Iran claims that it has successfully test-fired what it calls "a rocket that had reached space".

The announcement, made on Sunday on state-run television, was unclear; but it appeared to refer to Iran's efforts to launch commercial satellites into orbit.
 
Iran's science and technology and defence ministries built the craft, the state-run television quoted Mohsen Bahrami, head of Iran's space research centre, as saying.

DARPA's HELLADS (High Energy Liquid Laser Area Defense System) will be light enough to fit on a fighter jet or drone aircraft, and yet powerful enough to fire a 150 kilowatt beam of energy.

Star Wars laser cannon may be closer than you think. High energy laser weapons already in development are powerful enough to bring down missiles (see MTHEL - Mobile Tactical High Energy Laser). However, their very large size has precluded placement on any but the largest planes.

The main weight problem comes from the cooling systems needed. HELLADS makes use of a unique cooling technique to save weight. The high-energy laser uses a liquid that has the same angle of refraction as the mirrors inside the blaster.

That way, the "ray gun" can fire away, even while it's being cooled. Currently in the third of five phases of development, a 15 kilowatt subscale prototype is being tested in the laboratory. In the next phase, the demonstrator device will be scaled up to 150 kW, and will specifically be targeted to achieve the low specific weight (5 kg/kW) and compact size need to be mounted in a smaller airborne vehicle.

The final phase is engineering, fabricating, integrating and demonstrating the complete HELLADS weapon system on a tactical platform. The device will be built by General Atomics and the tracking system will be built by Lockheed.

by Arnaud De Borchgrave
UPI Editor at Large
Washington (UPI) Jan 29, 2007

China is making geopolitical hay while the sun isn't shining for America. Chinese leaders have seen President Bush's approval ratings continue a downward slide all over the world, according to the BBC's latest universal survey. More important, previous public opinion polls showed China with a better image than America in friendly European countries -- with the notable exception of Poland.

The rest of the world has watched the defection of some of President Bush's Congressional supporters. China's topsiders have heard from their close ally president Musharraf -- "a major non-NATO ally" -- he doesn't think the United States can avoid what the world will perceive as a defeat in Iraq. And perception trumps reality the world over.