Re: Non Violent Weapons

On Sun, 8 Mar 1998, Thomas Barclay wrote:

> I've been working on Non Violent weapons for peacekeeping ops, and 
> I'm wondering if anyone has any experience in the real world with 
> rubber or wax bullets. My supposition is that they have a 
> significantly lower effective range (but what range is appropriate? 
> ideas?) and that they can kill, even though as a rule they do less 
> serious injuries. Any idea if these rounds use the same powder loads 
> as normal rounds? 

Well, for starters, "non-lethal" is just the PR name. In actuality, they

are "less lethal". E.g. usually the doctrine for using rubber bullets in

rifle-caliber weapons calls for shooting at the *ground* and having the 
richochets hit the rioters' *legs*. Aimed directly at torso or head,
they 
are quite potentially lethal.

I have some rubber shells for 12g shotgun -- upon trying these out, they

went straight through a 1" pine plank (at 5 yards, but still).
 
I know wax is used in blanks and for indoor plinking, but I've never 
heard of it in riot ammo.

Auto-loading weapons would need a fairly hefty charge to work in 
autoloaders -- the blank adapter isn't there just to stop the caps, it 
also increases pressures to working levels.

> The ruling I'm suggesting for this type of round is the use of a 
> special NV wpn damage table which gives them a higher chance of 
> wounding and lower chance of killing. I suggest a reduced impact die 
> shift (two levels for wax, one for rubber) based on my assumption of 
> a full powder load and the assumption that even a rubber bullet 
> hitting an armoured Marine in the eyeball would be bad news. I also 
> suggest a maximum range such as 1 band for wax and two bands for 
> rubber. Thoughts anyone?

Sounds pretty realistic. The range sucks, but within effective range
they 
are potentially lethal.

> wax/rubber bullets, beanbags (GL and shotgun), net grenades, stun 
> grenades, CS/CN grenades, sonics, neural disrupters, tasers, stun 
> guns (a la 9 Volt model currently available), Shock gloves, Riot 
> armour and shields (w truncheons), slippy/sticky foam, firehose, dart 
> guns, tranq needlers, solidifying foam, and some defences against 
> some of the above.

The problem with any gas, neural disrupter etc. is that in a riot
situation you're targeting a very large group of people. Even if only 1%
of population is violently allergic to stumm gas, there are bound to be
a
couple in any rioting mob -- and you want to avoid *any* casualties. 
Civilians suffocating in their own vomit is bad press. 

The problems are heightened by active mobs trampling the incapacitated
guys -- for an ideal riot control weapon, you'd want something that
hurts
but doesn't damage (sting a little and let 'em limp home on their own
feet). 

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