Stealth Laser-Air Combat: Chinese J-20 & US F-35 Will Both Fire Lasers

by Kris Osborn, President, Center for Military Modernization

(Washington D.C.)  The US Air Force Research Lab has for years been making rapid progress developing laser weapons for ground and air applications, as many experiments continue to show great promise. The ultimate ambition, which relies to a large extent upon the pace at which sufficient amounts of mobile-electrical power can be scaled to a small enough form factor to arm fighter jets.  Transporting the requisite amount of on-board power for lasers has been a long-standing challenge, yet the AFRL and other service weapons developers anticipate maybe lasers will fire first from larger cargo-aircraft such as C-130s before transitioning to smaller, faster fighter jets. This might enable developers to leverage technological progress for eventual application on F-35s, F-15 and perhaps even the emerging 6th-generation stealth Next-Generation Air Dominance platform. 

However, it will surprise nobody to learn that major US competitors are also working on arming stealth fighter jets with lasers.  The Chinese military,  for instance, is prioritizing laser weapons development for aircraft integration, yet there seems to be little information available regarding just how mature and combat-ready they may be. 

Earlier this year, a Chinese government-backed newspaper is floating the idea that the People’s Liberation Army Air Force J-20 might soon fire laser weapons to incinerate opposing aircraft and ground targets.

J-20 Laser Weapons

While the story in the Global Times mentions little to no specifics regarding the maturity of such a plan and does not offer any detail on testing, prototyping or development, the paper does refer to efforts to arm fighter jets with a “laser pod.”

t certainly seems realistic that the PLA Air Force would be working on this in an effort to keep pace with the US Air Force.

Lasers are a great tool for aerial interception, as weapons able to travel at the speed of light, there is no time delay. However laser weapons require a large amount of energy to be effective and that is the issue that must be addressed for it to be mounted on an aircraft.