Star Wars in Iraq
is a new investigative report by Maurizio Torrealta and Sigfrido Ranucci.
The document takes off from the disturbing eyewitness report from Majid Al
Ghezali, first violinist of the Baghdad Orchestra, who had witnessed the
conquest of the airport by the US Armed Forces. Al Ghezali tells that he
had seen the victims of the battle with their bodies shrunken and to have
heard talk about the use of laser weapons.
Even the chief surgeon of the General Hospital of
Hilla, Saad al Falluji, speaks of an episode involving the horrible
mutilations that had occurred to the passengers of a bus that had been hit
at an American checkpoint with a mysterious and silent weapon. The Iraqi
physician was shocked at the absence of bullets or bullet wounds upon the
dead and wounded. The journalists of Rai News 24 had requested information
from the Pentagon about the possible use of lethal laser weapons, on their
effects and on their usage in war zones, but as of today, they still have
not obtained any replies. Taking off precisely from these eyewitness
accounts, the Rai News 24 investigation analyses the current use of a new
typology of weapons, destined to signal the epochal passage from kinetic
weapons to those run by energy.
Laser devices mounted on the Humvees have already
been tested in Afghanistan and Iraq, officially to set off landmines and
hidden explosive devices. In the inquiry there is the detailed description
of a weapon considered to be non-lethal: the Pain Ray. The
characteristics of this weapon, that uses an invisible ray that provokes
an extremely intense painful sensation, but does not cause death, has
brought about the preoccupation of the organisations that work in human
rights defence and see in this new weapon the risk of an instrument of
gradual and legal torture. It is an alarm that is also motivated by the
fact that the studies on the effects of these weapons on the human body
are still covered by military secret.
SEE THE
FILM http://www.rainews24.it/ran24/inchieste/guerre_stellari_iraq.asp
in English, Italian or
Arabic.
READ THE TEXT OF THE FILM
in .rtf
An excerpt:
Retired Colonel John B. Alexander The Active Denial
System is a Millimetre Wave System, operates at about 93 GHz. It sends out
a beam for a very long distance, and whats important about it is that
when it hits the skin it penetrates only a very slight, for a few
millimetres under the skin and it its the pain receptors and causes, you
know, people to be adverse to the pain.
It hurts, it hurts a
lot.
The
tests that had been run they were to go for 3 seconds, each individual was
given a kill switch and nobody made 3 seconds. The answer to the pain is
extremely rapid, and you dont have to do it very long, I mean, it gets
your attention instantly.
To understand the consequences this new weapon
could have for human rights we went to the Empire State Building in
Manhattan, home of the offices of Human Rights Watch, one of the most
important human rights organizations.
Marc Garlasco We can see the
effects of a gun very easily and understand them, but when you cannot see
the effect of a weapon because it is not visible and because the science
is not very well understood because technology is so new, then it becomes
a grieve concern that enrages the states for potential human rights
violations and abuses. And that is something that we have to understand
about the Active Denial System, that it exists to create pain and is very
different in most other non-lethal weapons where the desire is either to
immobilize someone or make it so that they cannot walk in the area. With
the Active Denial System the main desire is pain, and we have to be very
careful because in international law is very clear that devices created
solely for the creation of pain can eventually lead to torture and are
therefore illegal, and its very critical that the United States does a
careful legal review of the Active Denial System and is open with their
findings. To date they have not been open.
William Arkin Some
people say ooh acoustic weapons, or High Power Microwave weapons, the
Active Denial System, we can use it for crowd control
What crowd control? What does
that mean?
It pretends that
anyone in the crowd is eighteen years old, and male and in good health,
and were just going to shoot these microwaves or shoot these acoustic
weapons on this crowd, and its going to be carefully calibrated at a
power level, in the intensity and at a range to affect all these eighteen
years old men in the crowd.
Well, what crowd is made up of just eighteen years
old men?
Look at the Intifada, look at any riot in Iraq today: children,
women, pregnant women, old people, and so the effect
the effect that you
would need in order to have an impact on a healthy male, you target, would
be too much for a child or a pregnant woman or an old person.
Marc
Garlasco Theres been a lot of discussion also about the potential for eye
damage. They have done some tests on the skin to show that is not harmful,
but where is the eye test? And there are concerns raised by scientists
about potential harm to the eyes. And we also have concerns about the
effects to children, to the infirm, to the elderly
Why are they not
producing the data? Why are they not sharing it with
us?
As
regards the use of the pain ray in the field of war, the military review
Defence Industry Daily reports that three Sheriff vehicles were ordered at
a price of about 31 million dollars, and that approval has been requested
for another 14 vehicles by Brigadier General James Haggin, chief of staff
of the multinational forces in Iraq.
Retired Colonel John B.
Alexander In my view the next global conflict has already began and we
dont have an understanding of what that conflict looks like. Because of
the issues of terrorism for instance the adversaries are going to be I
think mixed in with civilian populations. We need weapons that allow us to
be able to sort, minimize what they call collateral casualties. I think
the battlefields are going to be in urban
areas.