Project Excalibur was the codename used by the British government to refer to a secret nuclear missile launch facility hidden under Blairquhan Castle on an island off the coast of Scotland.
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- Project Excalibur
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| - Project Excalibur was the codename used by the British government to refer to a secret nuclear missile launch facility hidden under Blairquhan Castle on an island off the coast of Scotland.
- The project was seen as a more conventional application of Robotechnology over Project Valkyrie with the aim to create heavily fortified mobile ground units otherwise known as destroids. The Project was headed by Colonel Anatole Leonard. The project began in 2001. (Robotech Infopedia) In 2006, when Project Valkyrie was briefly suspended due to numerous accidents it was planned for its resources were to be assigned in part of Project Excalibur. (Robotech: From the Stars comic: "The Gathering Storm")
- Limited accounts in the unclassified press indicate that the device consisted of a small nuclear device surrounded by multiple rods made of a material that served as an x-ray gain medium, releasing x-rays when "pumped" by incident photons. Each rod would function as a separate x-ray laser. The x-ray laser would be optically pumped by the extremely high density of high energy photons that appear in the first nanoseconds of a nuclear detonation. The pumped medium would emit a pulse of coherent x-rays, in the direction of the long axis of the rod. Unlike optical lasers, in which the light is reflected by mirrors at the ends and makes multiple passes through the gain medium, in the x-ray laser the x-ray pulse is generated in a single pass through the rod. The calculations showed that the extre
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| abstract
| - Project Excalibur was the codename used by the British government to refer to a secret nuclear missile launch facility hidden under Blairquhan Castle on an island off the coast of Scotland.
- The project was seen as a more conventional application of Robotechnology over Project Valkyrie with the aim to create heavily fortified mobile ground units otherwise known as destroids. The Project was headed by Colonel Anatole Leonard. The project began in 2001. (Robotech Infopedia) In 2006, when Project Valkyrie was briefly suspended due to numerous accidents it was planned for its resources were to be assigned in part of Project Excalibur. (Robotech: From the Stars comic: "The Gathering Storm") The project would prove to be a success with a range of destroids entering into service, starting with the Destroid Tomahawk in 2006. (Robotech Infopedia)
- Limited accounts in the unclassified press indicate that the device consisted of a small nuclear device surrounded by multiple rods made of a material that served as an x-ray gain medium, releasing x-rays when "pumped" by incident photons. Each rod would function as a separate x-ray laser. The x-ray laser would be optically pumped by the extremely high density of high energy photons that appear in the first nanoseconds of a nuclear detonation. The pumped medium would emit a pulse of coherent x-rays, in the direction of the long axis of the rod. Unlike optical lasers, in which the light is reflected by mirrors at the ends and makes multiple passes through the gain medium, in the x-ray laser the x-ray pulse is generated in a single pass through the rod. The calculations showed that the extremely high gain and high energy pulse from the lasers would occur before the detonation destroyed the lasers and the rest of the satellite. If large numbers of gain media rods were used, each pre-aligned to point at a missile, then a large number of missiles could be destroyed in one fell swoop. The original proposal was to place many x-ray laser satellites in orbit. There needed to be at least one between the U.S. and its enemies when a massive launch of intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) occurred. The Soviet Union was the only foe technologically able to accomplish a massive simultaneous launch. Since satellite basing would have violated the Outer Space Treaty which prohibits nuclear weapons in space, a later proposal would have based them on "pop-up" missiles in Alaska and in an effort to be closer still to the point of launch, on SLBMs in the Sea of Okhotsk & Kara Sea. In the event of a Russian ICBM launch the laser could pop-up into space in the path of the approaching ICBMs in anticipation for interception. The project was proposed as a solution to the problems of using optical lasers in satellites to shoot down missiles: if a large nearly simultaneous launch of ICBMs occurred, the Space Based Laser could not destroy them all, since it was designed to fire upon one at a time. It was felt that the large optics of the SBL could not be re-positioned to point from one missile to the next quickly enough. A considerable amount of research went into rapidly re-targeting the Space Based Laser so that many missiles could be destroyed in time to deal with the massive attack. However, it remained out of reach, giving rise to the Excalibur approach, which was viewed as something of a desperate approach even by those who worked on the project. Ten known tests of nuclear-pumped x-ray lasers were conducted between 1978 and 1988. The project was determined to be out of reach of current technology and was formally abandoned in 1992. Since then, its main influence has been its appearances in science fiction. Research was redirected to laser satellites and kinetic weapons under the Strategic Defense Initiative. A number of artist's impressions of the device were made.
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