The prime minister told MPs on Thursday that replacing traditional guns with energy weapons would help solve the problem of troops running out of ammo, and that lasers were among "technologies that >The prime minister told MPs on Thursday that replacing traditional guns with energy weapons would help solve the problem of troops running out of ammo, and that lasers were among "technologies that will revolutionise warfare".

“Our warships and combat vehicles will carry directed energy weapons, destroying targets with inexhaustible lasers. For them, the phrase 'out of ammunition' will become redundant," he told the Commons.

Mr Johnson said his defence modernisation package would "end the era of retreat" and "upgrade our capabilities across the board" when it came to the armed forces.

The prime minister has also announced the creation of a new Space Command wing of the military, and said he would give British troops the ability to overwhelm their enemies by launching "a swarm attack by drones".

He also said the UK’s new aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth would next year lead a task group to East Asia, in a challenge to China that the prime minister described as “our most ambitious deployment for two decades”.

“We shall deploy more of our naval assets in the world’s most important regions, protecting the shipping lanes that supply our nation,” he said.

Mr Johnson announced that the Ministry of Defence would get a four-year financial settlement, in contrast to other government departments whose finances are only set to be guaranteed for a single year.

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said: “We welcome this additional funding for our defence and security forces. And we agree that it’s vital to end what the Prime Minister called, I’d say with complete lack of self awareness, an era of retreat.”

Sir Keir said that it was under Conservative-led government over the past decade that defence spending had fallen by £8bn in real terms and regular forces had fallen by a quarter, while a £13bn black hole had opened up in MoD equipment budgets.

“The additional funding today is on foundations that have been seriously weakened over the last 10 years,” said the Labour leader.

Sir Keir said that the announcement of additional funding before the publication of the planned integrated review of the UK’s defence priorities meant there was “no clarity” about the government’s strategy.

And he added: “How will this announcement be paid for?

“Such is the government’s handling of the pandemic that the UK has the sharpest economic downturn of any G7 country.

“Next week the Chancellor will have to come here and set out the consequences of that. So can the Prime Minister tell us today, will the commitments he’s made require additional borrowing, mean tax rises - and if so, which ones? - or will have money have to come from other departmental budgets?”

He challenged the PM to come clean on whether he would keep to the manifesto to spend 0.7 per cent of GDP on aid, warning that failure to do so “would not only undermine public trust, but also hugely weaken us on the global stage.”

  • Civility [none/use name]
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    edit-2
    4 years ago

    The fuck.

    Laser weapons are banned internationally under the Protocol on Blinding Laser Weapons which the UK and 108 other nations signed. Weapons designed to maim have been against the rules of war since forever and It's almost impossible to kill a person, let alone a ship, using a laser without also blinding everyone in their general vicinity and also anyone who happens to be looking at the laser gun at the time.

    Limiting the use of especially fucked up armaments has been one of the best things liberal internaitonalism has accomplished. Incredibly bad sign if the Brits are deciding to blatantly flaunt anti-war crime treaties they're members of.

    • aaaaaaadjsf [he/him, comrade/them]
      ·
      4 years ago

      You won't be able actually see the laser, it's invisible, at least that's how the US version works.

      https://youtu.be/tyUh_xSjvXQ

      • Civility [none/use name]
        ·
        edit-2
        4 years ago

        The US Navy has actually explicitly stated the main purpose of their latest ODIN laser is to blind sensors and it would be a warcrime to point it at a human.

        ODIN is what is known as a dazzler laser. That is, it's one of a class of lasers that are intended to blind or distract rather than destroy. Though the legality of using such lasers against human pilots restricts them to only distracting the person by acting like the glare of oncoming headlamps, such lasers can also disable or destroy delicate optical sensors on drones.

        Some research indicates that the laser system in the video was almost certainly a "LaWS" which the US navy has said (warcrime alert!)

        According to the Navy, LaWS is capable of handling small attack boats, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), and other asymmetric targets, and has a wide range of settings, ranging from the ability to "dazzle" people and sensors without destroying them

        is capable of "dazzling" people without "destroying" them.

          • Civility [none/use name]
            ·
            edit-2
            4 years ago

            Yah, just edited

            The one in the video looks like LaWS, which is being phased out now they've developed ODIN and also "dazzled" (read:blinded) any humans it was pointed at.