The Active Denial System: the weapon that's a hot topic - Telegraph

The Active Denial System: the weapon that's a hot topic - Telegraph: "'It was as if some invisible jet impinged upon them… I saw them staggering and falling, and their supporters turning to run.” Since the first appearance of the “heat-ray” in H G Wells’s The War of the Worlds, ray guns have been a staple feature of science fiction: the classic sign of overwhelming technological superiority. But they are no longer fiction. Last month, Lt Col John Dorrian admitted that the US military’s brand-new Active Denial System (ADS) had been shipped to Afghanistan, the first time it has been present in an active theatre of war. According to the top brass, it is a “non-lethal, directed-energy, counter-personnel weapon”. Among the troops, however, its favoured description is rather shorter: “the pain ray”."