Scary Stuff ! I can just imagine all those CIA interrogators, who thanks to our minister will be visiting here soon, might decide to use this to loosen a few tongues without leaving a mark…
Volunteers taking part in tests of the Pentagon’s “less-lethal” microwave weapon were banned from wearing glasses or contact lenses due to safety fears. The ADS fires a 95-gigahertz microwave beam, which is supposed to heat skin and to cause pain but no physical damage.
Little information about its effects has been released, but details of tests in 2003 and 2004 were revealed after Edward Hammond, director of the US Sunshine Project – an organisation campaigning against the use of biological and non-lethal weapons – requested them under the Freedom of Information Act.
The ADS weapon’s beam causes pain within 2 to 3 seconds and it becomes intolerable after less than 5 seconds. People’s reflex responses to the pain is expected to force them to move out of the beam before their skin can be burnt.
A vehicle-mounted version of ADS called Sheriff could be in service in Iraq in 2006 according to the Department of Defense, and it is also being evaluated by the US Department of Energy for use in defending nuclear facilities. The US marines and police are both working on portable versions, and the US air force is building a system for controlling riots.
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