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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Nadine Carroll who wrote (37738)	8/13/2002 11:33:06 PM
From: Bilow	Respond to of 281500

Hi Nadine Carroll; Re why laser weapons on tanks are ridiculous. (1) It's a violation of conventions on weapons. If it happened, we'd know more about it. (2) It's the world's least efficient way to hurt people. (3) Medium to low wattage lasers don't blind you, what they do is take out small parts of your retina. They degrade your vision. You're left with tiny holes in your vision, not blindness. Your brain integrates over the holes. (4) High power lasers are probably beyond the ability of the Iraqis to send into combat. That comment "victims of internal organ damage". Do you have any idea what the power of a laser would have to be to do that? (5) Even very high power lasers are harmless (at reasonable distances) unless they are well collimated. But when you focus it, you have to point it. The target acquisition and tracking is way beyond what Iraq is capable of. Without extremely accurate tracking, you would have to strap the victim down to the end of the laser in order to do him damage. Trust me on this one. Iraq did not use battlefield lasers to blind 5000 Iranians. -- Carl