This heralds the end of the ICBM which is good, but the major manufacturer of silicon and gallalium arsenide crystals is China which is bad. The US has created the technology only to lose it in 5 years time to another country who will make it cheaper and mass produce it from stolen data and reverse enginering, just like the Manhattan project.
Sometimes it is better as a successful black project that stays black, one that we all believe to be a failure. After all this technology automaticaly also creates the worlds most powerful LIDAR, making all current stealth aircraft obsolete. The F35, B2 and F22 looked viable until today.

LIDAR is good for fire control and docking maneuvers but it does not work well for general surveillance.

from my point of view; they didn't seem to address the energy loss in the system, i.e. 1 megawatt to produce 100 kw = 900 kw energy loss. to where? can they use the 900 kw to power a vehicle? or do they have to get rid of it? 10% efficiency is lousy.

Re; Slowburn
That is nothing to do with Lidar's ability to paint a target but bad conceptual programming in processing data return.

re; L1ma
It has to do with trying to light up the whole sky with a laser. Go into a large dark room and try to find a 1cm square of tape on the walls and ceiling using only a laser pointer as a flashlight.

Re; Slowburn
I work with raster line scanning and pattern recognition. I could find a nanometer dust pattern on that ceiling and recognise it to a 50% or less probability and I am currently only one of 2 people who could, the first is Professor Bill Lionheart who wrote a software scanner used in xray scanning, I have a European and American patent pending for the only viable working logic circuit in micro electronics.
There is no practical limit to the size of the light collector, or the CCD array. We are now at 28 feet reflectors and 3.2 gigapixel ccd, with ground based LIDAR we have also access to real time supecomputer processing. The whole sky is no longer the limit, there were never any to begin with.

Notarichman: Lasers are notoriously inefficient. They all produce much more heat than light. 10% efficiency really isn't bad, especially when scaled up.
Some types of lasers are only 0.1% efficient.

re; L1ma
It is not that it can not be done. It is that you are making a more complex system that won't do the job any better, but will require more power. There are easier ways to defeat stealth systems as well.

Re; Slowburn.
"It is that you are making a more complex system that won't do the job any better"
My pattern recognition circuit is 8 bit, it does not require a processor but takes its data directly from a bitmap - the CCD chip. I do not need LIDAR to use it, any data which needs pattern recognition will do. 8 bit means any value from 0 - 255, I have a circuit with less power than a pocket calculator from 1980 doing the same job as Bill lionharts 3D xray scanner which is software based, it cannot get any simpler.
"There are easier ways to defeat stealth systems as well"
That is all covered in making the object harder to see by reducing its RCS return and heat signature, however stealth is useless against light. This is a weapon that can both illuminate and kill, which was the original death ray concept with radar. To hide you would have to absorb 100 % of light from infrared to the visible spectrum without having detection devices which would inevitably give a return signal from backscatter.
This would mean a return to nap of the earth flying - now in cloud against LIDAR, they are therefore again in the 10000 ft groundfire danger zone and weather restricted. The easiest way to defeat a stealth warplane is a rifle round from a sqauddie as it flies over his head.

Re; Slowburn
I am also pretty tired of you never providing content, but always demanding yet more proof to convince Slowburn, in all your posts. We do not provide comment here to make you look good as you tire us out letting you have the last word.
Answer some questions youself
"It is not that it can not be done. It is that you are making a more complex system that won't do the job any better, but will require more power. There are easier ways to defeat stealth systems as well. "
1. In what way is the system more complex - it is identical in operation to Radar - a little help. (http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-the-difference-between-lidar-and-radar.htm) 2. How do you know and by what values in wattage please is a LADAR less efficient than the equivalent RADAR. Remember that LIDAR only is absorbed in the Infra red spectrum in the Earths atmosphere, in what way is a high definition visable light LIDAR CCD reciever less capable as a collector of information as a longer wavelength radio and microwave receiver of equivalent size.
"LIDAR is good for fire control and docking maneuvers but it does not work well for general surveillance." (With eye safe IR - Firstrike by definition is not going to be absorbed by the atmosphere) . More help (http://www.kmimediagroup.com/mgt-home/380-gif-2012-volume-10-issue-1-february/5183-shedding-light-with-lidar.html) (http://www.sparpointgroup.com/Blogs/Head-in-the-Point-Clouds/Using-lidar-in-Afghanistan/)
There is a vast difference between giving opinion and just being obnoxious for the sake of it. You are again adding to these are blog posts without providing sources for your own brand of knowledge.