According to the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) Chairman G. Satheesh Reddy, organisation is working on next bunch of military technologies including ‘Directed energy weapons’ or DEWs .
What is Directed energy weapons
- It is a futuristic warfare system. Laser-based or microwave-based high-power DEWs can quietly disable enemy drones or missiles temporarily or permanently without leaving physical debris.
- In contrast, the ASAT or anti-satellite missile that the DRDO tested on March 27, 2019 killed an orbiting Indian target satellite and left hundreds of small pieces as debris for a few months.
- As per Dr. Reddy, who is also Secretary, Department of Defence R&D, Directed energy weapons would play a major role in future warfare. Since the world is moving towards them, in India too, a lot of experiments are going on. DRDO is working in this area for the past three to four years to develop 10-kW and 20-kW weapons.
- The Centre for High Energy Systems and Sciences (CHESS)- DRDO’s Hyderabad-based lab, is the node for all related activities.
