A Chinese defense company has rolled out its latest and greatest device for crowd/Diaoyu Island control: a long-range microwave cannon that makes people feel like they're on fire. Cheery stuff.
The weapon works like a microwave. It heats up the water under a person's skin, causing "extraordinary pain" from anywhere between a few hundred feet to more than half a mile away. The ray is not deadly, and isn't even gruesome - it just hurts like @!#@$&.
China isn't the first country to roll out this not-quite-a-death ray; the USA was working on a similar project about five years ago, but ultimately scrapped it for field use in Afghanistan. The American model took some 16 hours to boot up (not exactly prepared to quell an unexpected crowd) and, as the reporter who covered its deployment on the field reported, "Ray-gun advocates better think long and hard about the Taliban’s propaganda bonanza when news leaks of the Americans zapping Afghans until they feel roasted alive."
Nevertheless, what fails in Afghanistan isn't doomed in other places. There haven't been any reports on the Chinese military's planned use for this weapon (if they have a plan for it at all) but we can bet when PLA generals hear the words "Senkaku Islands" they'll get ready to set their phasers from stun to burn.
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