They should offer up 250 million to the first American one that can do this. It would be a fraction of the costs of what NASA would pay. And if they give them until say 2020, it would really push it. Heck, I would not be surprised to see ATK make that happen.

Actually, they only need to do about 8MJ for the A10. Ideally, make a gattling gun type approach to it.

well, I do not understand this. Back in Dec, the DOD announced that BAE won. Now, they are testing GA's system. I have to wonder if BAE is going on to develop something else.

In particular, for the ships, they need a replacement for Phalanx. Basically, imagine a gattling gun with these at say 8 megajoules rather than 64 mj that this uses. Simply fire small rounds to take out an incoming missile or plane that comes within 20 miles.

In addition, the house republicans need to allow the DOD to stop production on the M1A2. They want to upgrade the system so that it will have better protection from IEDs, but also so that the main gun can be replaced with this. A tank that can shot shells like this just 10 miles, but in particular, can do it with 3 second bursts, would be a major change in warfare.

Not quite. You can bet on it that they will ahve a smart shell that has fins/electronics so that it can move a couple of degrees around, which would be enough to handle moving targets.

yup. However, far more likely, is that a smart warhead will be developed so that it can steer a bit around.

BAE and GA have been working on that. That is why this has taken almost a decade. Hopefully, China does not have the technology because, what you describe is the main problem, which is from heat.

Keep in mind that while most of these shells are dummies, some of them will be smart shells with the ability to move a bit.

Not really old news. THis is the winner of all that work. Prior to this, BAE and GA were competing to make these, which is not easy. And DDX has been gutted, so now, the focus is on putting railguns on current ships. Personally, I wish that they would make the DDX, but make it nukes so that it can have plenty of power to run motor, lasers and multiple railguns.

BAE had another contract for building more of these. How did GA get this? Do not get me wrong. I am happy to see this since rail guns are about the sanest approach to weapons. BUT, GA had lost the contract.

Actually, I am hopeful that the current situation with Russia along with the CO2, will make us re-think nukes. We desperately need to phase out our need on coal/nat gas, not just in America, but throughout the west.

You know, I think that is the whole issue with America today. We have far too few companies with MBAs for executives that only chase short-term $. Thank good for SpaceX, Tesla, Spike Aviation, etc.

did not know that. Wonder why they would do that. They were the ones with the most thorium experience. In fact, ft. st. vrain's reactor was a great success. The real issue was the back-end.

Seriously, these companies could easily solve this and with a dirt cheap solution.

Yeah, its not like solar, wind, and micro hydro ever use DC->ac converters, and transformers.