Riot Control Ray-Gun for Use in Iraq

team99parody writes "An 'Active Denial System' weapon that 'fires a 95GHz microwave beam at rioters to cause heating and intolerable pain in less than five seconds' is scheduled for service in Iraq in 2006 according to CNET and the print version of New Scientist. It was recently tested on people playing the part of rioters at Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico where they asked the subjects to remove glass and contact lenses to protect their eyes. Hopefully real rioters will get the same courtesy. Police and the Marines are working on portable versions. Sandia Labs also has a nice writeup on this system with pictures of smaller versions of the weapon."

Comments

Re:"Nonlethal" at the sandia article

[_Sprocket_]

The term they should have used (and what law enforcement uses now, after more than a few wrongful death lawsuits, is the term of "Less lethal". Did any of the Kirtland Air Force Base participants have a pre existing heart condition? I bet they didnt let pregnant women participate.

Good point. These weapons are designed to have a negative impact on their target(s) that will also present a fairly high chance of survivability. But they are still weapons. And they still present a danger. It is disingenuous to present these weapons to the public in a manner that hides this danger. And it is outright dangerous to arm people with these weapons who don't have the appropriate training and respect for the danger these weapons present.

Incidently, you might have missed that the Pentagon apparently classifies these as "less lethal", not "nonlethal".

I find it highly ironic that our testing of this indescriminant weapon will be used in our even more indescriminant war.

Queue the politics.

Terrorists dont use large crowds as weapons, if you stop and think at why this weapon would be needed, its ultimately crowd control on our home front. Now why would we need that? Lakers winning again? I highly doubt it. Someone had a plan when they initated and funded the development of this, and it doesnt look like a good one.

Who the hell said anything about terrorists? I didn't see the word even used in the entire article - I even did a text search.

No - the use for this is to "manage" crowds. Specifically, rioters. You might be interested to note that riots happen in other locations around the world other than the US. And it might also interest you to note that it doesn't take a major US sporting event to bring one about.

The real issue here is whether agencies like the US Department of Defense who choose to deploy this (and simular) technology properly understand the capabilities and dangers of the weapons they use. And, more importantly, whether they choose to use them in appropriate situations.

Re:Coming to America

[Andrew Tanenbaum]

Only cowards hold a distinction between a riot and a protest. If you're not physically asserting yourself, you're not doing anything significant - there's no point in your physical presence. Do you actually think holding a sign is going to change things?

Re:Health implications

[G-funk]

Ok children, let's see you put your hands up if you know what the depleted in depleted uranium means? Depleted uranium is unhealthy, in the same way lead is (don't eat the shit) but don't pretend you're going to get keel over handling it or being around it.