Radical environmentalists accused Japanese whalers of attacking them with high tech sound guns which can cause nausea, disorientation and hearing damage in the latest round of their annual confrontation in the frozen seas off the Antarctic.
Members of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society claimed that crew members of the whaling ship Nisshin Maru used the Long Range Acoustic Device (LRAD) against rubber launches attempting to disrupt their annual hunt in the Southern Ocean.
The LRAD is a non-lethal weapon used for crowd control by soldiers and riot police, as well as by ships travelling through pirate-infested waters. It consists of a round disc three feet across which directs a beam of shrill sound, extremely loud and off-putting at a range of several hundred yards, and capable of causing permanent ear damage at close range.
This is a military grade weapon system that sends out mid to high frequency sound waves designed to disorient and possibly incapacitate personnel, Sea Shepherd said in a statement. It is basically an anti-personnel weapons system.
The self-styled environmental pirates claimed that two of its crew members were slightly injured over the weekend when the Japanese sailors fired water hoses and threw metal balls at them as they attempted to obstruct the launch of smaller harpoons from the Nisshin Maru.
It is a very dramatic scene out here as ships zig zag back and forth in thick ice and heavy swells, said Paul Watson, captain of the Sea Shepherd ship, Steve Irwin. The whalers are deploying water cannons, concussion grenades, acoustic weapons, and throwing solid brass and lead balls at Sea Shepherd crew members.
If we were to do any of the things these thugs are doing, we would be denounced as eco-terrorists. There certainly is a double standard where whale killers can use violence without fear of condemnation from their government, and we can't even defend ourselves without condemnation from our governments.
Y'know, Bill Ayers makes pretty much the same argument.
In Japan, the governments Fisheries Agency admitted that water sprays and beeping warning tones had been used against the environmentalists. A spokesman for the Institute of Cetacean Research, a government funded organisation which campaigns in the whaling cause, did not deny that the LRAD had been put to use. All legal means available will be used to ensure these pirates do not board Japanese ships or threaten the lives of the crews or the safety of the vessels," Glenn Inwood said.
If the "pirate" meme sticks, it won't be just whale blood in the water.
The hunting of whales was banned in 1986 by the International Whaling Commission after evidence that the world's largest mammals were being driven towards extinction. Japan continues to hunt whales every year in the guise of scientific research, although most of the 935 minke and 50 fin whales which it hopes to harvest this year will be sold as whale meat.
Every year Tokyo has sought to overturn the moratorium to allow a full and uneuphemistic return to commercial whaling; in recent IWC meetings, it has edged closer to the required three-quarters majority.
Opponents of whaling accuse it of using overseas aid to buy the votes of small countries which have no interest in the industry, but great interest in winning the favour of Japan among the pro-whaling faction expected to be present in Tokyo are tiny island states such as Tuvalu and Kiribati, and Mongolia, which has no coastline.
Captain Watson was a founder of Greenpeace who broke away to form his own more radical group. Sea Shepherds confrontational and sometimes violent tactics are opposed even by those who denounce Japans whaling programme, including Greenpeace and the governments of Australia and New Zealand.
What is important, however, is that despite the violence from the whalers, no whales are being killed, Captain Watson said. They can't get away from us and if we keep on their tail they can't kill whales. 
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