copied from:
https://www.wired.com/2007/12/the-voice-of-go/
SHARON WEINBERGERSECURITYDEC 21, 2007 6:45 AM
The Voice of God Weapon Returns
The Voice of God weapon — a device that projects voices into your head to make you think God is speaking to you — is the military’s equivalent of an urban myth. Meaning, it’s mentioned periodically at defense workshops (ironically, I first heard about it at the same defense conference where I first met Noah),
The Voice of God weapon -- a device that projects voices into your head to make you think God is speaking to you -- is the military's equivalent of an urban myth. Meaning, it's mentioned periodically at defense workshops (ironically, I first heard about it at the same defense conference where I first met Noah), and typically someone whispers about it actually being used. Now Steven Corman, writing at the COMOPS journal, describes his own encounter with this urban myth:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 27_pf.html
http://comops.org/journal/2007/12/20/ps ... your-head/
*At a government workshop some time ago I head someone describe a new tool that was described as the “voice of Allah.” This was said to be a device that would operate at a distance and would deliver a message that only a single person could hear. The story was that it was tested in a conflict situation in Iraq and pointed at one insurgent in a group, who whipped around looking in all directions, and began a heated conversation with his compatriots, who did not hear the message. At the time I greeted this story with some skepticism. *
Is there any basis to this technology? Well, Holosonic Research Labs and American Technology Corporation both have versions of directed sound, which can allow a single person to hear a message that others around don't hear. DARPA appears to be working on its own sonic projector. Intriguingly, Strategy Page reports that troops are using the Long Range Acoustic Device as a modified Voice of God weapon:
http://www.holosonics.com/
http://www.atcsd.com/site/
https://www.wired.com/defense/2007/06/d ... ic_pr.html
http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htweap ... 71217.aspx
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_range_acoustic_device
It appears that some of the troops in Iraq are using "spoken" (as opposed to "screeching") LRAD to mess with enemy fighters. Islamic terrorists tend to be superstitious and, of course, very religious. LRAD can put the "word of God" into their heads. If God, in the form of a voice that only you can hear, tells you to surrender, or run away, what are you gonna do?
And as Corman also notes, CNET recently wrote about an advertisement in New York for A&E's TV show Paranormal State, which uses some of this technology. Beyond directed sound, it's long been known that microwaves at certain frequencies can produce an auditory effect that sounds like it's coming from within someone's head (and there's the nagging question of classified microwave work at Brooks Air Force Base, that the Air Force stubbornly refuses to talk about).
That brings us back to the Voice of God/Allah Weapon. Is it real or bogus? In one version -- related to me by another defense reporter -- it's not just Allah's voice -- but an entire holographic image projected above (um, who decides what Allah looks like?).
Does it exist? I'm not sure, but it's funny that when you hear it brought up at defense conferences, no one ever asks the obvious question: does anybody think this thing will actually convince people God is speaking to them? I'm thinking, not.
http://blogs.cnet.com/8301-13645_1-9836453-47.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microwave_auditory_effect
The Voice of God Weapon Returns
Re: The Voice of God Weapon Returns
https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/c ... 27_pf.html
Xtreme Defense
Lightning guns, heat rays, weapons that can make you hear the voice of God. This is what happens when the war on terror meets the entrepreneurial spirit
By Sharon Weinberger
Sunday, August 28, 2005
"This is very clandestine," Pete Bitar whispered, as his red Dodge Caravan idled in the parking lot of a Burger King near Fort Belvoir. "They called last week, and they wanted delivery this week."
It did feel a little clandestine, if a bit unlikely. Yet there, in the Burger King parking lot, a small transaction in America's war on terror was about to take place. In the minivan were Bitar, the president and founder of Xtreme Alternative Defense Systems (XADS), Edward Fry, the company's research coordinator, and George Gibbs, of Marine Corps Systems Command, who two years ago plucked Bitar's obscure company out of its paper existence and provided it with more than half a million dollars in Pentagon funding.
They were waiting for Superman.
Bitar had battled start-up disappointments and even ridicule -- not to mention January cold and Beltway rush-hour traffic -- to seal his first Pentagon deal. The procurement order had gone through so quickly that the Indiana-based Bitar, who was in town for a conference, agreed to make his final delivery at the Burger King to avoid the hassle of getting onto the Virginia Army base.
Bitar flipped open a case containing his first sale: the "dazzler," one in a line of about a half-dozen "nonlethal" weapons that XADS is marketing to the military. It looked like an executive pen: slick, green and flecked with gold. But the pen was really a green laser designed to disorient and temporarily blind an enemy. Sale price: $1,100 apiece.
It looked, to use one of Bitar's favorite phrases, really cool.
Bitar glanced up. "There's Superman."
Sure enough, a broad-shouldered man materialized in front of the Caravan. He was wearing a leather jacket embroidered with the familiar "S" emblem and a matching tie.
Superman stuck out his hand and introduced himself: Shane Gilmore. Pentagon folks seem especially fond of quirky nicknames and are not above cultivating that mystique. Asked about the Kryptonian symbols, he'd say only, "I'm Superman." But today he wasn't saving the world, just trying to protect it as part of an Army task force buying equipment for troops in Iraq. They had placed an order for 13 of Bitar's dazzlers. Supercharged versions of commercial laser pointers, dazzlers are the lowest-tech of Bitar's weapons, and they're not what initially caught the Pentagon's eye. Rather, it was his concept for a gun that could shoot bolts of artificial lightning to paralyze, but not kill, an enemy, like a "Star Trek" phaser set on stun.
After handing over the goods, Bitar explained his unusual entry into the high-tech weapons market as he headed into Arlington for dinner. The lightning gun began, literally, as a daydream when Bitar was running a Styrofoam recycling business in the early 1990s. Watching the machinery that cut up the used material, he noticed sparks shooting into the air. He began to wonder, at first idly and then more intensely, if there was a way to extend the sparks' range.
But he had no engineering or technical expertise, and his speculation went nowhere.
A decade later, Bitar was no closer to becoming an experimental weapons entrepreneur. But he did have a new business, founded largely to fund an "extreme" hobby of his, powered paragliding. The idea was to turn enthusiasts of the sport -- who strap motors to their backs, take off running, then yank open a parachute -- into flying billboards. He called it XADS -- for "Xtreme Ads," as in advertising.
Undeterred by his lack of engineering qualifications, he began to apply for Department of Defense research and development contracts set aside for small businesses. Bitar started out pitching an idea related to his paragliding business involving a parachute design. But no one at the Pentagon was biting. Then one day, Bitar learned that the Pentagon was seeking ideas for a taser gun. It was like being struck by lightning. He dusted off his decade-old idea and, in 2002, was granted a contract to develop his lightning gun. Suddenly, he needed a new name for his company. "Xtreme Advertising" would sound pretty silly at defense trade shows. Fortuitously, XADS had a handy "D" for Defense.
Now his company consists of two full-time employees, himself and Fry, but he hires physicists and engineers as consultants to design and build the parts for his weapons that aren't commercially available. His job is to be the visionary. "I call myself the glue -- I kind of had the idea and vision of what it could be," Bitar said.
Back in his lab in Anderson, Ind., Bitar has a large apparatus -- 11 feet high -- that shoots sparks about 16 feet. It's too large and cumbersome to be a portable weapon; he thinks it could be used for securing U.S. embassies. He also produces smaller units -- dubbed "StunStrike" -- that he says shoot four-foot bolts of lightning.
His prototype for a rifle weighs about 25 pounds and can shoot electricity about 12 feet, he says.
Gibbs, the Marine Corps official who first funded Bitar, has a fondness for edgy ideas. A chemical engineer and longtime proponent of nonlethal weaponry, Gibbs funds other offbeat projects, such as Medusa, an attempt to develop a weapon that uses low-power microwaves -- believed to cause an audible buzzing in subjects' heads -- to make people think God is speaking to them. Another such weapon would use beams of energy to make people dizzy and lose their balance.
Gibbs acknowledges that electrical engineers in his office said that Bitar's lightning gun would never fly because of a variety of technical hurdles. But, he says, he figured "it was minimal risk to the Marine Corps to try it." He gave XADS the initial $100,000 (that's "minimal risk" in Pentagonese). Bitar was able to prove, by the end of the nine-month contract, that he could generate a one-foot spark with some degree of control, which led to more funding.
Striding into a Lebanese restaurant at Pentagon Row, Bitar greeted the servers in fluent Arabic. "Pete, you never cease to amaze me," Gibbs said to Bitar, as the group was guided to a quiet booth in the back.
Bitar traces his interest in nonlethal weapons to his heritage as a Christian Arab. His father was born in Syria, his mother in Lebanon and he in Michigan. "We're sitting in an Arabic restaurant, speaking Arabic. Honestly, it gives me a little bit of an ad-vantage," he said. "I can think the way a Middle Eastern mind thinks. I understand where they're coming from. So, we can design tactical solutions that deal with that."
Lightning, for example, is a very big fear for Arabs, Bitar contends. Peter Bechtold, the head of Near East studies at the State Department's Foreign Service Institute, was dubious that Arabs would be more frightened than anyone else by lightning guns. "It sounds strange," Bechtold said, when presented with Bitar's idea. But ideas are what Bitar overflows with. His latest is to use ultrasonic waves in the dazzler not to just blind enemies, but also to convey messages into their heads, similar to Gibbs's Medusa project. Hearing voices from God is a "big thing" in Arab culture, according to Bitar. "We flash-blind them. And, while their eyes are shut, you could send a recorded message or deep guttural voice that echoes in the inside of their head. They're looking around, 'Hey, did you hear that?'''
Bitar laughed. "That's the psych warfare side of this thing."
Suddenly serious, he leaned back. "You know, I'm a Christian, and I just believe in preserving life," he said. "Yet, preserving it in the context of order, law and force, if needed."
Gibbs interrupted Bitar's soliloquy as dinner arrived. "What if I say grace before we eat?" he asked.
With soft Arabic music playing in the background, Bitar and Fry lowered their heads as Gibbs began: "Dear Heavenly Father, we thank you for this marvelous meal. We thank you for this opportunity we have to share with each other and do great stuff for our country."
After grace, Bitar resumed with his vision of bloodless warfare. Hostage situations would be as easy as hosing down a whole group of people with the lightning gun, and "then you could separate them out: hostages and non-hostages," he said.
"Um, just the capability to employ force, achieve American objectives and protect ourselves and yet not kill," he said.
"I mean, this whole war on terror, that's exactly what we have to do. We have to be able to minimize our collateral damage because, frankly, we can't afford for the whole world to hate us for very long."
"They always will," Gibbs interrupted again.
Over the past year, Bitar has received almost $1 million to develop his weapons. That includes money from the Marine Corps, a contract from the Navy and a smaller amount of matching funds from the state of Indiana. Of all the products Bitar is developing, he describes a handheld lightning gun as the "Holy Grail." But there is at least one barrier he hasn't even approached.
"We haven't done human testing," Bitar said.
"We haven't done animal testing," Gibbs added.
"Yeah, not officially," Bitar said with a sly smile. He would not elaborate on any unofficial testing.
Anyone happening upon the Quantico Marine Base in April might have thought someone was staging a county fair. Brightly striped canopies crowded the grounds, and concessionary booths advertised snow cones, nachos and ice-cold sodas, as visitors milled about and long lines formed for barbecue and hot dogs.
This was the Force Protection Equipment Demonstration, or FPED, the world's largest trade show for counterterrorism technology. Instead of local crafts and game booths, vendors offered the opportunity to check out the latest in bomb containment devices, among other things. Booth after booth of space-age decontamination suits, newfangled barriers, advanced sensors, X-ray machines, weapons and data destruction devices clamored for people's attention, even as a discordant mix of Bond music and reveille drowned out conversation.
One booth allowed visitors the chance to shoot high-powered pepper balls at dummies. Taser International, the country's largest manufacturer of stun guns, was demonstrating its weapon on any willing takers, provided they'd sign a liability release form. Taser's stun gun (which delivers an electric charge through wires attached to two darts) works by disrupting the body's nervous system, immobilizing its victim. By mid-morning, Taser had more than a dozen volunteers, including Sergio, a dark-haired young man whose friends cheered and laughed as he sat in a chair to be zapped, one leg flying up straight in front of him as the jolt hit his body.
The expo is a testament to the entrepreneurial spirit of America, but it's also a vision of its future: a nation mired in barriers and locks, fitted out with all-seeing sensors and closed-circuit television, where terrorism, as one company's slogan goes, "is reduced to a minor inconvenience."
Even among military trade shows, FPED is unique. With only five major companies left in the U.S. weapons market, most of today's military expos feature an orderly array of brightly colored PowerPoint briefings displayed next to plastic mockups of weapons. With so few companies, the jockeying of a typical trade show is absent.
FPED, in contrast, harks back to a different era: the 1980s and the Cold War, when an imminent threat of annihilation fueled a market full of companies competing for a slice of the Pentagon's budget. What started off after the 1996 bombing of Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia as a show for a few dozen specialized companies has today grown to more than 500 vendors crowding two massive aircraft hangars and an entire airfield.
The counterterrorism business is booming. And for those who want to break into the market, FPED is the place. The expo was closed to the public, but representatives of law enforcement and military agencies crowded the grounds, shopping for the latest technology. Traffic into the huge base was backed up for more than two miles on the first day of the three-day show.
XADS's 10-by-10 booth was set up at the back of the first hangar; a table in front displayed an assortment of the company's latest products, including its full line of laser dazzlers. XADS had also added a new acoustic weapon called Screech, which true to its name emits an ear-piercing shriek designed to disperse crowds and cause headaches, Bitar said.
The most striking feature of the XADS booth, at first glance, was a framed poster, mounted on a pedestal, that Bitar called concept art. On it, dark, vaguely Middle Eastern-looking men attack a U.S. Embassy, only to writhe in pain as giant bolts of XADS lightning hit them. A graphic artist who draws for GI Joe and Spider-Man comics designed the poster.
But the star attraction was a simple black briefcase that Bitar promised would shoot lightning bolts. He and Fry placed the briefcase (innocuous-looking, if you ignored the pointed needle a few inches long sticking out the side) on top of a carpeted podium, plugged it into a wall socket and flipped a switch. Then they stood back.
Iridescent streaks of purple lightning snaked out of the briefcase, accompanied by the deafening rattle of what sounded like an M-16, and even in the noisy hangar, conversations momentarily ceased.
"It looks like something out of a 1950s movie," one onlooker commented.
Bitar's technology is based on a technique pioneered more than 100 years ago by the eccentric Serbian inventor Nikola Tesla. The StunStrike uses an electrical charge to break down the air in front of the weapon to create a path for sparks generated by a "resonant transformer," better known as a Tesla coil. Unlike a typical Tesla coil, however, Bitar's invention uses electronics to tune and direct the spark stream. It goes about four feet.
"We can tune it all the way down so it feels like broom bristles, and all the way up to knock you down," Bitar informed a group of gawkers.
Electricity that shoots out even a few feet is enough to grab people's attention. A small, wiry man wearing a CIA badge and a lanyard emblazoned with "In-Q-Tel," the agency's venture capital arm, stopped at the booth. He paused to look at the lightning, nodded approvingly and picked up a business card before moving on.
Many of the vendors at the expo were strikingly similar to Bitar: men with ambitious ideas who entered the counterterrorism market as a second career. George Cairnes, a former pilot, is now selling full-body restraining cuffs. The elaborate bondage gear was developed for police as an alternative to "hog-tying," and is being used by the military, according to Cairnes. He said he had an order for 200 going to Guantanamo Bay. Joe Villa, a mechanical engineer, founded US Bunkers, a Florida-based company specializing in flying saucer-shaped mini-fortresses that can fit in your back yard. Villa conceived the idea after 1992's Hurricane Andrew as a way to protect people and property from violent storms, but he, too, is expanding into the counterterrorism market: Imagine a safe room to be used after a biochemical attack; the company points out it could also double as a sauna. A promotional poster depicts a family grilling next to a bunker.
With so many vendors, drawing visitors to individual displays -- particularly visitors with money -- is cutthroat competition. Charles Smith, a former Nokia salesman, persuaded a childhood friend from Texas, an attractive blonde, to stand with him at his booth. His strategy appeared to work, as a crowd assembled to look at the blonde, and Smith's product, a desktop machine designed to drill holes through computer drives, destroying sensitive data.
Hesco Bastion, the world's largest manufacturer of sand-filled barricades (ubiquitous in Iraq and Afghanistan to shield against attacks), took a similar route: It hired midriff-baring models to serve soft drinks from a bar made of its sandbags. The show's organizers wouldn't let them serve beer.
Some vendors go negative. Grant Haber, a former police officer and now a distributor of bomb-proof trash cans designed for subways and other public places, hung out by the press trailer, trying to entice a reporter to examine his file of allegations against a rival manufacturer "They've been fraudulent," he said, clutching the folder. "I have proof of falsified test reports."
Back at Bitar's booth, the draw was StunStrike. When the crowd would thin, all Bitar had to do was flip the switch, and people would flock to the booth.
At noon on the second day, XADS captured the attention of a VIP. Marine Corps Col. David Karcher, who heads the Pentagon's Joint Nonlethal Weapons Directorate, stopped to watch the demonstration, and promised to return.
The vendors' eyes followed Karcher, a man who controls $55 million in annual funding, as he walked slowly past the exhibits, explaining his role: He pays firms to develop nonlethal technology and to test it against strict Pentagon and international standards. For example, his office helped develop the Active Denial System, a weapon that uses millimeter waves -- a supercharged version of microwaves -- to heat up the skin's nerve endings, creating a burning sensation similar to touching a 100-watt light bulb. Except the beam, while painful, does not actually burn the skin.
The weapon was only recently declassified, and the Pentagon still won't divulge how far the beam goes, but Karcher says it could be used to control crowds at feeding stations in countries like Somalia and Iraq. "Often you see the people pushing their way to the front of the crowd are young men," he said. "They'll push women and children out of the way."
Karcher pointed to a demo of the system set up at Raytheon's booth. No required release forms here; Raytheon took a more direct approach: self-infliction. "We can't do it to you, but if you want to do it to yourself," the vendor said, handing over a control switch.
When a reporter hesitated, Karcher quickly offered up his own hand. "Press the button," he instructed. The invisible beam clicked on.
"I put my hand there, it starts to hurt, I take my hand way," Karcher explained calmly as he slowly slid his arm away from the beam. The point, he continued, is not to hurt someone, but simply to force a particular action, or to condition a response.
"Sort of like Pavlov's dogs," interrupted the enthusiastic Raytheon vendor.
Comparing humans to dogs who salivate on command didn't seem to sit well with Karcher, who winced. The Pentagon's nonlethal work, particularly that which relies on pain, is under intense public scrutiny and subject to international legal conventions. But the main problem with the Active Denial System, and similar directed energy weapons, is size, according to Karcher. Now the weapon goes on a Humvee, but the military is finding that troops in Iraq want smaller, handheld devices -- phasers.
But it's precisely those goals -- small and long-range weapons -- that place phaser technology, at least for now, in the realm of science fiction. The largest lightning guns in the XADS lab are too big to be mobile weapons, and while the rifle has generated sparks of up to 12 feet, Bitar says, the system has blown out repeatedly and isn't stable beyond four feet.
The military would like something that can go 30 to 100 feet. "We can fire a taser and be very effective at 15 feet," Karcher said. But 15 feet is almost "knife fight" range, he added, and in that case, troops may want a more lethal option, like a rifle.
But for every naysaying expert, there always seems to be a Pentagon official who believes the risk is worthwhile. Franz Gayl, one of the officials who contacted Bitar after hearing about XADS from news accounts, agrees there are barriers to a lighting gun, but he argues for helping nascent companies. The concept of a lightning gun, though risky, offers a potential payoff, according to Gayl. He noted a military officer who built a Tesla coil weapon, claiming to have tested it by shooting it "into the grille of an annoying rude driver in a traffic jam."
Back at the show, Bitar looked bitterly across the way at Raytheon, which was handing out customized jars of spicy hot fajita powder to promote its "burning" nonlethal weapon. Other experienced venders dished out logo-inscribed chocolate and pens. XADS had only postcard- size brochures and business cards.
It was the end of the third day, and still no sales. A man who introduced himself as a buyer for the Turkish military asked if he could get a free sample of Bitar's lasers, or barring that, could he borrow one and return it if the Turkish military wasn't interested. Bitar said that wasn't likely.
"We're not going to do that," Bitar chuckled. "We're not Wal-Mart."
But Bitar noticed that foreign militaries were the most interested in his weapons, and officials from Asia, the Middle East and Europe had all visited his booth. "It's kind of weird, especially because when it comes to weapons, you'd rather arm your own country than someone else," he said.
But he shrugged and added, "A customer is a customer."
Toward the end of the expo, Bitar was demonstrating the lightning gun when he suddenly recoiled in pain. "It bit him," Fry said with a note of concern. One of the electric tentacles had reached around and grabbed Bitar. He rubbed his shoulder. Since electricity seeks the quickest route to complete its circuit, it will reach out and touch the first thing that's grounded, such as a person holding the gun.
Bitar appeared unusually downbeat. He'd been standing for three days straight at the booth, and he was worried about how to keep his business going. Even with $1 million total in start-up funds, he'd have to close shop in about six months if he didn't get orders. "I didn't sleep well last night," he acknowledged. "Busy thinking about things, like how to get through to the Joint Nonlethal Directorate, so they take us a little more seriously."
At dinner the night before, Bitar's confidence -- shaken by the competition at the show-- seemed to ebb. He would be turning 40 soon. The initial success of XADS allowed his wife to stay home with their young son. His bravado momentarily gone, he talked about his previous businesses, which, while not failures, had not really been successes either. The Styrofoam recycling company sold at break even, and his parachute logo business barely made a profit.
Back at the show, Bitar sighed. "You get all this stuff going against us."
But a few minutes later, he was uptempo again.
"I just think we're only limited by our funding," Bitar said, pausing to pack up the cartoon poster of their weapons. "We could do so much more than the big companies." He pointed to the Raytheon booth. "These guys are burning your hand at 10 feet away with $50 million worth of research."
He gestured to the StunStrike. "We've got $10,000 worth of research in that thing, and we can do the exact same thing."
Pausing, he added, "Okay, we haven't been through all the studies and testing because we haven't had all the money to put into it."
Bitar's concerns are not just about big companies like Raytheon, but also about his nemesis Ionatron, a start-up backed partly by investment from the CIA venture capital fund. Ionatron, whose weapons are based on a similar concept for channeling lightning, was founded in 2002, and its stock is now worth more than half a billion dollars on the Nasdaq Stock Market.
Unlike Bitar, who won his early contracts through a competitive process, Ionatron's most significant contract, for $12.6 million, came through a congressional line item, which typically requires high-level lobbying. Another difference from XADS: Ionatron would like the nonlethal lightning guns to be, if necessary, lethal.
But both companies face an age-old problem with harnessing lightning: It is notoriously difficult to control. Making it go straight and far requires breaking down the air, like drilling a path through wood for a nail. Creating this path for any more than a few feet presents a formidable challenge.
Bitar's idea for doing this, like Ionatron's, is to use pulsed lasers to create a conductive path ahead of the lightning. A pioneer in this method is a New Mexico-based physicist named Jean-Claude Diels. The Belgian-born scientist says he started his research not to build "zap guns," as he calls them, but to prevent deaths from lightning, which kills on average 67 people a year in the United States, according to the National Weather Service. But the military was never terribly interested in his work, he said, and nonmilitary funding for research is hard to come by these days.
Now caught in a bind, Diels takes money from Ionatron. He doubts it would be possible to shrink the weapon down to the size of a pistol, although he believes a portable system, such as one mounted on a car, is possible.
"It's taking a disturbing turn," Diels said with a sigh. "I feel a little bit like the German scientists of the Third Reich, who have no option but to do this research because that's what the government funds."
What's wrong with the idea of a stun gun? "This nonlethal technology, I mean, aimed at electrocuting a crowd of protesters?" he said. "That's not really appetizing, I must say."
As the spectators at FPED thinned out, Bitar started to pack up, and Fry went to get the car. They'd be back in town the next week for another show, but Fry needed to return home for an exam: He's getting a master's degree in theology and peace studies. On the way out, Fry looked back at the weapons bazaar and shook his head.
Toward the front, a banner for Hawaiian Shaved Ice had fallen askew.
Perhaps what makes U.S. military trade shows seem so incongruous is that they treat their market -- war and terrorism -- as if it were plastics, medical supplies or textiles. And Bitar is just another entrepreneur. Despite his lack of big orders, back in Indiana a couple months later, he enthused over his company's progress. Field reports from Iraq on his dazzlers were "stellar," he said, and several Pentagon offices had placed small trial orders. A European television crew wanted to follow him around for six months.
The Pentagon also is preparing for the first time to buy large numbers of commercial dazzlers from several manufacturers and give them to troops in Iraq. Gayl, the Pentagon official who has supported Bitar's work, cautions now that he is concerned that some companies, including XADS, are making lasers so intense that they would permanently blind the people they target. The XADS lasers "are way out of line," Gayl said recently.
Bitar adamantly disagrees that his lasers will cause permanent blindness, saying they are eye-safe, if used properly. It's a key point for his company, since the StunStrike weapon has slipped to the back burner, and the dazzlers' time appears to have arrived. Bitar said he was negotiating with what he called a major supplier for the military and law enforcement on a new version of XADS's dazzler. The PD/G-105 is a souped-up laser that would be twice as powerful as the ones Bitar sold at the Burger King back in January.
The supplier, Bitar said, was looking at orders in the tens of thousands.
"It'll totally kick butt," he said.
Xtreme Defense
Lightning guns, heat rays, weapons that can make you hear the voice of God. This is what happens when the war on terror meets the entrepreneurial spirit
By Sharon Weinberger
Sunday, August 28, 2005
"This is very clandestine," Pete Bitar whispered, as his red Dodge Caravan idled in the parking lot of a Burger King near Fort Belvoir. "They called last week, and they wanted delivery this week."
It did feel a little clandestine, if a bit unlikely. Yet there, in the Burger King parking lot, a small transaction in America's war on terror was about to take place. In the minivan were Bitar, the president and founder of Xtreme Alternative Defense Systems (XADS), Edward Fry, the company's research coordinator, and George Gibbs, of Marine Corps Systems Command, who two years ago plucked Bitar's obscure company out of its paper existence and provided it with more than half a million dollars in Pentagon funding.
They were waiting for Superman.
Bitar had battled start-up disappointments and even ridicule -- not to mention January cold and Beltway rush-hour traffic -- to seal his first Pentagon deal. The procurement order had gone through so quickly that the Indiana-based Bitar, who was in town for a conference, agreed to make his final delivery at the Burger King to avoid the hassle of getting onto the Virginia Army base.
Bitar flipped open a case containing his first sale: the "dazzler," one in a line of about a half-dozen "nonlethal" weapons that XADS is marketing to the military. It looked like an executive pen: slick, green and flecked with gold. But the pen was really a green laser designed to disorient and temporarily blind an enemy. Sale price: $1,100 apiece.
It looked, to use one of Bitar's favorite phrases, really cool.
Bitar glanced up. "There's Superman."
Sure enough, a broad-shouldered man materialized in front of the Caravan. He was wearing a leather jacket embroidered with the familiar "S" emblem and a matching tie.
Superman stuck out his hand and introduced himself: Shane Gilmore. Pentagon folks seem especially fond of quirky nicknames and are not above cultivating that mystique. Asked about the Kryptonian symbols, he'd say only, "I'm Superman." But today he wasn't saving the world, just trying to protect it as part of an Army task force buying equipment for troops in Iraq. They had placed an order for 13 of Bitar's dazzlers. Supercharged versions of commercial laser pointers, dazzlers are the lowest-tech of Bitar's weapons, and they're not what initially caught the Pentagon's eye. Rather, it was his concept for a gun that could shoot bolts of artificial lightning to paralyze, but not kill, an enemy, like a "Star Trek" phaser set on stun.
After handing over the goods, Bitar explained his unusual entry into the high-tech weapons market as he headed into Arlington for dinner. The lightning gun began, literally, as a daydream when Bitar was running a Styrofoam recycling business in the early 1990s. Watching the machinery that cut up the used material, he noticed sparks shooting into the air. He began to wonder, at first idly and then more intensely, if there was a way to extend the sparks' range.
But he had no engineering or technical expertise, and his speculation went nowhere.
A decade later, Bitar was no closer to becoming an experimental weapons entrepreneur. But he did have a new business, founded largely to fund an "extreme" hobby of his, powered paragliding. The idea was to turn enthusiasts of the sport -- who strap motors to their backs, take off running, then yank open a parachute -- into flying billboards. He called it XADS -- for "Xtreme Ads," as in advertising.
Undeterred by his lack of engineering qualifications, he began to apply for Department of Defense research and development contracts set aside for small businesses. Bitar started out pitching an idea related to his paragliding business involving a parachute design. But no one at the Pentagon was biting. Then one day, Bitar learned that the Pentagon was seeking ideas for a taser gun. It was like being struck by lightning. He dusted off his decade-old idea and, in 2002, was granted a contract to develop his lightning gun. Suddenly, he needed a new name for his company. "Xtreme Advertising" would sound pretty silly at defense trade shows. Fortuitously, XADS had a handy "D" for Defense.
Now his company consists of two full-time employees, himself and Fry, but he hires physicists and engineers as consultants to design and build the parts for his weapons that aren't commercially available. His job is to be the visionary. "I call myself the glue -- I kind of had the idea and vision of what it could be," Bitar said.
Back in his lab in Anderson, Ind., Bitar has a large apparatus -- 11 feet high -- that shoots sparks about 16 feet. It's too large and cumbersome to be a portable weapon; he thinks it could be used for securing U.S. embassies. He also produces smaller units -- dubbed "StunStrike" -- that he says shoot four-foot bolts of lightning.
His prototype for a rifle weighs about 25 pounds and can shoot electricity about 12 feet, he says.
Gibbs, the Marine Corps official who first funded Bitar, has a fondness for edgy ideas. A chemical engineer and longtime proponent of nonlethal weaponry, Gibbs funds other offbeat projects, such as Medusa, an attempt to develop a weapon that uses low-power microwaves -- believed to cause an audible buzzing in subjects' heads -- to make people think God is speaking to them. Another such weapon would use beams of energy to make people dizzy and lose their balance.
Gibbs acknowledges that electrical engineers in his office said that Bitar's lightning gun would never fly because of a variety of technical hurdles. But, he says, he figured "it was minimal risk to the Marine Corps to try it." He gave XADS the initial $100,000 (that's "minimal risk" in Pentagonese). Bitar was able to prove, by the end of the nine-month contract, that he could generate a one-foot spark with some degree of control, which led to more funding.
Striding into a Lebanese restaurant at Pentagon Row, Bitar greeted the servers in fluent Arabic. "Pete, you never cease to amaze me," Gibbs said to Bitar, as the group was guided to a quiet booth in the back.
Bitar traces his interest in nonlethal weapons to his heritage as a Christian Arab. His father was born in Syria, his mother in Lebanon and he in Michigan. "We're sitting in an Arabic restaurant, speaking Arabic. Honestly, it gives me a little bit of an ad-vantage," he said. "I can think the way a Middle Eastern mind thinks. I understand where they're coming from. So, we can design tactical solutions that deal with that."
Lightning, for example, is a very big fear for Arabs, Bitar contends. Peter Bechtold, the head of Near East studies at the State Department's Foreign Service Institute, was dubious that Arabs would be more frightened than anyone else by lightning guns. "It sounds strange," Bechtold said, when presented with Bitar's idea. But ideas are what Bitar overflows with. His latest is to use ultrasonic waves in the dazzler not to just blind enemies, but also to convey messages into their heads, similar to Gibbs's Medusa project. Hearing voices from God is a "big thing" in Arab culture, according to Bitar. "We flash-blind them. And, while their eyes are shut, you could send a recorded message or deep guttural voice that echoes in the inside of their head. They're looking around, 'Hey, did you hear that?'''
Bitar laughed. "That's the psych warfare side of this thing."
Suddenly serious, he leaned back. "You know, I'm a Christian, and I just believe in preserving life," he said. "Yet, preserving it in the context of order, law and force, if needed."
Gibbs interrupted Bitar's soliloquy as dinner arrived. "What if I say grace before we eat?" he asked.
With soft Arabic music playing in the background, Bitar and Fry lowered their heads as Gibbs began: "Dear Heavenly Father, we thank you for this marvelous meal. We thank you for this opportunity we have to share with each other and do great stuff for our country."
After grace, Bitar resumed with his vision of bloodless warfare. Hostage situations would be as easy as hosing down a whole group of people with the lightning gun, and "then you could separate them out: hostages and non-hostages," he said.
"Um, just the capability to employ force, achieve American objectives and protect ourselves and yet not kill," he said.
"I mean, this whole war on terror, that's exactly what we have to do. We have to be able to minimize our collateral damage because, frankly, we can't afford for the whole world to hate us for very long."
"They always will," Gibbs interrupted again.
Over the past year, Bitar has received almost $1 million to develop his weapons. That includes money from the Marine Corps, a contract from the Navy and a smaller amount of matching funds from the state of Indiana. Of all the products Bitar is developing, he describes a handheld lightning gun as the "Holy Grail." But there is at least one barrier he hasn't even approached.
"We haven't done human testing," Bitar said.
"We haven't done animal testing," Gibbs added.
"Yeah, not officially," Bitar said with a sly smile. He would not elaborate on any unofficial testing.
Anyone happening upon the Quantico Marine Base in April might have thought someone was staging a county fair. Brightly striped canopies crowded the grounds, and concessionary booths advertised snow cones, nachos and ice-cold sodas, as visitors milled about and long lines formed for barbecue and hot dogs.
This was the Force Protection Equipment Demonstration, or FPED, the world's largest trade show for counterterrorism technology. Instead of local crafts and game booths, vendors offered the opportunity to check out the latest in bomb containment devices, among other things. Booth after booth of space-age decontamination suits, newfangled barriers, advanced sensors, X-ray machines, weapons and data destruction devices clamored for people's attention, even as a discordant mix of Bond music and reveille drowned out conversation.
One booth allowed visitors the chance to shoot high-powered pepper balls at dummies. Taser International, the country's largest manufacturer of stun guns, was demonstrating its weapon on any willing takers, provided they'd sign a liability release form. Taser's stun gun (which delivers an electric charge through wires attached to two darts) works by disrupting the body's nervous system, immobilizing its victim. By mid-morning, Taser had more than a dozen volunteers, including Sergio, a dark-haired young man whose friends cheered and laughed as he sat in a chair to be zapped, one leg flying up straight in front of him as the jolt hit his body.
The expo is a testament to the entrepreneurial spirit of America, but it's also a vision of its future: a nation mired in barriers and locks, fitted out with all-seeing sensors and closed-circuit television, where terrorism, as one company's slogan goes, "is reduced to a minor inconvenience."
Even among military trade shows, FPED is unique. With only five major companies left in the U.S. weapons market, most of today's military expos feature an orderly array of brightly colored PowerPoint briefings displayed next to plastic mockups of weapons. With so few companies, the jockeying of a typical trade show is absent.
FPED, in contrast, harks back to a different era: the 1980s and the Cold War, when an imminent threat of annihilation fueled a market full of companies competing for a slice of the Pentagon's budget. What started off after the 1996 bombing of Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia as a show for a few dozen specialized companies has today grown to more than 500 vendors crowding two massive aircraft hangars and an entire airfield.
The counterterrorism business is booming. And for those who want to break into the market, FPED is the place. The expo was closed to the public, but representatives of law enforcement and military agencies crowded the grounds, shopping for the latest technology. Traffic into the huge base was backed up for more than two miles on the first day of the three-day show.
XADS's 10-by-10 booth was set up at the back of the first hangar; a table in front displayed an assortment of the company's latest products, including its full line of laser dazzlers. XADS had also added a new acoustic weapon called Screech, which true to its name emits an ear-piercing shriek designed to disperse crowds and cause headaches, Bitar said.
The most striking feature of the XADS booth, at first glance, was a framed poster, mounted on a pedestal, that Bitar called concept art. On it, dark, vaguely Middle Eastern-looking men attack a U.S. Embassy, only to writhe in pain as giant bolts of XADS lightning hit them. A graphic artist who draws for GI Joe and Spider-Man comics designed the poster.
But the star attraction was a simple black briefcase that Bitar promised would shoot lightning bolts. He and Fry placed the briefcase (innocuous-looking, if you ignored the pointed needle a few inches long sticking out the side) on top of a carpeted podium, plugged it into a wall socket and flipped a switch. Then they stood back.
Iridescent streaks of purple lightning snaked out of the briefcase, accompanied by the deafening rattle of what sounded like an M-16, and even in the noisy hangar, conversations momentarily ceased.
"It looks like something out of a 1950s movie," one onlooker commented.
Bitar's technology is based on a technique pioneered more than 100 years ago by the eccentric Serbian inventor Nikola Tesla. The StunStrike uses an electrical charge to break down the air in front of the weapon to create a path for sparks generated by a "resonant transformer," better known as a Tesla coil. Unlike a typical Tesla coil, however, Bitar's invention uses electronics to tune and direct the spark stream. It goes about four feet.
"We can tune it all the way down so it feels like broom bristles, and all the way up to knock you down," Bitar informed a group of gawkers.
Electricity that shoots out even a few feet is enough to grab people's attention. A small, wiry man wearing a CIA badge and a lanyard emblazoned with "In-Q-Tel," the agency's venture capital arm, stopped at the booth. He paused to look at the lightning, nodded approvingly and picked up a business card before moving on.
Many of the vendors at the expo were strikingly similar to Bitar: men with ambitious ideas who entered the counterterrorism market as a second career. George Cairnes, a former pilot, is now selling full-body restraining cuffs. The elaborate bondage gear was developed for police as an alternative to "hog-tying," and is being used by the military, according to Cairnes. He said he had an order for 200 going to Guantanamo Bay. Joe Villa, a mechanical engineer, founded US Bunkers, a Florida-based company specializing in flying saucer-shaped mini-fortresses that can fit in your back yard. Villa conceived the idea after 1992's Hurricane Andrew as a way to protect people and property from violent storms, but he, too, is expanding into the counterterrorism market: Imagine a safe room to be used after a biochemical attack; the company points out it could also double as a sauna. A promotional poster depicts a family grilling next to a bunker.
With so many vendors, drawing visitors to individual displays -- particularly visitors with money -- is cutthroat competition. Charles Smith, a former Nokia salesman, persuaded a childhood friend from Texas, an attractive blonde, to stand with him at his booth. His strategy appeared to work, as a crowd assembled to look at the blonde, and Smith's product, a desktop machine designed to drill holes through computer drives, destroying sensitive data.
Hesco Bastion, the world's largest manufacturer of sand-filled barricades (ubiquitous in Iraq and Afghanistan to shield against attacks), took a similar route: It hired midriff-baring models to serve soft drinks from a bar made of its sandbags. The show's organizers wouldn't let them serve beer.
Some vendors go negative. Grant Haber, a former police officer and now a distributor of bomb-proof trash cans designed for subways and other public places, hung out by the press trailer, trying to entice a reporter to examine his file of allegations against a rival manufacturer "They've been fraudulent," he said, clutching the folder. "I have proof of falsified test reports."
Back at Bitar's booth, the draw was StunStrike. When the crowd would thin, all Bitar had to do was flip the switch, and people would flock to the booth.
At noon on the second day, XADS captured the attention of a VIP. Marine Corps Col. David Karcher, who heads the Pentagon's Joint Nonlethal Weapons Directorate, stopped to watch the demonstration, and promised to return.
The vendors' eyes followed Karcher, a man who controls $55 million in annual funding, as he walked slowly past the exhibits, explaining his role: He pays firms to develop nonlethal technology and to test it against strict Pentagon and international standards. For example, his office helped develop the Active Denial System, a weapon that uses millimeter waves -- a supercharged version of microwaves -- to heat up the skin's nerve endings, creating a burning sensation similar to touching a 100-watt light bulb. Except the beam, while painful, does not actually burn the skin.
The weapon was only recently declassified, and the Pentagon still won't divulge how far the beam goes, but Karcher says it could be used to control crowds at feeding stations in countries like Somalia and Iraq. "Often you see the people pushing their way to the front of the crowd are young men," he said. "They'll push women and children out of the way."
Karcher pointed to a demo of the system set up at Raytheon's booth. No required release forms here; Raytheon took a more direct approach: self-infliction. "We can't do it to you, but if you want to do it to yourself," the vendor said, handing over a control switch.
When a reporter hesitated, Karcher quickly offered up his own hand. "Press the button," he instructed. The invisible beam clicked on.
"I put my hand there, it starts to hurt, I take my hand way," Karcher explained calmly as he slowly slid his arm away from the beam. The point, he continued, is not to hurt someone, but simply to force a particular action, or to condition a response.
"Sort of like Pavlov's dogs," interrupted the enthusiastic Raytheon vendor.
Comparing humans to dogs who salivate on command didn't seem to sit well with Karcher, who winced. The Pentagon's nonlethal work, particularly that which relies on pain, is under intense public scrutiny and subject to international legal conventions. But the main problem with the Active Denial System, and similar directed energy weapons, is size, according to Karcher. Now the weapon goes on a Humvee, but the military is finding that troops in Iraq want smaller, handheld devices -- phasers.
But it's precisely those goals -- small and long-range weapons -- that place phaser technology, at least for now, in the realm of science fiction. The largest lightning guns in the XADS lab are too big to be mobile weapons, and while the rifle has generated sparks of up to 12 feet, Bitar says, the system has blown out repeatedly and isn't stable beyond four feet.
The military would like something that can go 30 to 100 feet. "We can fire a taser and be very effective at 15 feet," Karcher said. But 15 feet is almost "knife fight" range, he added, and in that case, troops may want a more lethal option, like a rifle.
But for every naysaying expert, there always seems to be a Pentagon official who believes the risk is worthwhile. Franz Gayl, one of the officials who contacted Bitar after hearing about XADS from news accounts, agrees there are barriers to a lighting gun, but he argues for helping nascent companies. The concept of a lightning gun, though risky, offers a potential payoff, according to Gayl. He noted a military officer who built a Tesla coil weapon, claiming to have tested it by shooting it "into the grille of an annoying rude driver in a traffic jam."
Back at the show, Bitar looked bitterly across the way at Raytheon, which was handing out customized jars of spicy hot fajita powder to promote its "burning" nonlethal weapon. Other experienced venders dished out logo-inscribed chocolate and pens. XADS had only postcard- size brochures and business cards.
It was the end of the third day, and still no sales. A man who introduced himself as a buyer for the Turkish military asked if he could get a free sample of Bitar's lasers, or barring that, could he borrow one and return it if the Turkish military wasn't interested. Bitar said that wasn't likely.
"We're not going to do that," Bitar chuckled. "We're not Wal-Mart."
But Bitar noticed that foreign militaries were the most interested in his weapons, and officials from Asia, the Middle East and Europe had all visited his booth. "It's kind of weird, especially because when it comes to weapons, you'd rather arm your own country than someone else," he said.
But he shrugged and added, "A customer is a customer."
Toward the end of the expo, Bitar was demonstrating the lightning gun when he suddenly recoiled in pain. "It bit him," Fry said with a note of concern. One of the electric tentacles had reached around and grabbed Bitar. He rubbed his shoulder. Since electricity seeks the quickest route to complete its circuit, it will reach out and touch the first thing that's grounded, such as a person holding the gun.
Bitar appeared unusually downbeat. He'd been standing for three days straight at the booth, and he was worried about how to keep his business going. Even with $1 million total in start-up funds, he'd have to close shop in about six months if he didn't get orders. "I didn't sleep well last night," he acknowledged. "Busy thinking about things, like how to get through to the Joint Nonlethal Directorate, so they take us a little more seriously."
At dinner the night before, Bitar's confidence -- shaken by the competition at the show-- seemed to ebb. He would be turning 40 soon. The initial success of XADS allowed his wife to stay home with their young son. His bravado momentarily gone, he talked about his previous businesses, which, while not failures, had not really been successes either. The Styrofoam recycling company sold at break even, and his parachute logo business barely made a profit.
Back at the show, Bitar sighed. "You get all this stuff going against us."
But a few minutes later, he was uptempo again.
"I just think we're only limited by our funding," Bitar said, pausing to pack up the cartoon poster of their weapons. "We could do so much more than the big companies." He pointed to the Raytheon booth. "These guys are burning your hand at 10 feet away with $50 million worth of research."
He gestured to the StunStrike. "We've got $10,000 worth of research in that thing, and we can do the exact same thing."
Pausing, he added, "Okay, we haven't been through all the studies and testing because we haven't had all the money to put into it."
Bitar's concerns are not just about big companies like Raytheon, but also about his nemesis Ionatron, a start-up backed partly by investment from the CIA venture capital fund. Ionatron, whose weapons are based on a similar concept for channeling lightning, was founded in 2002, and its stock is now worth more than half a billion dollars on the Nasdaq Stock Market.
Unlike Bitar, who won his early contracts through a competitive process, Ionatron's most significant contract, for $12.6 million, came through a congressional line item, which typically requires high-level lobbying. Another difference from XADS: Ionatron would like the nonlethal lightning guns to be, if necessary, lethal.
But both companies face an age-old problem with harnessing lightning: It is notoriously difficult to control. Making it go straight and far requires breaking down the air, like drilling a path through wood for a nail. Creating this path for any more than a few feet presents a formidable challenge.
Bitar's idea for doing this, like Ionatron's, is to use pulsed lasers to create a conductive path ahead of the lightning. A pioneer in this method is a New Mexico-based physicist named Jean-Claude Diels. The Belgian-born scientist says he started his research not to build "zap guns," as he calls them, but to prevent deaths from lightning, which kills on average 67 people a year in the United States, according to the National Weather Service. But the military was never terribly interested in his work, he said, and nonmilitary funding for research is hard to come by these days.
Now caught in a bind, Diels takes money from Ionatron. He doubts it would be possible to shrink the weapon down to the size of a pistol, although he believes a portable system, such as one mounted on a car, is possible.
"It's taking a disturbing turn," Diels said with a sigh. "I feel a little bit like the German scientists of the Third Reich, who have no option but to do this research because that's what the government funds."
What's wrong with the idea of a stun gun? "This nonlethal technology, I mean, aimed at electrocuting a crowd of protesters?" he said. "That's not really appetizing, I must say."
As the spectators at FPED thinned out, Bitar started to pack up, and Fry went to get the car. They'd be back in town the next week for another show, but Fry needed to return home for an exam: He's getting a master's degree in theology and peace studies. On the way out, Fry looked back at the weapons bazaar and shook his head.
Toward the front, a banner for Hawaiian Shaved Ice had fallen askew.
Perhaps what makes U.S. military trade shows seem so incongruous is that they treat their market -- war and terrorism -- as if it were plastics, medical supplies or textiles. And Bitar is just another entrepreneur. Despite his lack of big orders, back in Indiana a couple months later, he enthused over his company's progress. Field reports from Iraq on his dazzlers were "stellar," he said, and several Pentagon offices had placed small trial orders. A European television crew wanted to follow him around for six months.
The Pentagon also is preparing for the first time to buy large numbers of commercial dazzlers from several manufacturers and give them to troops in Iraq. Gayl, the Pentagon official who has supported Bitar's work, cautions now that he is concerned that some companies, including XADS, are making lasers so intense that they would permanently blind the people they target. The XADS lasers "are way out of line," Gayl said recently.
Bitar adamantly disagrees that his lasers will cause permanent blindness, saying they are eye-safe, if used properly. It's a key point for his company, since the StunStrike weapon has slipped to the back burner, and the dazzlers' time appears to have arrived. Bitar said he was negotiating with what he called a major supplier for the military and law enforcement on a new version of XADS's dazzler. The PD/G-105 is a souped-up laser that would be twice as powerful as the ones Bitar sold at the Burger King back in January.
The supplier, Bitar said, was looking at orders in the tens of thousands.
"It'll totally kick butt," he said.
Re: The Voice of God Weapon Returns
https://csc.asu.edu/2007/12/20/psyops-t ... your-head/
PSYOPS Tech: Voices in your head
Dec 20, 2007 | Media, PSYOPS, technology
by Steven R. Corman
At a government workshop some time ago I head someone describe a new tool that was described as the “voice of Allah.” This was said to be a device that would operate at a distance and would deliver a message that only a single person could hear. The story was that it was tested in a conflict situation in Iraq and pointed at one insurgent in a group, who whipped around looking in all directions, and began a heated conversation with his compatriots, who did not hear the message. At the time I greeted this story with some skepticism.
Lo and behold, today I saw this item on CNET News:
http://blogs.cnet.com/audiophiliac/?tag=cnetfd.blogs
The folks who heard the ad for A & E’s TV show “Paranormal State” emitted from a billboard in New York City’s Greenwich Village must have thought it was pretty weird. As they walked into the targeted area they were exposed to highly focused sound, picked up not by their ears, but by their skulls. The otherwise inaudible sound waves are experienced via bone conduction–the sound resonates inside the passerby’s head.
The system is being developed for commercial use by Holosonic Research Labs which besides the billboard stunt has installed systems at the Seattle Space Needle, at museums, and at Disney EPCOT center.
http://www.holosonics.com/?g&gclid=CIip ... OAod3xBvMQ
Here is a clip of an ABC news story about use of the technology in a CourtTV promotional campaign that has reactions from, um, victims that are amazingly like the one recounted about the insurgent.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=6h3KZjysoEo
Memo to self: Don’t be so quick to doubt stories you hear from defense technogeeks at government workshops.
PSYOPS Tech: Voices in your head
Dec 20, 2007 | Media, PSYOPS, technology
by Steven R. Corman
At a government workshop some time ago I head someone describe a new tool that was described as the “voice of Allah.” This was said to be a device that would operate at a distance and would deliver a message that only a single person could hear. The story was that it was tested in a conflict situation in Iraq and pointed at one insurgent in a group, who whipped around looking in all directions, and began a heated conversation with his compatriots, who did not hear the message. At the time I greeted this story with some skepticism.
Lo and behold, today I saw this item on CNET News:
http://blogs.cnet.com/audiophiliac/?tag=cnetfd.blogs
The folks who heard the ad for A & E’s TV show “Paranormal State” emitted from a billboard in New York City’s Greenwich Village must have thought it was pretty weird. As they walked into the targeted area they were exposed to highly focused sound, picked up not by their ears, but by their skulls. The otherwise inaudible sound waves are experienced via bone conduction–the sound resonates inside the passerby’s head.
The system is being developed for commercial use by Holosonic Research Labs which besides the billboard stunt has installed systems at the Seattle Space Needle, at museums, and at Disney EPCOT center.
http://www.holosonics.com/?g&gclid=CIip ... OAod3xBvMQ
Here is a clip of an ABC news story about use of the technology in a CourtTV promotional campaign that has reactions from, um, victims that are amazingly like the one recounted about the insurgent.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=6h3KZjysoEo
Memo to self: Don’t be so quick to doubt stories you hear from defense technogeeks at government workshops.
Re: The Voice of God Weapon Returns
https://www.wired.com/2007/06/darpas-sonic-pr/
SHARON WEINBERGERSECURITYJUN 5, 2007 10:20 AM
A Voice Only You Can Hear: DARPA's Sonic Projector
IMAGINE A WEAPON that creates sound that only you can hear. Science fiction? No, this is one area that has a very solid basis in reality. The Air Force has experimented with microwaves that create sounds in people's head (which they've called a possible psychological warfare tool), and American Technologies can "beam" sounds to specific targets with their patented HyperSound (and yes, I've heard/seen them demonstrate the speakers, and they are shockingly effective).
SHARON WEINBERGERSECURITYJUN 5, 2007 10:20 AM
A Voice Only You Can Hear: DARPA's Sonic Projector
IMAGINE A WEAPON that creates sound that only you can hear. Science fiction? No, this is one area that has a very solid basis in reality. The Air Force has experimented with microwaves that create sounds in people's head (which they've called a possible psychological warfare tool), and American Technologies can "beam" sounds to specific targets with their patented HyperSound (and yes, I've heard/seen them demonstrate the speakers, and they are shockingly effective).
Re: The Voice of God Weapon Returns
https://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htwea ... 71217.aspx
Weapons: Death Ray Replaced By The Voice of God
December 17, 2007: While U.S. efforts to deploy it's microwave Active Denial System (which transmits a searchlight sized bean of energy when makes people downrange feel like their skin is on fire) continue to be delayed, another non-lethal system, LRAD (Long Range Acoustic Device) has been quietly deployed to Iraq. And there the story gets a little strange.
LRAD is basically a focused beam of sound. Originally, it was designed to emit a very loud sound. Anyone whose head was touched by this beam, heard a painfully loud sound. Anyone standing next to them heard nothing. But those hit by the beam promptly fled, or fell to the ground in pain. Permanent hearing loss is possible if the beam is kept on a person for several seconds, but given the effect the sound usually has on people (they move, quickly), it is unlikely to happen. LRAD works. It was recently used off Somalia, by a cruise ship, to repel pirates. Some U.S. Navy ships also carry it, but not just to repel attacking suicide bombers, or whatever. No, the system was sold to the navy for a much gentler application. LRAD can also broadcast speech for up to 300 meters. The navy planned to use LRAD to warn ships to get out of the way. This was needed in places like the crowded coastal waters of the northern Persian Gulf, where the navy patrols. Many small fishing and cargo boats ply these waters, and it's often hard to get the attention of the crews. With LRAD, you just aim it at a member of the crew, and have an interpreter "speak" to the sailor. It was noted that the guy on the receiving end was sometimes terrified, even after he realized it was that large American destroyer that was talking to him. This apparently gave the army guys some ideas, for there are now rumors in Iraq of a devilish American weapon that makes people believe they are hearing voices in their heads.
This made more sense when an American advertising firm recently used an LRAD unit to support a media campaign for a new TV show. LRAD was pointed at a sidewalk in Manhattan, below the billboard featuring the new show. LRAD broadcast a female voice providing teaser lines from the show. The effect was startling, and a bit scary for many who passed through the LRAD beam. It appears that some of the troops in Iraq are using "spoken" (as opposed to "screeching") LRAD to mess with enemy fighters. Islamic terrorists tend to be superstitious and, of course, very religious. LRAD can put the "word of God" into their heads. If God, in the form of a voice that only you can hear, tells you to surrender, or run away, what are you gonna do?
Meanwhile, the microwave powered ADS, a non-lethal weapon that looks like a radar dish, languishes in politically correct limbo. The ADS "radar dish" projects a "burn ray" that is about four feet in diameter. It is effective in fog, smoke and rain. When pointed at people and turned on, it creates a burning sensation on the skin of its victims, causing them to want to leave the area, or at least greatly distracts them. The microwave weapon has a range of about 500 meters. ADS is carried on a hummer or Stryker, along with a machine-gun and other non-lethal weapons (like LRAD). The proposed ROE (Rules of Engagement) for ADS were that anyone who kept coming after getting hit with microwave was assumed to have evil intent, and could be killed. The microwave is believed to be particularly useful for terrorists who hide in crowds of women and children, using the human shields to get close enough to make an attack. This has been encountered in Somalia and Iraq.
Deployment of ADS has been delayed for years because of concerns about how non-lethal it really is. ADS has been fired, in tests, over 2,500 times. Many of these firings were against human volunteers, and the device performed as predicted, without any permanent damage. But generations of exposure to lurid science fiction descriptions of "death rays" has made the defense bureaucrats anxious over the negative public relations potential if something like ADS was actually used. From a publicity perspective, using more lethal "non-lethal-weapons" is preferable to deploying something safer, but that could be described, however incorrectly, as a "death ray." In any event, it appears that the cheaper, smaller (about 45 pounds), gentler and more flexible LRAD has taken ADS's place in the American arsenal. At least for now.
Weapons: Death Ray Replaced By The Voice of God
December 17, 2007: While U.S. efforts to deploy it's microwave Active Denial System (which transmits a searchlight sized bean of energy when makes people downrange feel like their skin is on fire) continue to be delayed, another non-lethal system, LRAD (Long Range Acoustic Device) has been quietly deployed to Iraq. And there the story gets a little strange.
LRAD is basically a focused beam of sound. Originally, it was designed to emit a very loud sound. Anyone whose head was touched by this beam, heard a painfully loud sound. Anyone standing next to them heard nothing. But those hit by the beam promptly fled, or fell to the ground in pain. Permanent hearing loss is possible if the beam is kept on a person for several seconds, but given the effect the sound usually has on people (they move, quickly), it is unlikely to happen. LRAD works. It was recently used off Somalia, by a cruise ship, to repel pirates. Some U.S. Navy ships also carry it, but not just to repel attacking suicide bombers, or whatever. No, the system was sold to the navy for a much gentler application. LRAD can also broadcast speech for up to 300 meters. The navy planned to use LRAD to warn ships to get out of the way. This was needed in places like the crowded coastal waters of the northern Persian Gulf, where the navy patrols. Many small fishing and cargo boats ply these waters, and it's often hard to get the attention of the crews. With LRAD, you just aim it at a member of the crew, and have an interpreter "speak" to the sailor. It was noted that the guy on the receiving end was sometimes terrified, even after he realized it was that large American destroyer that was talking to him. This apparently gave the army guys some ideas, for there are now rumors in Iraq of a devilish American weapon that makes people believe they are hearing voices in their heads.
This made more sense when an American advertising firm recently used an LRAD unit to support a media campaign for a new TV show. LRAD was pointed at a sidewalk in Manhattan, below the billboard featuring the new show. LRAD broadcast a female voice providing teaser lines from the show. The effect was startling, and a bit scary for many who passed through the LRAD beam. It appears that some of the troops in Iraq are using "spoken" (as opposed to "screeching") LRAD to mess with enemy fighters. Islamic terrorists tend to be superstitious and, of course, very religious. LRAD can put the "word of God" into their heads. If God, in the form of a voice that only you can hear, tells you to surrender, or run away, what are you gonna do?
Meanwhile, the microwave powered ADS, a non-lethal weapon that looks like a radar dish, languishes in politically correct limbo. The ADS "radar dish" projects a "burn ray" that is about four feet in diameter. It is effective in fog, smoke and rain. When pointed at people and turned on, it creates a burning sensation on the skin of its victims, causing them to want to leave the area, or at least greatly distracts them. The microwave weapon has a range of about 500 meters. ADS is carried on a hummer or Stryker, along with a machine-gun and other non-lethal weapons (like LRAD). The proposed ROE (Rules of Engagement) for ADS were that anyone who kept coming after getting hit with microwave was assumed to have evil intent, and could be killed. The microwave is believed to be particularly useful for terrorists who hide in crowds of women and children, using the human shields to get close enough to make an attack. This has been encountered in Somalia and Iraq.
Deployment of ADS has been delayed for years because of concerns about how non-lethal it really is. ADS has been fired, in tests, over 2,500 times. Many of these firings were against human volunteers, and the device performed as predicted, without any permanent damage. But generations of exposure to lurid science fiction descriptions of "death rays" has made the defense bureaucrats anxious over the negative public relations potential if something like ADS was actually used. From a publicity perspective, using more lethal "non-lethal-weapons" is preferable to deploying something safer, but that could be described, however incorrectly, as a "death ray." In any event, it appears that the cheaper, smaller (about 45 pounds), gentler and more flexible LRAD has taken ADS's place in the American arsenal. At least for now.
Re: The Voice of God Weapon Returns
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Rang ... tic_Device
The Long-Range Acoustic Device (LRAD) is an acoustic hailing device, sound cannon and sonic weapon[1] developed by Genasys. Law enforcement organizations and the manufacturer claim that LRAD systems are primarily designed for long-range communications;[2] however, the device has an extremely high decibel capacity and is controversially used as a less-lethal weapon for crowd control. The Academy of Doctors of Audiology states that 'Individuals exposed to weaponized LRAD use at the 2009 G20 Summit experienced mild traumatic brain injuries, permanent hearing loss, tinnitus (ringing in the ears), eardrum perforation (holes), ear pain, dizziness, and disorientation.'[3]
According to the manufacturer's specifications, the systems weigh from 15 to 320 pounds (6.8 to 145.1 kg) and can emit sound in a 30–60° beam at 2.5 kHz.[4] The manufacturer also produces systems for public address and mass notification use that broadcast 360°.[5]
LRAD systems are used by law enforcement, government and defense agencies, as well as maritime and commercial security companies to broadcast audible notifications and warnings over distance. LRAD systems are also used to deter wildlife from airport runways, wind and solar farms, nuclear power facilities, gas and oil platforms, mining and agricultural operations, and industrial plants.
The Long-Range Acoustic Device (LRAD) is an acoustic hailing device, sound cannon and sonic weapon[1] developed by Genasys. Law enforcement organizations and the manufacturer claim that LRAD systems are primarily designed for long-range communications;[2] however, the device has an extremely high decibel capacity and is controversially used as a less-lethal weapon for crowd control. The Academy of Doctors of Audiology states that 'Individuals exposed to weaponized LRAD use at the 2009 G20 Summit experienced mild traumatic brain injuries, permanent hearing loss, tinnitus (ringing in the ears), eardrum perforation (holes), ear pain, dizziness, and disorientation.'[3]
According to the manufacturer's specifications, the systems weigh from 15 to 320 pounds (6.8 to 145.1 kg) and can emit sound in a 30–60° beam at 2.5 kHz.[4] The manufacturer also produces systems for public address and mass notification use that broadcast 360°.[5]
LRAD systems are used by law enforcement, government and defense agencies, as well as maritime and commercial security companies to broadcast audible notifications and warnings over distance. LRAD systems are also used to deter wildlife from airport runways, wind and solar farms, nuclear power facilities, gas and oil platforms, mining and agricultural operations, and industrial plants.
Re: The Voice of God Weapon Returns
https://www.holosonics.com/
AUDIO SPOTLIGHT BY HOLOSONICS
directional sound system
The Audio Spotlight is a revolutionary new audio technology that creates sound in a narrow beam, just like light. Aim the flat, thin speaker panel to your desired listening area, and provide all of the sound and none of the noise.™
Since 2000, thousands of Audio Spotlight systems have been installed in a wide range of applications around the world. From museums, exhibits, kiosks, and digital signage to retail stores and special projects, hundreds of companies have chosen this unique, patented technology to provide high-quality, precisely controlled sound, while preserving the quiet.
AUDIO SPOTLIGHT BY HOLOSONICS
directional sound system
The Audio Spotlight is a revolutionary new audio technology that creates sound in a narrow beam, just like light. Aim the flat, thin speaker panel to your desired listening area, and provide all of the sound and none of the noise.™
Since 2000, thousands of Audio Spotlight systems have been installed in a wide range of applications around the world. From museums, exhibits, kiosks, and digital signage to retail stores and special projects, hundreds of companies have chosen this unique, patented technology to provide high-quality, precisely controlled sound, while preserving the quiet.
Re: The Voice of God Weapon Returns
https://www.forbes.com/sites/markcancia ... onstrators
Sep 18, 2020,12:23am EDT|10,570 views
‘Heat Ray’ And ‘The Voice Of God’: My Experience With The Nonlethal Weapons Eyed For Use In D.C. Protests
During the summer disturbances in Washington, D.C., a top local military police officer asked the D.C. National Guard about deploying two military systems that seem to come out of science fiction. One, the Active Denial System (ADS), makes the target’s skin feel like it’s on fire. The other, called the Long Range Acoustic Device (LRAD), directs intense sound in a narrow cone. The sound is so clear and so powerful that it was nicknamed “the voice of God.” I encountered both systems, one at Quantico, Virginia, the other in Falluja, Iraq. Here’s what I saw.
https://www.npr.org/2020/09/16/91374880 ... protesters
The ADS is the most dramatic. It looks like a square dish mounted on a heavy truck and directs millimeter waves at targets. This directed energy makes the skin feel like it’s on fire. The feeling is so intense that you can’t withstand it. (Trust me on this; I felt it.) That drives targets to move away. Once out of the direct path of the beam, the effect ends. Here’s a video for those wanting to see the system in action.
https://jnlwp.defense.gov/Portals/50/Do ... _AUG20.pdf
https://jnlwp.defense.gov/Press-Room/Mu ... gy-Videos/
ADS is technically not a “heat ray” because it uses millimeter waves, not infrared waves. That may seem like a minor difference, of interest only to physicists, but it is crucially important to the target. Heat rays (from the infrared portion of the electromagnetic spectrum) leave blistering (i.e., sunburn) that takes days to heal. The millimeter wave effect stops as soon as the target gets out of the way and does not leave a residual injury.
The LRAD is a smaller dish, mounted on a stand or light vehicle, that focuses sound in a narrow cone. The sound is very intense and clear, not like the attenuated sound of a bullhorn. In Iraq, the Marines used the system to warn civilians who were getting too close to Marine positions. The Marines found that civilians sometimes ignored all warnings―flags, flares, warning shots―and got shot. The LRAD produces sound so forceful that it could not be ignored. It got the attention of drivers even if they were listening to the radio or dealing with screaming kids in the backseat.
https://genasys.com/lrad/
Why does the military have these systems? These systems, and many more, come out of an organization located at Quantico, Virginia, and run by the Marine Corps. Originally called the Joint Nonlethal Weapons Directorate, it has been renamed (for classic bureaucratic reasons) the Intermediate Force Capabilities Office. The military stood this organization up in 1996 in response to the experience in Bosnia and Somalia. There, military forces faced hostile crowds but had few tools to deal with them.
https://jnlwp.defense.gov/
The military decided to develop nonlethal systems to provide a capability between presence and lethal force. The Marine Corps led the effort because it felt these pressures most acutely, having frequently faced unruly civilians in its overseas deployments. Thus, the organization is headquartered on a Marine Corps base and headed by a Marine colonel.
How should people think about these systems? The reporting has been breathless as if the military were about to shine death rays on peaceful citizens. The exotic nature of the technologies has added to the anxiety. In fact, both systems have been around for a long time and deployed overseas. (It’s not clear whether ADS was used overseas.) ADS has not been used operationally in the United States. LRAD is commercially available, and police departments use it occasionally. Indeed, LRAD has a variety of uses from scaring wildlife off runways to alerting boaters about danger.
Because the LRAD is like a powerful megaphone, its use seems relatively familiar. ADS is different, a novel and exotic capability for which there is no ready analog. People should think of it like a taser, which police departments routinely use. For those fortunate enough not to have met one up close, a quick explanation: a Taser fires electrodes into the victim and then hits them with a high voltage that is enough to short-circuit the nervous system for a short period of time. Victims are incapacitated. Tasers have gained acceptance because they provide an intermediate step between a baton and a bullet. Someone coming after a police officer with a stick, for example, needs to be stopped, but they don’t need to be shot.
ADS is similar. It uses technology to incapacitate people without hurting them. It’s an intermediate force option. An important difference, however, is that tasers are used every day, and are hence familiar, while ADS is strange and unfamiliar.
Aren’t these the kind of systems that militarize the police? No. Militarization of the police is a real problem, but that’s not the issue here. Debates about militarization arise because DOD has a program whereby it provides excess military gear to police departments. Many have criticized the program for encouraging the overuse of force. However, the ADS and LRAD provide the opposite kind of capability: civilian policing capabilities brought into the military. Further, ADS would not be available even if police departments wanted it because the system is expensive, complicated, and scarce.
So, would it have been appropriate to deploy the systems? It’s important to note that the systems were not used and were not even moved to the area. The D.C. National Guard does not own them; they would come from other parts of DOD, likely the Marine base at Quantico. It’s also clear that a staff member just asked a question. That’s what staff members are supposed to do. It’s a long way from asking a question to deploying a capability.
The question of usage gets wrapped up in disputes about President Trump’s attitude towards the use of force against demonstrators, and the fact that many people disagreed with his views. It’s a reasonable discussion about what level of violence requires what level of response. Wherever the line gets drawn, however, it is better to use a high-tech electronic beam than batons, tear gas, and, ultimately, firearms.
Sep 18, 2020,12:23am EDT|10,570 views
‘Heat Ray’ And ‘The Voice Of God’: My Experience With The Nonlethal Weapons Eyed For Use In D.C. Protests
During the summer disturbances in Washington, D.C., a top local military police officer asked the D.C. National Guard about deploying two military systems that seem to come out of science fiction. One, the Active Denial System (ADS), makes the target’s skin feel like it’s on fire. The other, called the Long Range Acoustic Device (LRAD), directs intense sound in a narrow cone. The sound is so clear and so powerful that it was nicknamed “the voice of God.” I encountered both systems, one at Quantico, Virginia, the other in Falluja, Iraq. Here’s what I saw.
https://www.npr.org/2020/09/16/91374880 ... protesters
The ADS is the most dramatic. It looks like a square dish mounted on a heavy truck and directs millimeter waves at targets. This directed energy makes the skin feel like it’s on fire. The feeling is so intense that you can’t withstand it. (Trust me on this; I felt it.) That drives targets to move away. Once out of the direct path of the beam, the effect ends. Here’s a video for those wanting to see the system in action.
https://jnlwp.defense.gov/Portals/50/Do ... _AUG20.pdf
https://jnlwp.defense.gov/Press-Room/Mu ... gy-Videos/
ADS is technically not a “heat ray” because it uses millimeter waves, not infrared waves. That may seem like a minor difference, of interest only to physicists, but it is crucially important to the target. Heat rays (from the infrared portion of the electromagnetic spectrum) leave blistering (i.e., sunburn) that takes days to heal. The millimeter wave effect stops as soon as the target gets out of the way and does not leave a residual injury.
The LRAD is a smaller dish, mounted on a stand or light vehicle, that focuses sound in a narrow cone. The sound is very intense and clear, not like the attenuated sound of a bullhorn. In Iraq, the Marines used the system to warn civilians who were getting too close to Marine positions. The Marines found that civilians sometimes ignored all warnings―flags, flares, warning shots―and got shot. The LRAD produces sound so forceful that it could not be ignored. It got the attention of drivers even if they were listening to the radio or dealing with screaming kids in the backseat.
https://genasys.com/lrad/
Why does the military have these systems? These systems, and many more, come out of an organization located at Quantico, Virginia, and run by the Marine Corps. Originally called the Joint Nonlethal Weapons Directorate, it has been renamed (for classic bureaucratic reasons) the Intermediate Force Capabilities Office. The military stood this organization up in 1996 in response to the experience in Bosnia and Somalia. There, military forces faced hostile crowds but had few tools to deal with them.
https://jnlwp.defense.gov/
The military decided to develop nonlethal systems to provide a capability between presence and lethal force. The Marine Corps led the effort because it felt these pressures most acutely, having frequently faced unruly civilians in its overseas deployments. Thus, the organization is headquartered on a Marine Corps base and headed by a Marine colonel.
How should people think about these systems? The reporting has been breathless as if the military were about to shine death rays on peaceful citizens. The exotic nature of the technologies has added to the anxiety. In fact, both systems have been around for a long time and deployed overseas. (It’s not clear whether ADS was used overseas.) ADS has not been used operationally in the United States. LRAD is commercially available, and police departments use it occasionally. Indeed, LRAD has a variety of uses from scaring wildlife off runways to alerting boaters about danger.
Because the LRAD is like a powerful megaphone, its use seems relatively familiar. ADS is different, a novel and exotic capability for which there is no ready analog. People should think of it like a taser, which police departments routinely use. For those fortunate enough not to have met one up close, a quick explanation: a Taser fires electrodes into the victim and then hits them with a high voltage that is enough to short-circuit the nervous system for a short period of time. Victims are incapacitated. Tasers have gained acceptance because they provide an intermediate step between a baton and a bullet. Someone coming after a police officer with a stick, for example, needs to be stopped, but they don’t need to be shot.
ADS is similar. It uses technology to incapacitate people without hurting them. It’s an intermediate force option. An important difference, however, is that tasers are used every day, and are hence familiar, while ADS is strange and unfamiliar.
Aren’t these the kind of systems that militarize the police? No. Militarization of the police is a real problem, but that’s not the issue here. Debates about militarization arise because DOD has a program whereby it provides excess military gear to police departments. Many have criticized the program for encouraging the overuse of force. However, the ADS and LRAD provide the opposite kind of capability: civilian policing capabilities brought into the military. Further, ADS would not be available even if police departments wanted it because the system is expensive, complicated, and scarce.
So, would it have been appropriate to deploy the systems? It’s important to note that the systems were not used and were not even moved to the area. The D.C. National Guard does not own them; they would come from other parts of DOD, likely the Marine base at Quantico. It’s also clear that a staff member just asked a question. That’s what staff members are supposed to do. It’s a long way from asking a question to deploying a capability.
The question of usage gets wrapped up in disputes about President Trump’s attitude towards the use of force against demonstrators, and the fact that many people disagreed with his views. It’s a reasonable discussion about what level of violence requires what level of response. Wherever the line gets drawn, however, it is better to use a high-tech electronic beam than batons, tear gas, and, ultimately, firearms.
Re: The Voice of God Weapon Returns
https://www.npr.org/2020/09/16/91374880 ... protesters
Military Confirms It Sought Information on Using 'Heat Ray' Against D.C. Protesters
September 16, 2020 7:55 PM ET
A spokesperson for Joint Forces Headquarters Command in Washington, D.C., confirmed to NPR that hours before federal police officers cleared a crowded park near the White House with smoke and tear gas on June 1, a military police staff officer asked if the D.C. National Guard had a kind of "heat ray" weapon that might be deployed against demonstrators in the nation's capital.
Col. Robert Phillips, a spokesperson for the Joint Force Headquarters-National Capital Region, or JFHQ-NCR, said the inquiry was made "as a matter of due diligence and prudent military planning."
The command "inquired informally about capabilities across the full-spectrum of non-lethal systems, to include the Long Range Acoustic Device (LRAD) and Active Denial System (ADS)," Phillips told NPR in a written statement. "JFHQ-NCR does not possess these systems, did not request such systems, and no further action was taken as a result of the officer's E-Mail query."
This statement comes hours after NPR obtained and published written responses to the House Committee on Natural Resources from Maj. Adam DeMarco of the D.C. National Guard, who revealed he had been copied on an email from the provost marshal of Joint Force Headquarters. The email said the top military police officer in D.C. was looking for two things: a Long Range Acoustic Device, a kind of sound cannon known as an LRAD, and a device called the Active Denial System, or ADS.
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents ... -QFRs.html
The military developed the ADS some 20 years ago as a way to disperse crowds. There have been questions about whether it worked, or should be deployed in the first place. It uses millimeter wave technology essentially to heat the skin of people targeted by its invisible ray.
In his written response, DeMarco, who has sought whistleblower protection, quoted from an email he said was forwarded to him that originated from the provost marshal that read the "ADS can provide our troops a capability they currently do not have, the ability to reach out and engage potential adversaries at distances well beyond small arms range, and in a safe, effective, and non-lethal manner."
The email went on to say that the ADS can direct a beam toward a group and that "provides a sensation of intense heat on the surface of the skin. The effect is overwhelming, causing an immediate repel response by the targeted individual."
Last month, The New York Times reported that U.S. border officials weighed deploying the so-called heat ray against migrants a few weeks before the 2018 elections. The Times reported that Kirstjen Nielsen, then secretary of homeland security, told an aide after the meeting "that she would not authorize the use of such a device, and that it should never be brought up again in her presence."
Yet, according to DeMarco, it was something considered by the Defense Department's lead military police officer the morning of June 1 after days of fiery protests and looting in Washington. DeMarco said in his written comments that he responded about a half hour later that "the D.C. National Guard was not in possession of either an LRAD or an ADS."
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/26/us/p ... ation.html
Sound cannon
The second piece of equipment DeMarco said they asked for was a kind of sound cannon called an LRAD. NPR reported last week that by not using one, authorities may have violated court-ordered regulations that spell out how demonstrators in the nation's capital are to be warned before aggressive tactics are used against them.
https://www.npr.org/2020/09/11/91191292 ... in-they-di
Attorneys who helped write the agreed-upon rules as part of a 2015 settlement agreement said federal police are required to warn large crowds multiple times they need to disperse, and they must do so loudly enough that the orders can be heard for blocks. That's how an LRAD would be used in this case. The LRAD emits a piercing noise and then can broadcast a voice or a recording at a deafening level. The idea is to allow people at the back of a crowd to hear instructions.
That notice did not appear to happen on June 1. Protesters who were there said police advanced through the crowd with little warning, firing tear gas and smoke canisters shortly before President Trump appeared outside for a photograph in front of St. John's Episcopal Church.
"They have an obligation to notify that group that they are in violation of the law and to give them the opportunity to comply with a lawful order," said Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, who helped write the settlement agreement. In a class-action lawsuit, she represented demonstrators, tourists and passersby who were arrested during a 2002 demonstration against the International Monetary Fund and World Bank in Washington.
Gregory Monahan, acting chief of U.S. Park Police, told lawmakers in July that his officers had abided by the rules in that agreement. "The protocol was followed," he said during sworn testimony before the House Committee on Natural Resources in July. "There were three warnings given and they were given utilizing a Long Range Acoustic Device; it's called an LRAD, that's what it stands for, that was the device used."
DeMarco said in his written answers to the committee that the National Guard "was not in possession" of an LRAD that day.
"There is zero evidence that there were any officers who can testify that they were in the farthest reaches of the crowd," Verheyden-Hilliard said. "There has to be documentation that the notice was given multiple times, and there are supposed to be recordings made that the notice was given. We wrote all these in specifically for this reason. In fact, unfortunately, it would appear in anticipation of what happened in Lafayette Park."
A U.S. Park Police spokesman told NPR that Monahan "stands by his testimony to the committee." The official said because of ongoing litigation the U.S. Park Police couldn't comment further.
Military Confirms It Sought Information on Using 'Heat Ray' Against D.C. Protesters
September 16, 2020 7:55 PM ET
A spokesperson for Joint Forces Headquarters Command in Washington, D.C., confirmed to NPR that hours before federal police officers cleared a crowded park near the White House with smoke and tear gas on June 1, a military police staff officer asked if the D.C. National Guard had a kind of "heat ray" weapon that might be deployed against demonstrators in the nation's capital.
Col. Robert Phillips, a spokesperson for the Joint Force Headquarters-National Capital Region, or JFHQ-NCR, said the inquiry was made "as a matter of due diligence and prudent military planning."
The command "inquired informally about capabilities across the full-spectrum of non-lethal systems, to include the Long Range Acoustic Device (LRAD) and Active Denial System (ADS)," Phillips told NPR in a written statement. "JFHQ-NCR does not possess these systems, did not request such systems, and no further action was taken as a result of the officer's E-Mail query."
This statement comes hours after NPR obtained and published written responses to the House Committee on Natural Resources from Maj. Adam DeMarco of the D.C. National Guard, who revealed he had been copied on an email from the provost marshal of Joint Force Headquarters. The email said the top military police officer in D.C. was looking for two things: a Long Range Acoustic Device, a kind of sound cannon known as an LRAD, and a device called the Active Denial System, or ADS.
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents ... -QFRs.html
The military developed the ADS some 20 years ago as a way to disperse crowds. There have been questions about whether it worked, or should be deployed in the first place. It uses millimeter wave technology essentially to heat the skin of people targeted by its invisible ray.
In his written response, DeMarco, who has sought whistleblower protection, quoted from an email he said was forwarded to him that originated from the provost marshal that read the "ADS can provide our troops a capability they currently do not have, the ability to reach out and engage potential adversaries at distances well beyond small arms range, and in a safe, effective, and non-lethal manner."
The email went on to say that the ADS can direct a beam toward a group and that "provides a sensation of intense heat on the surface of the skin. The effect is overwhelming, causing an immediate repel response by the targeted individual."
Last month, The New York Times reported that U.S. border officials weighed deploying the so-called heat ray against migrants a few weeks before the 2018 elections. The Times reported that Kirstjen Nielsen, then secretary of homeland security, told an aide after the meeting "that she would not authorize the use of such a device, and that it should never be brought up again in her presence."
Yet, according to DeMarco, it was something considered by the Defense Department's lead military police officer the morning of June 1 after days of fiery protests and looting in Washington. DeMarco said in his written comments that he responded about a half hour later that "the D.C. National Guard was not in possession of either an LRAD or an ADS."
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/26/us/p ... ation.html
Sound cannon
The second piece of equipment DeMarco said they asked for was a kind of sound cannon called an LRAD. NPR reported last week that by not using one, authorities may have violated court-ordered regulations that spell out how demonstrators in the nation's capital are to be warned before aggressive tactics are used against them.
https://www.npr.org/2020/09/11/91191292 ... in-they-di
Attorneys who helped write the agreed-upon rules as part of a 2015 settlement agreement said federal police are required to warn large crowds multiple times they need to disperse, and they must do so loudly enough that the orders can be heard for blocks. That's how an LRAD would be used in this case. The LRAD emits a piercing noise and then can broadcast a voice or a recording at a deafening level. The idea is to allow people at the back of a crowd to hear instructions.
That notice did not appear to happen on June 1. Protesters who were there said police advanced through the crowd with little warning, firing tear gas and smoke canisters shortly before President Trump appeared outside for a photograph in front of St. John's Episcopal Church.
"They have an obligation to notify that group that they are in violation of the law and to give them the opportunity to comply with a lawful order," said Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, who helped write the settlement agreement. In a class-action lawsuit, she represented demonstrators, tourists and passersby who were arrested during a 2002 demonstration against the International Monetary Fund and World Bank in Washington.
Gregory Monahan, acting chief of U.S. Park Police, told lawmakers in July that his officers had abided by the rules in that agreement. "The protocol was followed," he said during sworn testimony before the House Committee on Natural Resources in July. "There were three warnings given and they were given utilizing a Long Range Acoustic Device; it's called an LRAD, that's what it stands for, that was the device used."
DeMarco said in his written answers to the committee that the National Guard "was not in possession" of an LRAD that day.
"There is zero evidence that there were any officers who can testify that they were in the farthest reaches of the crowd," Verheyden-Hilliard said. "There has to be documentation that the notice was given multiple times, and there are supposed to be recordings made that the notice was given. We wrote all these in specifically for this reason. In fact, unfortunately, it would appear in anticipation of what happened in Lafayette Park."
A U.S. Park Police spokesman told NPR that Monahan "stands by his testimony to the committee." The official said because of ongoing litigation the U.S. Park Police couldn't comment further.
Re: The Voice of God Weapon Returns
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/ ... 180957879/
Operation Desert Storm Was Not Won By Smart Weaponry Alone
Despite the “science fiction”-like technology deployed, 90 percent of ammunitions used in Desert Storm were actually “dumb weapons”
Jackie Mansky
January 20, 2016
Technology has long been a deciding factor on the battlefield, from powerful artillery to new weaponry to innovations in the seas and the skies. Twenty-five years ago was no different, as the United States and its allies, proved overwhelmingly successful in the Persian Gulf War. A coalition of U.S. Army Apache attack helicopters, cruise missiles from naval vessels, and Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk “stealth fighters” soundly broke through Saddam Hussein’s army defenses in Kuwait during Operation Desert Storm, which became known as the “100-hours war.”
The military response was a reaction to Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait earlier that year. The United Nations Security Council had demanded that Hussein withdraw his troops by a mid-January 1991 deadline, or it would launch a counter-offensive. When troops remained on the ground past the cutoff date, Operation Desert Storm came to fruition.
The swift and dominant victory made it seem like the future was now when it came to science fiction-like military weaponry that helped win the day.
The U.S., entrenched in the Cold War, had been heavily investing in its military technology for years leading up to the Gulf War. In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan’s proposed missile defense system against the USSR, Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), signaled a commitment to the highest technology not just in space, but in different realms, says former defense analyst Robert English. English advised the military on national security in the 1980s, when much of the technology used in Operation Desert Storm was first put on the drawing board.
At the time, English recalls, it was at first an uphill battle to get the Pentagon to approve spending money on high-tech projects. As a general rule, military brass were reluctant to introduce new technology, as they would rather stick to with a larger quantity of battle-proven weaponry. But the “Star Wars” defense program, as SDI was dubbed, helped serve as an impetus for new investments in technology across the board.
This led to the debut of the Patriot air missiles, which targeted and intercepted Iraqi Scud ballistic missiles and the Lockheed F-117, a “stealth fighter,” first deployed when the United States invaded Panama in 1989. The fighter was described by Daniel Plesch and Michael Wardell for the Los Angeles Times in 1991. They wrote, “…It is intended to close in on its target unnoticed, virtually eliminating the enemy's capacity to react. Its radar signature is supposed to be no bigger than that of a duck.”
Though the fighter proved effective against Iraqi forces, stealth technology was still in its infancy at the time of Desert Storm, as Plesch and Wardell point out in their piece. For instance, British allies on Royal Navy destroyers in the Gulf were able to pick up the F-117 up to 40 miles from its targets, using technology more than a decade old. Despite its glitches, the Nighthawks’ surgical strike capability was what “convinced the U.S. Air Force to make significant changes after the war,” writes Don Hollway for HistoryNet, moving the U.S. toward new technology and tactics. The F-117 would have a long shelf life. The 1,313th and final F-117 was delivered to the U.S. Air Force just this month.
During Desert Shield, soldiers, sailors and air crews also used $25,000 Holographic One-Tube light amplifying goggles to capture and reflect visible light too dim for the naked human eye, electronically, “somewhat like the viewfinder on a home video camera, with magnification,” wrote Martha P. Hernandez for the Associated Press at the time. It was these glasses, she predicted in a piece published right after Operation Desert Storm began, that would give the U.S. and its allies a “major edge” over Iraqi forces in night battles.
Perhaps one of the most effective technologies employed during the Gulf War was using satellite surveillance systems. The war might have been prolonged has troops not been given GPS receivers, the United Kingdom’s Science Museum positions. Though the U.S. Department of Defense had been investing in GPS technology since the 1960s, it was unprepared to supply troops in the Gulf with multiple GPS receivers. The museum writes:
Manufacturers had to scramble to make new receivers and send them out to the troops. Often there were as few as two instruments for 100 vehicles. Some soldiers relied on members of their families to buy civilian GPS systems and ship them out, even though they were less accurate. Even the military equipment was not well designed for use in a theatre of war – tank crews and helicopter pilots stuck the devices to their vehicles with gaffer tape, for example.
Yet despite supply problems, GPS receivers were what allowed troops to find Iraqi ground forces, as well as assess bombing damage. The Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar Systems (JSTARS), U-2 reconnaissance planes, and reconnaissance satellites all relied on the surveillance equipment.
However the surveillance technology was not perfect, cautions Robert H. Gregory, Jr. in his book, Clean Bombs and Dirty Wars: Air Power in Kosovo and Libya. The technology was “susceptible to being fooled by Iraq's use of decoys, camouflage, and digging in of forces.” As Gregory points out, Iraq had in fact purchased “thousands of dummy tanks and artillery from an Italian company before the Gulf War,” which UN observers after the war called virtually “impossible to distinguish from actual equipment.”
But for all the posssibilites that this “Computer War,” offered, such as laser guidance systems on precision-guided munitions (PGMs), like cruise missiles—18-foot-computer-guided flying bombs launched from warships, Operation Desert Storm was not won by smart weaponry, alone. Rather, as English estimates, 90 percent of the ammunitions employed in Desert Storm were actually “dumb weapons.” The bombs, which weren't guided by lasers or satellites, were lucky to get within half a kilometer of their targets after they were dumped from planes. While dumb bombs might not have been exciting enough to garner the headlines during the attack, they were cheaper to produce and could be counted on to work.
PGMs might have been the “invention that shaped the Gulf War,” as Malcolm W. Browne wrote for the New York Times in 1991, as they enhanced the effectiveness of attacks by an extreme measure, yet it was the dumb bombs that was the most commonly used weapon during the attack. But frequency of use doesn’t change why history will remember Desert Storm for its smart weapons, rather than its dumb ones.
Operation Desert Storm Was Not Won By Smart Weaponry Alone
Despite the “science fiction”-like technology deployed, 90 percent of ammunitions used in Desert Storm were actually “dumb weapons”
Jackie Mansky
January 20, 2016
Technology has long been a deciding factor on the battlefield, from powerful artillery to new weaponry to innovations in the seas and the skies. Twenty-five years ago was no different, as the United States and its allies, proved overwhelmingly successful in the Persian Gulf War. A coalition of U.S. Army Apache attack helicopters, cruise missiles from naval vessels, and Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk “stealth fighters” soundly broke through Saddam Hussein’s army defenses in Kuwait during Operation Desert Storm, which became known as the “100-hours war.”
The military response was a reaction to Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait earlier that year. The United Nations Security Council had demanded that Hussein withdraw his troops by a mid-January 1991 deadline, or it would launch a counter-offensive. When troops remained on the ground past the cutoff date, Operation Desert Storm came to fruition.
The swift and dominant victory made it seem like the future was now when it came to science fiction-like military weaponry that helped win the day.
The U.S., entrenched in the Cold War, had been heavily investing in its military technology for years leading up to the Gulf War. In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan’s proposed missile defense system against the USSR, Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), signaled a commitment to the highest technology not just in space, but in different realms, says former defense analyst Robert English. English advised the military on national security in the 1980s, when much of the technology used in Operation Desert Storm was first put on the drawing board.
At the time, English recalls, it was at first an uphill battle to get the Pentagon to approve spending money on high-tech projects. As a general rule, military brass were reluctant to introduce new technology, as they would rather stick to with a larger quantity of battle-proven weaponry. But the “Star Wars” defense program, as SDI was dubbed, helped serve as an impetus for new investments in technology across the board.
This led to the debut of the Patriot air missiles, which targeted and intercepted Iraqi Scud ballistic missiles and the Lockheed F-117, a “stealth fighter,” first deployed when the United States invaded Panama in 1989. The fighter was described by Daniel Plesch and Michael Wardell for the Los Angeles Times in 1991. They wrote, “…It is intended to close in on its target unnoticed, virtually eliminating the enemy's capacity to react. Its radar signature is supposed to be no bigger than that of a duck.”
Though the fighter proved effective against Iraqi forces, stealth technology was still in its infancy at the time of Desert Storm, as Plesch and Wardell point out in their piece. For instance, British allies on Royal Navy destroyers in the Gulf were able to pick up the F-117 up to 40 miles from its targets, using technology more than a decade old. Despite its glitches, the Nighthawks’ surgical strike capability was what “convinced the U.S. Air Force to make significant changes after the war,” writes Don Hollway for HistoryNet, moving the U.S. toward new technology and tactics. The F-117 would have a long shelf life. The 1,313th and final F-117 was delivered to the U.S. Air Force just this month.
During Desert Shield, soldiers, sailors and air crews also used $25,000 Holographic One-Tube light amplifying goggles to capture and reflect visible light too dim for the naked human eye, electronically, “somewhat like the viewfinder on a home video camera, with magnification,” wrote Martha P. Hernandez for the Associated Press at the time. It was these glasses, she predicted in a piece published right after Operation Desert Storm began, that would give the U.S. and its allies a “major edge” over Iraqi forces in night battles.
Perhaps one of the most effective technologies employed during the Gulf War was using satellite surveillance systems. The war might have been prolonged has troops not been given GPS receivers, the United Kingdom’s Science Museum positions. Though the U.S. Department of Defense had been investing in GPS technology since the 1960s, it was unprepared to supply troops in the Gulf with multiple GPS receivers. The museum writes:
Manufacturers had to scramble to make new receivers and send them out to the troops. Often there were as few as two instruments for 100 vehicles. Some soldiers relied on members of their families to buy civilian GPS systems and ship them out, even though they were less accurate. Even the military equipment was not well designed for use in a theatre of war – tank crews and helicopter pilots stuck the devices to their vehicles with gaffer tape, for example.
Yet despite supply problems, GPS receivers were what allowed troops to find Iraqi ground forces, as well as assess bombing damage. The Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar Systems (JSTARS), U-2 reconnaissance planes, and reconnaissance satellites all relied on the surveillance equipment.
However the surveillance technology was not perfect, cautions Robert H. Gregory, Jr. in his book, Clean Bombs and Dirty Wars: Air Power in Kosovo and Libya. The technology was “susceptible to being fooled by Iraq's use of decoys, camouflage, and digging in of forces.” As Gregory points out, Iraq had in fact purchased “thousands of dummy tanks and artillery from an Italian company before the Gulf War,” which UN observers after the war called virtually “impossible to distinguish from actual equipment.”
But for all the posssibilites that this “Computer War,” offered, such as laser guidance systems on precision-guided munitions (PGMs), like cruise missiles—18-foot-computer-guided flying bombs launched from warships, Operation Desert Storm was not won by smart weaponry, alone. Rather, as English estimates, 90 percent of the ammunitions employed in Desert Storm were actually “dumb weapons.” The bombs, which weren't guided by lasers or satellites, were lucky to get within half a kilometer of their targets after they were dumped from planes. While dumb bombs might not have been exciting enough to garner the headlines during the attack, they were cheaper to produce and could be counted on to work.
PGMs might have been the “invention that shaped the Gulf War,” as Malcolm W. Browne wrote for the New York Times in 1991, as they enhanced the effectiveness of attacks by an extreme measure, yet it was the dumb bombs that was the most commonly used weapon during the attack. But frequency of use doesn’t change why history will remember Desert Storm for its smart weapons, rather than its dumb ones.