Recently,
Masers have been under development as a non-
lethal weapons.
The
Marine Corps (in coordination with the
Air Force) has recently developed a portable maser with integrated technology that limits the intensity of the beam of microwaves being emitted. The emission goes right through clothes, but rapidly heats the water and ion containing
tissue that makes up human flesh(not surprisingly,
microwaves really are used in your microwave to accomplish a similar feat, but in a slightly different manner). With the carefully limited
output of this device, it does not penetrate very deeply into the body (and thus does not do lethal damage to
internal organs).
Although information about the use of this new technology was not intended to be released until April (2001) it was published in Marine Corps Times somewhat earlier. A tech writer for UPI (Kelly Hearn) also published an article on shortly after the resulting media scramle. In her write up, she provided several insights into the weapon and how it might be used, saying:
"Unlike the other three branches, the
Marines often are in situations
where there are lots of
innocent bystanders, where they have to control an
unruly mob," said John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, a non-profit
policy research firm in Alexandria, Va. "
Tear gas and
rubber bullets just
have not been effective, so they've want something more lethal than those
and less lethal than an
M16. Whether they have found that here remains to be
seen."
...
Retired Major General William L. Nash, the former commanding general of
the 1st Armored Division, told
UPI the device will inevitably create a race
to build counter weapons. "The good news is the weapon is
non-lethal but the
bad news is that for every weapon there is bound to be a counter weapon," he
said. "I can imagine someone trying to develop a
polymer based shield
against this, for example."