The U.S. Army is looking to Raytheon Intelligence & Space (RI&S) to arm three Stryker combat vehicles with high-energy laser weapons systems by 2022. The 50-kW systems will be deployed by means of a $123 million contract as part of the Army’s Directed Energy Maneuver-Short Range Air Defense (DE M-SHORAD) program. RI&S is operating as a subcontractor in an Other Transaction Authority (OTA) agreement between the Army and KBR subsidiary Kord, which is based in Huntsville, AL. The field-ready systems will provide a combination of lethal laser power and the size and efficiency required to maintain Stryker mobility.
Annabel Flores, vice-president for electronic warfare (EW) systems at RI&S, said: “The U.S. Army is leading the charge to give soldiers the first-ever operational capability of a mobile high-energy laser weapon.” She added: “Two years ago, the Army set a goal to deliver a powerful, maneuverable and proven laser system that was ready for operators to use in the field right away, and our team demonstrated that capability.” RI&S, which has previously delivered high-energy laser weapons systems to the U.S. Air Force, earned the contract following a summer shoot-off at Fort Sill, OK to establish system requirements and the company’s capabilities to meet those requirements. During the shoot-off, soldiers operated the RI&S laser system, tracking, identifying, and engaging different targets. Flores explained: “In just a few days, soldiers went from training to operating the system and engaging targets to providing valuable feedback to our team that will help improve future systems.”
The weapons system features a 50-kW laser, a beam director, an electro-optical/infrared (EO/IR) target acquisition and tracking system and a multiple-mission radar system. In addition to use on all-terrain vehicles (see the figure), future variants of the directed-energy weapon are expected to be deployed on different forms of unmanned aerial systems (UAS) and be capable of performing as a counter UAS system. The DE M-SHORAD contract work will be performed at the RI&S facility in McKinney, TX. RI&S is a business unit of Raytheon Technologies Corp.