The Indian Army has taken counter-terrorism to new heights with a weapon that can reportedly track, target, and eliminate threats within just 10 milliseconds.
Meet TAIWS: an artificial intelligence-enabled system that scans vast areas for hostile movement and reacts at lightning speed.
Equipped with a medium machine gun, it swiftly engages targets up to 1.8 kilometers (1.1 miles) away after confirmation from a human supervisor.
“The camera will quickly give direction to the weapon where to point. 10 milliseconds is the reaction time which our weapon has,” said Col. Ashish Dogra, the leader of the army team behind TAIWS.
The weapon is set to be deployed along India’s Line of Control (LoC) — the high-tension border with Pakistan — to combat infiltration attempts by terrorists.
‘Highly Effective’ in Trials
TAIWS’ primary sighting system packs a high-resolution camera with a 40x optical zoom and thermal imaging, providing night vision at up to 2 kilometers (1.2 miles).
Should it fail to spot an enemy, secondary cameras automatically activate, ensuring no target is missed.
“What we did was we made a network of secondary cameras. We place them at intervals of 500 meters (1,640 feet), 1 kilometer (0.6 mile), 2 kilometers (1.2 miles), depending upon the terrain requirement. If we are not getting the line of sight from one direction, we will get this line of sight from any other direction,” Dogra explained.
“So, a terrorist can hide from one direction but he cannot hide from every direction because he has to move.”
The weapon has reportedly shown exceptional success in trials, achieving a first-round hit probability of 100 percent.
‘Firing at Future Positions’
Built for the dense, rugged LoC terrain, TAIWS creates a “kill box” of 50 meters (164 feet) by 50 meters (164 feet), making sure that no enemy can escape.
What’s more, the weapon can predict and fire at future positions, ensuring a higher kill probability.
“A lot of work has been done on this,” Dogra emphasized. “Even if a terrorist tries to run, he will still get hit.”
