The United States must integrate defense against directed energy weapons with the same intensity used to develop ballistic missile defenses. One of the major drawbacks of optical or directed light energy systems is the inability to penetrate clouds or dense fog. Advances in technology are beginning to bring weather phenomena under our control. Significantly increased computing power and micronized delivery these systems will allow us to create specific disturbances in local atmospheric conditions. These disruptions enable the immediate and long-lasting ability to create localized shielding of fog or stratus formations critical assets against attacks from energy weapons. The future of nanotechnology will enable creation of stratus cloud formations to defeat DEW and optically targeted attacks on United States assets. The solution to the weather control problem involves networked miniature balloons feeding and receiving data from a four-dimensionally variable (4d-Var) computer model via a network of sensors and actors. An array of diamond-walled balloons enters the area to be modified, then measures and affects localized temperature and vapor content. This system effectively shortens the control loop of an atmospheric system to the point that it can be managed. The capabilities of diamond-walled balloons are based on the future of nanotechnology.