Everything Drones

Small spy drones beware: Navy geeks want the next gun mounted on a Marine Humvee to be a laser cannon, not this M-240G machine gun. Photo: U.S. Marine Corps

If there was any doubt that the military has new confidence in its forthcoming laser arsenal, the Navy’s top geeks want to outfit Marines with a laser cannon to shoot small drones out of the sky.

Specifically, the Office of Naval Research thinks that Marine air-ground task forces are too vulnerable to adversaries flying cheap, small spy drones overhead, like the four-pound Raven the Marines themselves used in Iraq. Its answer: outfit Marine ground vehicles with laser guns.