U.S. Uses Laser 'Dazzler' to Stop Iraqis

[livendive 8]

Quote

You guys crack me up.

2 questions:

1. Should suspicious vehicles be shot up with real bullets or have their drivers temporarily blinded by a frikken laser beam?

2. Ever shot yourself with a laser pointer in the eye?

Now, I know it will be hard... but try to keep responses in the framework of the questions. Although we all know someone will post the standard "the US shouldn't even BE there..." drivel.

I'm ok with this method...less lethal is better than more lethal. I don't understand why you think "the US shouldn't even BE there..." is "drivel", as our absence would make the whole question irrelevant, but I suppose that's a topic for another thread.

Blues,
Dave

"I AM A PROFESSIONAL EXTREME ATHLETE!"
(drink Mountain Dew)

[bloody_trauma 2]

ok, right now i'm in baghdad, i'm a medic and i walk these steets every day and every night, the laser they decribed to you is in use here and comes in several different forms, one attaches to a rifle and another is a handheld laser pointer, they are not the lasers you are used to seeing, the beam is green as the human eye is most sensitive to that color... first off vehicles here arent even allowed to move when we are near them, they already know to stop or risk getting shot, and there are measures in place so that we dont just shoot and ask questions later, the US employs non lethal ammunition, we have beanbag shotgun rounds and nerf grenades ( 40MM foam projectile) and pepper sprays and those lasers, all of these are used in what is called escalation of force, and even then one must positively identify a person as a threat or one with intention of injuring coalition forces, at night it is dark here and generally we dont let the vehicles or civilians get within 100 meters of us and when its dark out and we shine the green laser on them they have no doubt in thier mind that they need to stop and turn around, they dont even hesitate, no matter how fast they are moving they will come to screeching halt and turn around... the US forces in iraq are experienced and know what they are doing, heck theyve been doing it for 3 years, we know what works and what doesnt, have confidence in us please, and know that we are not here running around like evil scientists with our evil green lasers chuckling as we point it at people, hahaha watch me blind this one... were doing a job here and doing it successfully and to the best of our ability and all we ask for is your support... hell if i were one of you ida been like cool more power to ya... lemme just wrap this up and clear the air... THE LASER DOES NOT BLIND PEOPLE, permanently or temporarily, it just makes them see green stars for a split second

Fly it like you stole it

[Lindsey 0]

...but it's so fulfilling to sit here at home and consider ways it could be done better.

linz

--
A conservative is just a liberal who's been mugged. A liberal is just a conservative who's been to jail

[warpedskydiver 0]

Quote

Quote

If it was only terrorists that didn't stop at check points, I may agree with you more... but people run red lights and check points for loads of different reasons... Kids, too scared, drunks (not so many of those there...) people who think that they have a right to drive how they want around their own country.

Regards,

Since you don't like either suggestion, why don't you tell us what you think should be done?

Imagine you have been up all nigh and you have seen dozens of your friends die at checkpoints in the past. Now a carload of males are driving towards you a high rate od speed. You order them to stop but they don't even slow down. They are 200' away and closing fast. You have less than 10 seconds to make a life or death decision. Tell us what you would do?

Engage them with an M240 otherwise known as the GPMG or MAG58

[n23x 0]

We can support you, and appreciate what you're doing for your country, even if we disagree with regard to the level of success you are having in Iraq.

Further, nobody is suggesting that you're intentionally trying to blind Iraqi's like some fat kid with a magnifying glass and a pile of ants.

What we are suggesting is that it is inappropriate for the US to begin/continue use of a device which has regularly been rejected in the past. A device that, misused, has an increased potential to cause blindness.

And how many US soldiers do you treat that have been blinded by terrorist dazzlers, anyways? Real numbers, please.

.jim

"Don't touch my fucking Easter eggs, I'll be back monday." ~JTFC

[Trent 0]

I think you guys who are "against" the dazzlers are just arguing because it's something the US is doing now. Really. It's kinda sad. It just shows that people will bitch about ABSOLUTELY anything if they don't like who's in charge. Ridiculous.

Oh, hello again!

[rickjump1 0]

I'm just one of millions of Americans who fully support you in your mission, and salute you for your bravery. Come home safe.

Do your part for global warming: ban beans and hold all popcorn farts.

[livendive 8]

Quote

ok, right now i'm in baghdad, i'm a medic

On that note, I watched Baghdad ER last night on HBO. It was really, really good. Anyone else catch it? Anyhow, thanks for your service.

Blues,
Dave

"I AM A PROFESSIONAL EXTREME ATHLETE!"
(drink Mountain Dew)

[bloody_trauma 2]

Quote

What we are suggesting is that it is inappropriate for the US to begin/continue use of a device which has regularly been rejected in the past. A device that, misused, has an increased potential to cause blindness.

And how many US soldiers do you treat that have been blinded by terrorist dazzlers, anyways? Real numbers, please.

Umm... its a laser... any laser can potentially cause eye damage, but its not like we are pin pointing thier retinas with a souped up laser, its just a really bright green laser and the human eye happends to be very sensitive to taht spectrum of light, and for that matter any bright light can damage your eyesight, thats why we don't look at solar eclipses with the naked eye, and terrorists/insurgents dont have lasers and if they did we'd freak out on him and fill him full of holes, seriously, we dont even point our own lasers at each other and the iraqis know better than to play with lasers in that manner, and further more i have not had to treat one single thermal burn period here and we use the lasers semi regularly, hey while were on the subject of nasty war devices did you know the US came up with a device that makes you sick to your stomach and disorients you, but we dont use it because it causes internal organ damage, as i said before the government knows what its doing and isnt out to intentionally harm people, i hate the state that my country is in right now, i'm supposed to be fighting to give the people of iraq the basic human rights that democracy ensures, when on the home front i have a people who are so disconnected from the war that they protest slain servicemens funerals, mexican americans that turn my flag upside down and raise thiers above my own, the very whos right to free speech i defend would deny me life if given the chance, and i'm supposed to bring that to this crazy ass country, lemme get out of here before i REALLY go off on a tangent... and sorry no HBO for us hope it was good though, been covered from head to toe in blood more than once, not fun... out

Fly it like you stole it

[n23x 0]

Did I say anything about Bush?

No.

I am disagreeing with the US using a device that has the potential to cause permenant vision damage. One that will be used indiscriminately against both innocent Iraqis and terrorists.

Stifle those tears and realize that not everything revolves around the W.

.jim

"Don't touch my fucking Easter eggs, I'll be back monday." ~JTFC

[n23x 0]

Alright.

What percentage of Iraqi's vs. US troops do you treat, on average?

As a medic, you should certainly know that damage to various organs (including sensory) is not necessarily immediately apparent to the person. Further, repeat exposure provides a much higher chance of damage.

Trust me, I get that you think that it's no different than a laser pen. I get it.

I have heard rumors of a device to produce "brown noise" though haven't seen any confirmed information. From what I understood, the differences in the average human body provided it with less than a useful success rate. If true, though, kudos to them on the choice to not use a device which has the non-lethal "safety factor" but has potential to cause real damage. That's what we're talking about.

Finally, understand that we are having a disagreement about the US choosing to deploy more visual impairment devices.

I am not attacking you, and while I would hope that I would never find myself in your position, I respect the duties that you are performing for your country. It's a shame that you feel so disjointed from your country, because you have a lot of support, even from those of us that disagree with the reasons that you are presently in Iraq.

.jim

"Don't touch my fucking Easter eggs, I'll be back monday." ~JTFC

[Trent 0]

Quote

I am disagreeing with the US using a device that has the potential to cause permenant vision damage. One that will be used indiscriminately against both innocent Iraqis and terrorists.

It has become clear to me that you'd have a problem if giving people hand-jobs at checkpoints became protocol on account of all those innocent sperms lost.

There's really no point I guess. I'll stick with lasers are better than shooting the shit out of a "maybe" car at a checkpoint.

Oh, hello again!

[n23x 0]

Good reply. Short and pointless.

.jim

"Don't touch my fucking Easter eggs, I'll be back monday." ~JTFC

[billvon 3,120]

>further more i have not had to treat one single thermal burn
>period here and we use the lasers semi regularly . . .

The level of energy that will permanently blind you is orders of magnitudes less than the level that will cause a thermal burn. Consider sunlight. Looking at it for more than a few moments can blind you, even when your eyes are 100% bright-adapted - but your skin can stand it for hours. That's 1000 watts/sq meter, or 1mW/mm2 energy density. At your retina that's 100 mW/mm2 energy density due to your eye's ability to focus light. A well collimated 1mW laser can produce an energy density of 15000 mW/mm2. It produces an effective energy at your retina of about 200 mW/mm2.

So a laser pointer (which I think you will agree would never come close to burning someone) is twice as damaging as sunlight to your retina. Class IIIb lasers can (and have) blinded researchers who are simply careless around them. Such vision damage is often hard to detect; your brain 'fills in' the damaged retinal area the same way it 'fills in' around your eye's blind spot, and there is usually no pain when the retina is damaged.

[Trent 0]

Quote

Good reply. Short and pointless.

It just frikkin' laser beams people!

Oh, hello again!

[n23x 0]

Better.

.jim

"Don't touch my fucking Easter eggs, I'll be back monday." ~JTFC

[billvon 3,120]

>It just frikkin' laser beams people!

. . . on their freakin HEADS

[skydyvr 0]

Quote

>It just frikkin' laser beams people!

. . . on their freakin HEADS

. . . and then they hits the freakin' brakes!!

. . =(_8^(1)

[bloody_trauma 2]

-Did I say anything about Bush?

No and niether did I thats a whole other topic thats being reserved for after he leaves office

-What percentage of Iraqi's vs. US troops do you treat, on average?

Don't know how tht relevant but, i cant give you a "HARD" number but on average i treat far more iraqis than coalition forces, and its not us taht hurting these people, right now there are these "death squads" that were dealing with right now and there are the ones who bomb market places, and car bomb busy intersections, and drive bys, and on an on it goes, but look the point is that most of the violence here comes from iraqi on iraqi violence, and foriegn fighter on iraqi violence, you hear about it all the time on the news, "twenty iraqis were killed and 12 injured today at a busy city square in iraq" and thats alot of what i see here is the iraqis getting smashed, and the injuries are a wide variety of nasty, and then on the latter, coalition forces have uparmored vehicles and battle drills set out so we dont get hurt, i cant go into any detail about injuries of coalition forces and efficacy of such attacks, but i will say the insurgents are loosing thier edge,
. . . .
as far as blindng people i'd rather them have optical problems then them bleeding all over the place from a bullet, soldiers shoot to kill not to wound. one shot one kill and thats all she wrote. now i'm going to stop trying to defend our methods, we do whats necessary to survive and thats that, good day on this one peeps

Fly it like you stole it

[n23x 0]

Politely, I asked for hard data, not an emotional appeal.

However, we came all the way from: "they cause no damage at all" to "we do whats necessary to survive and thats that", so I suppose there's not much else to talk about.

Stay safe,
.jim

"Don't touch my fucking Easter eggs, I'll be back monday." ~JTFC

[billvon 3,120]

>. . . and then they hits the freakin' brakes!!

I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about SHARKS with LASERS on their freaking HEADS!!!

[Trent 0]

Quote

Politely, I asked for hard data, not an emotional appeal.

He said, "...i cant give you a "HARD" number but on average i treat far more iraqis than coalition forces..."
If that's not good enough coming from someone who's there doing it...

Quote

However, we came all the way from: "they cause no damage at all" to "we do whats necessary to survive and thats that", so I suppose there's not much else to talk about.

Sure there is... they're still better than the current alternative of shooting up cars. On the remote chance that they cause some miniscule blindness, it probably won't be 100% blindness and it's still much healthier than a bullet to the eye. Maybe bloody_trauma can explain it better, but "dazzlers" that I've seen do not fire one steady laser beam. For one, it's too small to aim at a target like an eye while at a distance and moving and secondly, it'd only get one eye at a time. I've seen similar devices that throw out a "web" of lasers in a moving pattern to cover about a 5 foot circle at 50 feet or so. So it's a diffused laser that is moving... NOT spending full-time or full-power on one retina at a time. But that's just if they're using something similar to what already existed. They could be using giant frikken' laser beams strong enough to cover a whole head... but I doubt it's financially reasonable, or rifle mountable.

Oh, hello again!

[skydyvr 0]

Quote

I'm talking about SHARKS with LASERS on their freaking HEADS!!!

Now THAT was an interesting topic to learn about.

. . =(_8^(1)

[n23x 0]

Your confusion about exposure makes it hard for us to carry on an intelligent discussion.

Repeat and overexposure don't require "giant frikken' laser beams strong enough to cover a whole head".

If you don't believe me, meet me at Applied Sciences (if you're ever in CO), and we can see what a few 10ms flashes'll do. <- (that's the eye protection I'll be wearing)

.jim

"Don't touch my fucking Easter eggs, I'll be back monday." ~JTFC

[Trent 0]

Quote

Your confusion about exposure makes it hard for us to carry on an intelligent discussion.

I'm not confused. I just don't think they're gonna be using a 500mW laser in a pinpoint on a retina.

First, find out what kind of lasers they'll use. Then find out if it is similar to what I've seen before (diffusing the beam to cover more "real estate"). THEN I'll let you shoot one at me.


<-- that's me closing my eyes once they're exposed, since that's probably a normal reflex in humans.

Oh, hello again!