The Defense Department conducted a rare live demonstration of high-energy laser and high-power microwave weapons for Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, providing one of the clearest signals that the Pentagon is intensifying efforts to move directed-energy systems from experimental programs to frontline capabilities.
The Pentagon held the event at the Army’s White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico on Tuesday. It marked the first publicly known occasion a sitting defense secretary personally observed live multiple directed-energy weapons, according to people familiar with the demonstration. Emil Michael, the undersecretary of defense for research and engineering, along with other senior Defense Department leaders, attended the live demonstration.
Turning Science Into Weapons
Military planners, over the decades, have envisioned lasers and microwave systems as next-generation technologies capable of defeating enemy aircraft and missiles without relying on conventional ammunition. Despite years of development, however, the developers of those systems have struggled toconvert them from laboratories to widespread deployment.
Pentagon officials now say the escalation of inexpensive drones has changed the equation. “We have dramatically increased investment in scaling directed energy technologies, signaling to our manufacturing partners that the War Department is focused on delivering rapid solutions to the warfighter,” Michael said in a statement. “We are directly tackling manufacturability, reliability and integration — areas that have challenged transition under previous administrations.”
A New Arsenal Against Drone Swarms
The demonstration presented a series of advanced systems against unmanned aerial vehicles and mass attacks that can overwhelm traditional air defenses. Among the weapons on display were the Army’s Multi-Purpose High Energy Laser, or AMP-HEL, built around AV’s 20-kilowatt LOCUST Laser Weapon System; a 50-kilowatt version of the Directed Energy Maneuver-Short Range Air Defense system, known as DE-MSHORAD, developed by nLight; Lockheed Martin’s 300-kilowatt Indirect Fire Protection Capability-High Energy Laser, called Valkyrie; an Indirect Fire Protection Capability-High Power Microwave system based on Epirus’s Leonidas platform; and a high-power microwave variant of Raytheon’s Coyote interceptor, believed to be the Block 3 Non-Kinetic system.
Together, the systems showcased Pentagon’s effort to build multiple-layer defenses that are capable of countering swarms of drones and other low-cost threats.
Seeking an “Infinite Magazine”
Directed‑energy weapons have long fascinated military planners because of their economics. Traditional interceptors can cost hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of dollars per use. But a laser shot consumes only electricity and costs just a few dollars. The 2022 National Defense Strategy and the House Armed Services Committee’s bipartisan Future of Defense Task Force Report identified directed energy as a technology that could shape U.S. national security in the coming years.
A senior Pentagon official said Tuesday’s demonstration “affirmed the ability of directed energy systems, particularly high-energy lasers, to defeat high-density, highly proliferated threats from a variety of sources and power levels.” The official added: “Scaling directed energy enables our warfighters to fight beyond the limits of magazine capacity and no longer be limited by how many bullets are in the chamber,” the official said.
Building a Common Framework
The Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Research and Engineering has taken on an even bigger coordinating role through the Joint Laser Weapon System program although the Army, Navy, and Air Force independently manage many of its programs.
The broader “Golden Dome for America” missile defense initiative launched the program last year. It seeks to establish common technologies and accelerate the transition of directed-energy systems into frontline services.
Lessons From Ukraine and the Middle East
The Pentagon’s fresh focus on next-generation technologies reflects hard lessons from conflicts in Ukraine and across the Middle East, particularly Iran, where large numbers of inexpensive drones and loitering munitions have strained conventional air defenses.
Military officials view the directed-energy weapons as a potential answer to that imbalance. But bigger strategic hurdles remain, knowing that laser performance can degrade in dust, rain, and other adverse weather conditions. Systems also need sophisticated targeting and tracking, along with platforms capable of providing sufficient electrical power and cooling.
Tests have demonstrated success against smaller drones, but combat experience remains relatively limited.
From Experiment to Battlefield
White Sands Missile Range has traditionally served as a testing ground for missile and energy technologies. Tuesday’s live demonstration suggested that Pentagon leaders increasingly look at directed-energy weapons not as distant possibilities. Their presence at the military range could be a signal that the systems approaching operational relevance.
Officials hope advances in power scaling, beam control and manufacturing will allow lasers and microwave weapons to bed part of the routine elements of U.S. and allied air defenses in the years ahead.
A successful test of these new technologies is a shift that could alter one of the central equations of modern warfare, giving nations confronted by swarms of cheap aerial threats the ability to respond without exhausting stocks of costly missiles — and possibly change how air defense itself is fought.