Re: Non Violent Weapons

At 22:40 3/8/98, Mikko Kurki-Suonio wrote:
>On Sun, 8 Mar 1998, Thomas Barclay wrote:

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

To quote from a Neemis Enterprises ad (Phoenix Command Special Weapons
Supplement):

"Do people really care enough about student demonstrators to put a thin
plastic coating over a 13 gram steel core? People do."

>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).

Furthermore, something that will bruise when it hits the body will
*kill*
when it strikes the brain. That darn skull just isn't flexible enough...

Possible cyberpunk upgrade: The Brain Case. Surrounds the skull with a
relatively soft covering over a gel. Impacts in one place cause the
outer
'skull' to simply bulge somewhere else, reducing shock damage. Looks
weird
as all get out, but the average 'punk would find that a selling point.

>Civilians suffocating in their own vomit is bad press.

Ah, but if you already control the 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).

I always thought that a modern electro-pneumatic paintgun, loaded with
soft
rubber balls and chrono'd at 350 fps would hurt like hell, but (barring
a
shot in the eye) do little permanent damage to the average adult. I'm
wondering why no one has proposed this as an anti-riot solution. Lord
knows
there have been enough juvenile delinquents who have experimented with
the
idea....

Some time in the last six months, I read a SF short story about a war in
which the US and Soviets were fighting using non-lethal weapons, due to
various treaties. They used gasses, semi-toxic poison tranq guns, etc.
The
upshot of the story was, that in using non-lethal methodologies they
were,
over time, causing more lasting trauma and psychological damage than a
straight-up shooting war.

Don't ask me where I read this; I've been burning through the
anthologies
at the rate of about 2-3/month lately.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
------
Jim 'Jiji' Foster / jfoster@kansas.net / Jiji @ AnimeMUCK / TIP #28

"That's the way we all begin," said Tom Platt. "The boys they make
believe
all the time till they've cheated 'emselves into bein' men, an' so till
they die--pretendin' and pretendin'."
    Rudyard Kipling, _Captains Courageous_