ASELSAN, Türkiye’s leading defense company, continues to take important steps in the field of directed energy weapons, one of the new generation technologies. Previously proven effective against rotary- and fixed-wing kamikaze drones, GÖKBERK now showcased its advanced capabilities by detecting, autonomously tracking, and eliminating FPV drones across multiple test scenarios, demonstrating exceptional speed and precision in engagement.
As a critical component of Steel Dome, GÖKBERK stands out as a near-field air defense weapon system that enables hard kill-soft kill destruction of threats such as mini/micro UAVs and IEDs. GÖKBERK brings together ASELSAN's İHTAR platform and the laser weapon on a platform with 6x6 mobile deployment capability instead of a distributed architecture. Developed with contributions from key industry partners including TÜBİTAK BİLGEM, all major subcomponents of GÖKBERK have been designed and produced domestically, reinforcing Türkiye’s defense industry autonomy. With GÖKBERK, ASELSAN is developing a new and critical system that will serve within the Steel Dome air defense system.
GÖKBERK uses an indigenous laser source with high beam quality for hard kill destruction of targets, while also providing soft kill destruction with an electronic jammer developed by ASELSAN. The system can perform very precise target tracking with various electro-optical systems on the guidance unit. With artificial intelligence-supported algorithms, the system's tracking and identification capabilities are maximized, which enables GÖKBERK to destroy the threats in the target set in a very short time. Thanks to the cooler designed for 24/7 operation, GÖKBERK can fire uninterruptedly for a long time. The system, which creates maximum impact with minimum power, stands out as a cost-effective solution.
GÖKBERK will play a critical role in the defense of fixed facilities such as military bases, airports, power plants and oil refineries, and will have a wide range of applications thanks to its mobile deployment capability. With the data obtained from the firing tests and trials of GÖKBERK conducted under different weather conditions, improvement and development work on the system continues.
