Odd Lots · Friday, September 4, 2026
Wayne Sanders discussed the historical challenges and recent advancements in directed energy weapons, particularly lasers. Early lasers were the size of buildings due to immense power requirements, but ongoing research has focused on reducing Size, Weight, and Power (SWaP) characteristics to make these systems deployable on vehicles, ships, and aircraft.
“Because obviously, if you're trying to create something that's deployable, you can't just plug it into a grid and say, okay, all right, well, because now you're static. And so it's great if you're using something for a base defense, okay, and you have clean enough power and everything else to be able to plug that in to be able to use.”
“But the deployability aspect of where a lot of the militaries are going right now is I need to be able to throw something onto a truck. I need to be able to throw something onto a ship, and I need to be able to plug that thing into some type of shore power. so that I have the ability to have regenerative electronic capabilities to create those beams and increase what we normally call is the difference between mass versus magazine.”
“Because back in the day, some of these lasers were the size of buildings because you required that much energy to be able to create that beam, to be able to create that pulse. And so you're seeing actually the difference really in size. Weight, and power.”