My comment: So-called non-lethal weapons are often presented as relatively harmless, but when used to stalk targets very incessantly they can often do as much if not more damage than conventional weapons. How essential to normal life is an active autonomous mind or a body free of physical torture? What if you were deprived of either of these indefinitely by a persistent enemy? With these comments in mind you can read the following.
Sabrina Eaton
Plain Dealer Bureau
WASHINGTON -- The United States' role in policing troubled foreign lands is forcing the Pentagon to develop space-age crowd-control weapons--gizmos that seem more like Hollywood special effects than riot gear.
In the next two years, the Joint Non-Lethal Weapons Directorate says it will equip troops with a spray three times more slippery than ice, providing a novel way to trip angry crowds.
It will also use a device, mounted on a military vehicle, that looks like a communications dish but that actually projects an energy beam that penetrates the skin. Reaching less than 1/64-inch deep, the beam can inflict a burning pain from hundreds of yards away.
Soldiers could use the slip-and-fall spray, the energy beam and other devices under development to disperse crowds, break up advancing mobs and deal with the kinds of situations that just a few years ago left U.S. servicemen vulnerable and unpopular as they tried to keep the peace in Somalia.
Other weapons in the works include:
The U.S. Marine Corps is coordinating the $25 million-a-year research program, which cuts across all military branches. Interest in it soared after the Sept. 11 attacks, according to its spokesman, Capt. Shawn Turner.
He said the assaults heightened military commanders' awareness that modern enemies are likely to camouflage themselves as civilians, so there is a need for weapons that are less likely to harm bystanders.
"War has changed, and you don't always know who your friends and enemies are so we need to use technologies that fit specific situations and adversaries," added Richard Garcia, a spokesman for an Air Force research lab in New Mexico that developed the energy beam, known as the Active Denial System.
The headquarters for the Air Force's research program is Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton. The Columbus-based Battelle technology development organization is also conducting nonlethal weapons research for the government, but corporate spokeswoman Katy Delaney would not discuss details. Military documents show Battelle has helped the government assess whether proposed nonlethal weapons could cause permanent harm.
The two weapons the military is closest to using operate in radically different ways. The energy beam, broadcast from a dishlike antenna, is closely related to microwaves, and Garcia compared the pain it produces to touching a light bulb. It causes no lasting damage because of the low energy levels it uses, he said. In conflicts, adversaries are expected to flee within seconds of being targeted.
The slippery gel developed by the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio lasts from six to 12 hours and can also be sprayed on vertical surfaces such as walls, windows and doors, to prevent people from climbing in. The military believes it will be useful for halting people at checkpoints, denying avenues of approach and handling confrontational crowds.
Human rights groups are wary of the research. Amnesty International spokeswoman Jen Corlew questioned whether the military's safety tests could adequately predict long-term health consequences. She also worries that the devices could be sold to oppressive governments that would use them for torture.
William Arkin, senior military advisor to Human Rights Watch, said such weapons should not be used on innocent civilians or create unnecessary suffering. He added that although the Pentagon hopes the American public will accept its use of nonlethal weapons, public acceptance can be subjective, often depending on what viewers think when they see them used on television news reports.
"At one time, the public found land mines to be acceptable, and then the public aesthetic changed because of the indiscriminate nature of the weapons," Arkin said.
John M. Kenney, a researcher at Pennsylvania State University, said the military conducts extensive tests to determine the likelihood of injury and death for each prospect, and rejects any nonlethal weapons that are likely to cause harm. Kenney, who heads a program that advises the military on the likely effects of such weapons, noted that even objects like baseball bats can be abused by torturers.
The Council on Foreign Relations, a New York-based nonpartisan research center, supports use of nonlethal weapons and says the Defense Department hasn't moved quickly enough to develop and use them. In a 1999 report on the subject, the council said NATO's intervention in Serbia could have benefited from such technology.
"It is very important to determine whether these weapons represent a viable new and useful option for U.S. national security," Leslie Gelb, president of the council, said in the report.
Not all nonlethal weapons experiments work out. After investigating the use of stink bombs called "maloderants" to repel people and sticky foam that could be used to seal buildings and immobilize crowds, the military abandoned the research, Turner said. The sticky foam didn't dry quickly enough, and the maloderants "weren't working out," he said, declining to discuss why. Watchdog groups had questioned whether maloderants would violate chemical and biological weapons bans.
"When we put money toward something, we need to know it will meet all the requirements of being an ethical and responsible weapon," Turner said. "Anything that might not fall within that realm isn't worth putting money toward."
Contact Sabrina Eaton at:
seaton@plaind.com, 216-999-4212