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| Military readies directed-energy weapons |
| 2004-08-02 |
| A few months from now, Peter Anthony Schlesinger hopes to zap a laser beam at a couple of chickens or other animals in a cage a few dozen yards away. If all goes as planned, the chickens will be frozen in mid-cluck, their leg and wing muscles paralyzed by an electrical charge created by the beam, even as their heart and lungs function normally. Among those most interested in the outcome will be officials at the Pentagon, who helped fund Schlesinger's work and are looking at this type of device to do a lot more than just zap a chicken. More like zapping chicken-sh!ts. Devices like these, known as directed-energy weapons, could be used to fight wars in coming years. "When you can do things at the speed of light, all sorts of new capabilities are there," said Delores Etter, a former undersecretary of defense for science and technology and an advocate of directed-energy weapons. Directed energy could bring numerous advantages to the battlefield in places like Iraq and Afghanistan, where U.S. troops have had to deal with hostile but unarmed crowds as well as dangerous insurgents. Aside from paralyzing potential attackers or noncombatants like a long-range stun gun, directed-energy weapons could fry the electronics of missiles and roadside bombs, developers say, or even disable a vehicle in a high-speed chase. The most ambitious program is the Air Force's Airborne Laser, a plan to mount a laser on a modified Boeing 747 and use it to shoot down missiles. At the same Air Force Research Laboratory in New Mexico, researchers working with Raytheon Co. have developed a weapon called the Active Denial System, which repels adversaries by heating the water molecules in their skin with microwave energy. The pain is so great that people flee immediately. If you can't stand the heat, get out of the mob ... |
| Posted by:Zenster |
| #10 Silentbrick, that is a beautiful image! Where's .com and his photoshopped pics when you need them? |
| Posted by: The Doctor 2004-08-02 10:37:16 PM |
| #9 Yeah ... and now imagine that weapon in the hands of Al Qaeda. Yeah, they've always been the masters of such arcane fabrication techniques as submicron coplanarity optical alignment and half silvered mirrors. Al Qaeda would be lucky if they could even figure out how to recharge one of these weapons, much less override the human metrology factors activation code needed to make it operational. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2004-08-02 9:31:42 PM |
| #8 I still think directed microwave weapons would be more entertaining...target expands, turning a nice sickly red, then explodes! And from a serious morale kicker, that would definately make it a doozy. "I was just sitting there, chanting slogans when Abdula...he just exploded!" |
| Posted by: Silentbrick 2004-08-02 8:42:18 PM |
| #7 Yeah ... and now imagine that weapon in the hands of Al Qaeda. Actually, at present the required energy source is pretty big. That was the big problem with Directed Energy Weapons when I had a tangential connection to research during Reagan's Star Wars programs. We've come a long way, but not to the point of rechargeable personal weapons, so far as I know .... But then, I'm not in that loop LOL. |
| Posted by: rkb 2004-08-02 8:40:14 PM |
| #6 And if you make the hole small enough it would take a few minutes for them to die and they would have no idea where the shot came from...... "Hey... why is your forehead bleeding like that?" |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2004-08-02 6:52:35 PM |
| #5 Barbara - Me too. Still, imagine a sniper with a perfectly silent laser death ray. *brrr* |
| Posted by: BH 2004-08-02 6:40:16 PM |
| #4 Mucki seemingly getting a little lazy. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2004-08-02 6:32:43 PM |
| #3 BH - That's my preferred method, but I'm a notorious war-monger. ;-p |
| Posted by: Barbara Skolaut 2004-08-02 6:14:39 PM |
| #2 Ah, the first true Zionist(TM) Death Ray! |
| Posted by: The Doctor 2004-08-02 5:05:12 PM |
| #1 But the idea of using directed energy against humans is creating debate fueled by deaths allegedly caused by Taser stun guns and the alleged abuse of Iraqi prisoners -- which put the military’s respect for human rights under a microscope. Well, we could stick to the tried-and-true method of placing very large holes in their bodies with bullets. You'd think that human rights groups would approve of a method that doesn't assume a likelihood of death. |
| Posted by: BH 2004-08-02 4:59:54 PM |