As one of the foremost elements of sci-fi movies, laser has also become an ordinary feature of our daily lives. Laser’s potential as a weapon system was recognised by the Cold War rivals of the USA and the USSR soon after its appearance.

Laser, whose theoretical underpinnings can be dated back to Albert Einstein’s work in 1917, was built for the first time in 1960 by Theodora Maiman following intense research throughout the 1950s. Its power, range and capacity have continuously been upgraded since then. Against the background of a fierce competition in the Cold War period, a weapon system which can perform precision firing from afar to cause lethal damage in real-time would be decisive especially in space environment. Eventually, many research projects were launched for this purpose.