMP-HEL).

At the same time, a laser like LOCUST can only engage a single target at once. Lower-powered lasers need to dwell on their targets for a longer period of time in order to cause significant damage by burning a hole in them, as well. This limits the number of targets a single system can engage in a given window of time.

In addition, the power of any laser beam drops as it propagates through the atmosphere further and further away from its source. Weather and other environmental factors like smoke and dust can also distort the beam and reduce its power. All of this only adds to the aforementioned dwell time. Adaptive optics, and just more power overall, can help produce useful effects at greater distances, but laser weapons continue to have short ranges, typically measured in handfuls of miles, as a general rule. As an aside, LOCUST was originally described as a 10-kilowatt system and a version has at least been demonstrated with a 26-kilowatt power rating. How much more can be scaled up within the existing form factor is unclear.

The Army, as well as other branches of the U.S. military, have repeatedly acknowledged challenges in fielding laser directed energy weapon systems. Sensitivity to vibration, humidity, dust, and sand, as well as fragile optics and cooling demands, have all created further complications for operating and sustaining these systems in real-world environments. In 2024, Doug Bush, then Assistant Secretary of the Army for Acquisition, Logistics, and Technology, did tell members of the Senate Armed Services Committee that unspecified laser weapons emplaced at fixed sites “are proving successful” for “some” users. This was seen at the time as a likely reference to the overseas deployment of the palletized version of LOCUST.

U.S. military officials regularly stress that lasers are not a ‘silver bullet’ solution to the problem of drones or other aerial threats, and they expect to field them as part of layered defense networks. High-power microwave directed energy weapons and electronic warfare systems have also steadily emerged as key parts of future counter-drone ecosystems, especially for responding to swarm attacks. The pursuit of lasers, specifically, to defeat drones, as well as cruise missiles and potentially other targets, is a growing trend globally, as well. In the naval domain, lasers are also seen as valuable additions to ships for point defense against small watercraft.

Drones, especially smaller types, present their own additional challenges, in general, when it comes to detection and tracking, let alone engaging them with any effector. This has been underscored in reporting surrounding the recent temporary flight restrictions over El Paso.

Official statements so far from the Trump administration have said that the clampdown on the airspace around El Paso resulted from the response to a cross-border incursion of drones operated by Mexican drug cartels, something that happens on a near-daily basis. Questions have since been raised about exactly when the incident the administration has cited may have occurred and whether any drones were actually involved in that particular case.

“The [laser] anti-drone technology was launched near the southern border to shoot down what appeared to be foreign drones,” according to a story yesterday from CBS News, which was among the first to report on that detail. “The flying material turned out to be a party balloon, sources said. One balloon was shot down, several sources said.”

Other outlets, also citing anonymous sources, have since reported on the use of a laser directed energy weapon to down one or more innocuous balloons along the southern border earlier this week. However, the exact relationship between those engagements and the temporary flight restrictions remains murky.

However, “the Mexican cartels have been running drones on the border lately, the sources said, but it was unclear how many were hit by the military’s anti-UAS (unmanned aircraft systems) technology this week,” CBS News‘ report yesterday had also noted. “One official said at least one cartel drone was successfully disabled.”

It has also now been widely reported that U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) personnel have been the ones actually operating the laser systems along the border through an agreement with the U.S. military. This speaks to additional ongoing complications surrounding domestic authorities for responding to drone threats, something TWZ has explored in detail in the past. This is despite significant changes to policies that allow for broader and more rapid responses within the United States, at least on the U.S. military side, just in recent weeks.

Furthermore, a breakdown in coordination between the Army, CBP, and the FAA over the use of lasers along the border, operationally and/or in testing, looks to have been a central factor in the decision to shut down the airspace around El Paso based on the reporting to date.

“My team has been working with the FAA, DOW [Department of War], and others to gather more information about this morning’s temporary airspace closure in El Paso,” Texas Senator Ted Cruz, a Republican, wrote in a post on X yesterday. “I’m hopeful more details can be publicly shared in the coming days on interagency coordination.”

“The amount of misinformation being spread – including by the White House – is alarming and unhelpful,” Veronica Escobar, the Democrat who currently represents the El Paso area in the House of Representatives, also wrote yesterday in a series of posts on X. “To be clear: this was the result of incompetence at the highest levels of the administration.”

More details are yet to come about the exact circumstances surrounding the flight restrictions imposed this week around El Paso. What has already emerged points to a growing use, or at least desire to use, laser directed energy weapons like LOCUST to challenge the current flow of uncrewed aerial systems across the southern border from Mexico.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

The recent use of a laser directed energy weapon to down an aerial object near El Paso, Texas, and its chaotic aftermath, highlight the policy challenges and impediments the U.S. still faces in defending against drone incursions over the homeland. These are major national security concerns and a topic The War Zone has been reporting on for years.

The latest chapter in the ongoing saga of U.S. efforts to begin countering small drone incursions over the country began last week. Reacting to what they thought was a drone operated by a Mexican drug cartel, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) personnel reportedly used a laser directed energy weapon to take down the object, which multiple reports say turned out to be a Mylar balloon. The system, which Reuters identified as a AeroVironment LOCUST laser counter-drone weapon, was lent to CBP by the U.S. Army. This is the first publicly known instance of an object being shot down over the U.S. with a laser in an operational setting.

You can read more about LOCUST and how it works in our story here.

The use of the LOCUST came as the FAA was working on “a safety assessment of the risks the new technology could pose to other aircraft,” The New York Times reported. “F.A.A. officials had warned the Pentagon that if they were not given sufficient time and information to conduct their review, they would have no choice but to shut down the nearby airspace.”

The tug of war between the Pentagon and FAA – which led to a shutdown of airspace over the nation’s 23rd largest city – is a glaring example of the convoluted and conflicting authorities the U.S. relies on to deal with the increasing threat posed by drones.

The FAA did not respond to our request for comment. We also reached out to U.S. Northern Command and AeroVironment for comment.

However, safety concerns about using directed energy weapons, and especially kinetic ones, to take down drones in the U.S. have been a major factor in why they aren’t employed in this role. 

A little less than a year and a half ago, officials at U.S. Northern Command (NORTHCOM), which has coordinating authority for counter-drone efforts in the U.S., said the use of such weapons was not yet on the table. The reason is that they can create dangerous or otherwise serious collateral effects that are not a concern in a war zone.

“The biggest thing right now is the impact of the laser when it moves beyond its target,” NORTHCOM Deputy Test Director Jason Mayes said of laser directed energy weapons for counter-drone use. “You know, how far is it going? What’s that going to do? How long does the laser need to remain on target before it begins to inflict damage and so on, right?”

Mayes, speaking to a small group of reporters, including from The War Zone at Falcon Peak 2025, a counter-drone experiment at Peterson Space Force Base in October 2024, also raised questions about whether the laser beam could impact aircraft or even satellites passing by, as well as things on the ground like “hikers up on a hill.”

The military has been working to mitigate those concerns, Mayes proffered at the time.

“I think that we could get to a point where we have approval for that here in the homeland,” he posited.

The video below shows a test of a U.S. Navy shipboard laser directed energy weapon capable of being employed against drones.

USS Portland (LPD 27) tests LWSD laser system

It is unclear when the approval to use laser counter-drone weapons came or how extensive such permissions have been. We also don’t know if the LOCUST system, understood to have been stationed at nearby Fort Bliss, was sent there under a pilot program established under the Fiscal Year 2026 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). It calls for at least four military installations to be used to speed up the development of counter-drone efforts at bases across the country. The measure includes systems “capable of destroying or disabling a small unmanned aircraft by means of high-powered microwave, laser, or other similar technology.”

Fort Bliss is also home to a significant portion of the Army’s air defense units, which are increasingly charged with the counter-drone mission. The base is also a major hub for border security operations, which the U.S. military often conducts in cooperation with law enforcement agencies, as well.

The future domestic use of laser counter-drone weapons remains an open question, but the NDAA pilot program gives the military additional authorities under existing statutes to at least test them. Still, as we have frequently noted, a confusing and often competing set of federal laws governing the use of counter-drone systems domestically impacted the ability to defend against these threats. The El Paso situation is a case in point of how challenging this can be.

NORTHCOM has authority over the troops and equipment, in this case a laser system, to take down the drones. However, federal laws limit where and when the military can use these systems, which is a large reason why CBP was involved.

In advance of the U.S. hosting the 2026 World Cup and 2028 Olympic Games, the Trump administration pushed to expand counter-drone authorities. Congress granted that when it passed the Fiscal Year 2026 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA).

Under a federal law known as 124n, “the Departments of Homeland Security (DHS) and Justice (DOJ, including CBP, have limited authority to mitigate drone threats domestically to protect covered facilities or assets,” Scott Shtofman, Vice President & Counsel, Regulatory Affairs for the Association for Uncrewed Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI), told us. “That authority has been extended and expanded, under the Safer Skies Act of the NDAA, to certain certified state, local, Tribal, and territorial agencies operating under federal training and oversight.”

Still, “it’s not a blanket nationwide shoot down power and only applies in defined threat situations,” he added. 

Meanwhile, under another federal statute commonly referred to as 130(i), “DoW can mitigate drone threats to protect military installations and missions inside the U.S., but it does not have general domestic airspace policing authority,” Shtofman posited.

However, the Pentagon is working to expand its counter-drone capabilities. 

In January, the recently created Joint Interagency Task Force (JIATF) 401 announced updated guidance for counter-unmanned aerial systems (UAS) operations. The move empowered installation commanders “to take decisive action to protect military facilities, assets, and personnel within the homeland,” according to a press release at the time.

“The guidance, signed by the Secretary of War on December 8, 2025, streamlines and consolidates existing policies for detecting and mitigating UAS under the authority of 10 U.S. Code § 130i,” the release added, referring to another one of the laws governing domestic counter-small drone efforts. “It addresses the direct and growing threat posed by the proliferation of inexpensive and capable UAS. This updated framework provides commanders with the expanded authority and flexibility needed to dominate the airspace above their installations.”

Among other things, the new rules eliminate restrictions on defense perimeters that reduced installation commanders’ abilities to protect against drones.

“The previous ‘fence-line’ limitation has been removed, giving commanders a larger defensive area and greater decision space to protect covered facilities and assets,” the new rules state.

In earlier reporting, we noted that not all installations were considered “covered” to take down drones. The new rules permit service secretaries to determine which installations should be covered, to increase the number.

Beyond that, the Pentagon is now allowed to share “UAS track and sensor data among interagency partners, including the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Department of Justice (DOJ). It also allows for the use of trained and certified contractor personnel as C-sUAS operators.”

“Every commander has the inherent right to self-defense,” the Pentagon told us. “The Department of War will defend its personnel and assets from illicit UAS activity in accordance with our authority under title 10 Section 130i, and the standing rules for the use of force.”

In addition to the numerous drone incursions over U.S. installations that we have frequently covered, cross-border cartel drone operations are a chronic issue, and we have been calling attention to the growing dangers they pose for many years now. Controversy over the El Paso incident was magnified after the White House insisted that the U.S. shot down a cartel drone flying over the border, which was later contradicted by the reporting that it was a mylar balloon.

Regardless of what it was, small drones remain a clear and present danger to the U.S. Whether new technology and additional authorities to use them will make a difference is an open question.

Update: 8:31 PM Eastern –

A U.S. official responded with answers to some of our questions.

1. The limit on the distance installation commanders can counter drones is the capability of their counter-UAS systems and the ability to coordinate with local authorities and communities.
2. No sites have been chosen yet for the counter-drone pilot program.
3. To his knowledge, the El Paso incident was the first time a directed energy weapon had been used against illicit drones in the homeland.
4. There are no statutory preclusions to using directed energy weapons against drones in the homeland.

Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com

The U.S. Navy’s Arleigh Burke class destroyer USS Preble used its High-Energy Laser with Integrated Optical Dazzler and Surveillance (HELIOS) system to down four drones in a demonstration last year, Lockheed Martin has shared. Earlier this month, the Navy’s top officer said his goal is for directed energy weapons to become the go-to choice for warship crews when it comes to defending against close-in threats. However, the service has continued to face significant hurdles in fielding operational laser weapon systems.

“Speaking of amazing technology, we successfully used a shipboard laser system, Lockheed Martin’s HELIOS, to knock an incoming UAV [uncrewed aerial vehicle] right out of the sky,” the company’s CEO Jim Taiclet said during a quarterly earnings call last week. “The HELIOS weapon system successfully neutralized four drone threats in a U.S. Navy-operated counter-UAS [uncrewed aerial systems] demonstration at sea, showcasing an opportunity to eliminate drone attacks using lasers, and saving U.S. and allied air defense missiles for more advanced threats.”

TWZ reached out to Lockheed Martin, the prime contractor for HELIOS, for more information and was directed to comments from Navy Vice Adm. Brendan McLane at the Surface Navy Association’s (SNA) annual symposium in January. McLane is the commander of Naval Surface Force, U.S. Pacific Fleet. As the Navy’s top surface warfare officer, he is also often referred to by the title SWOBOSS.

“The Surface Navy has a rare opportunity with leadership aligned on delivering lethality, capability, and capacity at speed. As an enterprise, we must continue to think big as we develop the future platforms within the world. We must lay the foundations for the systems on those ships now so that they deliver on their promise to the American people,” McLane had said at the SNA conference. “Continued iteration with USS Preble’s HELIOS laser weapons system is another example of this. Last fall, successful at-sea testing paved the way for future laser weapons systems. We need to continue on this path. I am committed to advancing laser technology to the fleet. The dream of a laser on every ship can become a real one.”

TWZ has also reached out to the Navy for more information.

HELIOS, which also carries the designation Mk 5 Mod 0, is a 60-kilowatt-class laser directed energy weapon designed to be powerful enough to destroy or at least damage certain targets, such as drones or small boats. As its name indicates, it has a secondary function as a ‘dazzler’ to blind optical sensors and seekers, which could also be damaged or destroyed in the process. In the past, Lockheed Martin has talked about potentially scaling HELIOS’ power rating up to 150 kilowatts.

HELIOS has been integrated on Preble since 2022, and is currently the only Navy ship equipped with the system. Several other Arleigh Burke class destroyers have received lower-powered Optical Dazzling Interdictor (ODIN) laser systems. The Navy has installed more experimental high-energy laser directed energy weapons on other ships in the past.

Preble successfully downed at least one drone using HELIOS in a previous test in 2024. That milestone was disclosed in an annual report from the Pentagon’s Office of the Director of Operational Test and Evaluation (DOT&E) released in January 2025.

A multi-target scenario is a logical evolution in the demonstration of HELIOS’ capabilities. The Navy’s experiences during operations in and around the Red Sea in the past few years have underscored the challenges defenders face at sea and on land when responding to large volume drone attacks. Uncrewed aerial systems layered in with other threats like anti-ship ballistic and cruise missiles present even more complexities. The potential for traditional air defense capabilities to be overwhelmed is real. The level of complexity will only increase as artificial intelligence and machine learning-driven capabilities, including automated targeting and fully networked swarming, keep proliferating globally.

Laser directed energy weapons like HELIOS offer functionally unlimited magazine depth, as long as there is sufficient power and cooling capacity. As Lockheed Martin’s Taiclet noted last week, lasers also offer a way to conserve traditional surface-to-air missiles for use against targets that they might be better optimized against. That is particularly valuable for ships operating in areas where opportunities for rearming may be extremely limited and/or force them to leave their assigned station for an extended period of time.

This all presents cost benefits, too. As an example, the latest versions of the RIM-116 Rolling Airframe Missile (RAM), used for point defense on many Navy ships, each cost around $1 million.

USS Porter Conducts SeaRAM Test Fire

Many warships across the Navy are also equipped with Mk 15 Phalanx Close-In Weapon Systems armed with six-barreled 20mm M61 Vulcan rotary cannons, but the ammunition for those weapons is not unlimited, either. Each Phalanx has enough ammunition to fire for a total of around 30 seconds, at most, at the lower of two rate-of-fire settings, before needing to be reloaded. Many ships across the Navy also have a mixture of other guns, including 5-inch or 57mm main guns, as well as 25mm or 30mm automatic cannons, all of which can also be used against close-in threats.

Phalanx CIWS Close-in Weapon System In Action – US Navy’s Deadly Autocannon

There are still significant questions about the demonstration last fall, including how rapidly the USS Preble was able to shift HELIOS from one target to another and how long it took each one to be effectively neutralized. The proximity of the drones to the ship and what kinds of profiles they were flying are also unknown.

A single laser can only engage one target at once. As the beam gets further away from the source, its power also drops, just as a result of it having to propagate through the atmosphere. This can be further compounded by the weather and other environmental factors like smoke and dust. More power is then needed to produce suitable effects at appreciable distances. Adaptive optics are used to help overcome atmospheric distortion to a degree. Altogether, laser directed energy weapons generally remain relatively short-range systems.

In addition, laser directed energy weapons, especially sensitive optics, present inherent reliability challenges for use in real-world military operations. Shipboard use adds rough sea states and saltwater exposure to the equation. There is also the matter of needing to keep everything properly cooled, which creates additional power generation and other demands.

Despite the hurdles, the U.S. Navy, as well as other navies globally, have continued to pursue laser directed energy weapons, as well as high-power microwaves, because of the capabilities they promise to offer in the face of an ever-expanding drone and missile threat ecosystem. HELIOS and ODIN both feature prominently in the design of the Navy’s future Trump class “battleships.” There has been talk already about the potential for expanding that directed energy arsenal to include lasers with megawatt-class power ratings.

“You know, we have continuous electron beam, free electron lasers today that can scale to megawatt-plus, gigawatt-plus [power ratings],” Navy Adm. Daryl Caudle, Chief of Naval Operations, told TWZ and other outlets at the Surface Navy Association’s (SNA) annual symposium last month. “I’m telling you that I don’t think a one-megawatt laser is beyond what should be on that battery [on the Trump class].”

Beyond the Trump class, “this is my goal, if it’s in line of sight of a ship, that the first solution that we’re using is directed energy,” Caudle also said. “Point defense needs to shift to directed energy. It has an infinite magazine.”

“What that does for me is it improves my loadout optimization, so that my loadout, my payload volume is optimized for offensive weapons,” the Navy’s top officer added. Furthermore, “as you increase power, the actual ability to actually engage and keep power on target, and the effectiveness of a laser just goes up.”

Challenges to the Navy’s directed energy future clearly still remain. In speaking last month, Caudle was optimistic for the future, but he has been open about difficulties in the past. At the SNA symposium in 2025, the admiral, then head of U.S. Fleet Forces Command, said he was “embarrassed” at the state of his service’s directed energy weapon developments.

“I am not content with the pace of directed energy weapons,” Vice Adm. McLane had also said back in 2024. “We must deliver on this promise that this technology gives us.”

This is reflective of broader difficulties that all branches have faced in the development and fielding of laser directed energy weapons, in particular, for use in the air and on the ground, as well as at sea, as you can read more about here.

What we do know is that the Navy continues to use the USS Preble to prove out the HELIOS system, including with the recently disclosed demonstration of its drone-zapping capabilities last fall.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com