Not interested...
...until they can mount them on sharks (or a cloned T-Rex).
The UK has awarded contracts for laser cannons to be fitted to tanks and warships, a mere five years after first bounding into the field of directed energy weapons. A government announcement today said that consortia led by Thales and US arms megacorp Raytheon's UK tentacle would see a new laser weapon being tested aboard one …
"US-based dictionaries define it as either a type of harrow used in agriculture"
As a Yank farmer/rancher who owns (and uses) eight or nine different kinds of harrow, I've never heard of it.
However, the word herse is French for "harrow", per my Cajun buddy across the valley.
"All of these projects are said to be creating 50 new jobs and keeping a further 250 people employed."
Wouldn't they be better employed digging canals, filling them with very expensive bottled water, pulling the plug and watching it drain away? At least we'd end up with a nice canal tow-path to walk along whereas "all these projects" so far have resulted in nothing useful except some very greasy palms ...
Mirrors used in big laser cavities are not quite like the ones in the average bathroom.
At least one of them - maybe both depending on how the laser cavity is arranged - need to reflect virtually *all* of the light they receive.
Never easy, but do-able in a clean laser lab (although using dynamic mirrors to hold the beam together looks like piling on the misery).
However, anyone working with beefy lasers is likely to be familiar with that sinking feeling after a less-reflecty bit suddenly appears on a mirror surface.. Time to open another box of mirrors.
And when you move the laser outside into a desert or marine environment.....
Still, there's always the spares and repairs business.
If that Team Hersa development is neither effectively active in attack nor reactive in defence to NEUKlearer HyperRadioProACTive IT Command and Control Systems and Augmented Virtually Real Situations, is such a peer competitor and transparent opposition most suited to booting as an almighty friend for overwhelming reward rather than struggling to defeat as a phantom enemy with any kind of novel unconventional, non-traditional directed energy weapon which cannot present itself with a viable target for blasting.
Если эта разработка Team Hersa не будет ни эффективно атаковать, ни защищаться от NEUKlearer HyperRadioProACTive ИТ-систем управления и контроля и дополненных виртуально реальных ситуаций, то такой конкурент и прозрачная оппозиция больше всего подходят для загрузки в качестве всемогущего друга за огромную награду, а не изо всех сил пытается победить как фантомного врага с помощью любого нового нетрадиционного, нетрадиционного оружия направленной энергии, которое не может представлять собой жизнеспособную цель для взрыва.
如果 Hersa 团队的开发既不积极主动地攻击 NEUKlearer HyperRadioProACTive IT 指挥和控制系统和增强的虚拟现实情况,也不能有效地防御,那么这样的同行竞争对手和透明的反对派最适合作为全能的朋友启动以获得压倒性的奖励而不是 努力用任何一种新的非常规、非传统的定向能武器作为幻影敌人击败,这些武器无法为自己提供可行的爆破目标。
إذا لم يكن تطوير Team Hersa نشطًا بشكل فعال في الهجوم ولا رد فعل في الدفاع ضد NEUKlearer HyperRadioProACTive IT Command and Control Systems and Augment VR Real Situations ، فهو منافس نظير ومعارضة شفافة أكثر ملاءمة للتمهيد كصديق عظيم للحصول على مكافأة ساحقة بدلاً من تكافح من أجل الهزيمة كعدو وهمي مع أي نوع من أسلحة الطاقة الموجهة غير التقليدية وغير التقليدية التي لا يمكن أن تقدم نفسها مع هدف قابل للتطبيق لتفجيره.
VAIOSystems ..... Virtually Advanced IntelAIgent Operating Systems
SMARTR Portal ....... SMARTR Mentoring Analysis Reporting on Titanic Research Portal
A little something Extra ESPecially Extreme for whenever more of the same is never going to do what needs to be so easily done.
Here's a tad more news on the novelty here ....... https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/uk-military-trial-lasers-novel-weapons-programme
So what happened to the COIL, (Chemical Oxygen and Iodine Laser) that was touted many moons ago as the new super weapon, needed a sighting laser prior to firing and necessary adjustments for differing air density to target. Was a bit too heavy to be fighter mounted but the pumping hydraulics were all sorted out AFAICR and it was intensely touted as perfect for Naval use.
"So what happened to the COIL"
It was not operationally viable as a weapons system ... the useful range was too short in the atmosphere.
If I remember correctly, they would have had to increase the power output by over 10 times, and then fly about two dozen $1.5 billion converted 747s (at somewhere over one hundred million dollars per year each in maintenance alone) within the borders of Iran to keep a lid on their ballistic missiles. This would have had to be non-stop, a-la Operation Chrome Dome, so the actual number of aircraft would have probably been much higher.
The range is worse for the navy ... water vapo(u)r dissipates the beam faster.