PENTAGON: MORE RAY GUNS, PLEASE

The Joint Non-​​Lethal Weapons Directorate is the tiny Pentagon agency that’s push­ing weapons like the microwave-​​like pain ray and a slip­pery goo to make angry mobs lose their foot­ing. Now, the JNLWD is on the look­out for new, far-​​out projects to fund. And the Directorate’s $57.6 mil­lion shop­ping list is heavy on the ray guns:

* Emerging Directed Energy Weapons (DEW) that have non-​​lethal appli­ca­tions — specif­i­cally counter-​​personnel, counter-​​material, and counter-​​capability mis­sions (exam­ples include novel HPM [high power microwaves], RFR [radiofre­quency radi­a­tion], laser, and laser induced plasma sources).
* Human effects of non-​​lethal directed energy expo­sures, to include phys­i­o­log­i­cal and behav­ioral responses (exam­ples include HPM, pulsed and con­tin­u­ous radiofre­quency radi­a­tion RFR, laser radi­a­tion, and laser induced plasma stim­uli).
* Advanced Materials that either pro­vide or enhance non-​​lethal capa­bil­i­ties (exam­ples include advanced anti-​​traction mate­ri­als; engine suf­fo­cates, elec­tri­cal and mechan­i­cal foulers, mal­odor­ants, ther­mo­bar­ics, NL [non-​​lethal] nanopar­ti­cles; rigid foams/​materials, mor­ph­ing mate­ri­als, and NL pay­load deliv­ery sys­tems or pay­loads for long range remote engage­ment; and other NL reac­tants).
* Human effects relat­ing per­cus­sive and con­tin­u­ous sounds, inco­her­ent light sources, and over­pres­sures that alone or in com­bi­na­tion would pro­vide oper­a­tional capa­bil­i­ties while min­i­miz­ing adverse health effects (exam­ples include exposure-​​response rela­tion­ships result­ing in glare and flash­blindess, or behav­ioral responses result­ing from aver­sive sounds.) Also includes estab­lish­ing either safety thresh­olds or prob­a­bil­ity rela­tion­ship for adverse health effects for these stim­uli.
* Development of long-​​range acoustic and ocu­lar tech­nolo­gies and devices that sup­port oper­a­tional require­ments while min­i­miz­ing adverse health con­se­quences.
* Development of long-​​range, extended dura­tion, wire­less electro-​​muscular inca­pac­i­ta­tion tech­nolo­gies or devices (include char­ac­ter­i­za­tion of human effect and safety issues, minia­tur­iza­tion and advanced tech­nol­ogy issues, and pre­ci­sion tar­get­ing). (via The Sunshine Project)

November 19th, 2004 | Less-lethal | Comments Off Both comments and pings are currently closed.