Omega is a Soviet high-power laser weapon development program for air defense. The supervisor of the Omega program, launched in 1965, was A. M. Prokhorov . Practical work was carried out by the Design Bureau Strela , (later - Almaz ).
Back in 1965, on behalf of the general designer of KB-1, academician A. Raspletin B. Bunkin , deputy Raspletin, and his brother F. Bunkin , an employee of A. M. Prokhorov, made estimates that showed that low-flying targets could be hit by radiation laser on glass with neodymium with an active medium volume of approximately 1 m 3 . These assessments gave reason to A. Raspletin and A. Prokhorov to raise a question before the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR about the start of relevant work in a wide cooperation of performers. The proposal to create a laser system for air defense received support in the defense department of the CPSU Central Committee and in the Military Industrial Commission (MIC) of the Council of Ministers of the USSR.
On February 23, 1967, a Resolution of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR was issued, and on June 26 of the same year, a decision of the military-industrial complex. These documents determined the areas of work, the composition of the performers and the timing of the creation of the laser complex, code-named “Omega”.
The laser energy required to hit an air target was determined to be the same as the total kinetic energy of the fragments of a typical warhead of a ground-to-air missile . The task was to create a laser for a system with a total energy of "shot" 10 MJ.
Omega Complex
As part of the Omega program, in 1972 elements of the Omega-2 complex began to be delivered to facility 2506. So a laser locator (based on ruby lasers) was delivered together with a powerful radiation simulator based on neodymium glass lasers . The chief designer was E. Sukharev (Central Design Bureau "Almaz"). For the first time, a laser location of an aerodynamic target was carried out, its image was constructed, the possibility of choosing a weak spot on the target was evaluated, the accuracy of pointing a powerful radiation simulator was estimated, the influence of the atmosphere on the propagation of laser radiation was studied. The studies showed that it was impossible to fully solve the challenges and therefore the work was stopped.
The stage of creating a new experimental complex 73T6 Omega-2M began, in which the high-power open-type electron -pumped carbon dioxide laser ( BGRL ) was the generator of high-power laser radiation. The locator was built on the basis of the television system TOV "Karat-2." The main designer of the complex was L. N. Zakharyev, his deputy and the responsible leader of all the work, Yu. A. Konyaev, on September 22, 1982, during the tests, for the first time in the USSR, the radio-controlled target RUM-2 B. was hit by laser radiation. Further tests confirmed the stability of the result. This was repeatedly demonstrated to representatives of the leadership of the country's air defense and the USSR Ministry of Radio Industry .
Based on the test results, it was decided to create a mobile version of the 74T6 laser complex, which was created, delivered to the facility and tested. The complex has confirmed its ability to hit targets like RUM-2B. However, all the created installations could not surpass the existing air defense systems in technical specifications.