Sonic Warfare Erupts in Pittsburgh, Honduras [View All]

[JackRiddler]

Source: WIRED

* By David Hambling

Police in Pittsburgh are using sound blasters and other non-lethal weaponry to ward off protesters at the G-20 summit. The sonic weapon is the LRAD or Long Range Acoustic Device, a super loud-hailer deployed by U.S. forces and famously used to fight off pirates.

According to the Guardian, LRAD is being used in two ways: as a megaphone to order protesters to disperse, and, when they disobey, as an “ear-splitting siren” to drive them away. This has happened repeatedly, with the crowd assembling again a few streets away. It’s one of a number of controversial tactics being employed in the city; check out this video of a seeming “snatch-and-grab” arrest in the middle of a demonstration.

The sonic weaponry appears to be having a much greater effect thousands of miles from Pittsburgh, in Honduras. A siege situation has developed in the capital Tegucigalpa, where ousted President Manuel Zelaya is holed up in the Brazilian Embassy. The security forces can’t launch an assault, but they are stepping up the pressure with sound blasters and psychological warfare tactics.

Forced into exile in a coup three months ago, Zelaya sneaked back into the country on Monday. He gave speeches to crowds of supporters from an embassy balcony, calling for a peaceful solution to the current crisis. Recognizing the risk of a popular response, the coup leaders sent in security forces to clear the area using tear gas and water cannon. According to the Guardian, twenty people were injured and at least 170 detained following the disturbance; the BBC say that at least one person died.

The embassy is now surrounded. Water, electricity and telephone lines have been cut off.

SNIP - FOLLOW LINK PLEASE

Read more: http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2009/09/sonic-warfare-erupts-in-pittsburgh-honduras/

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The use of these weapons on the Brazilian Embassy is in violation of the 1963 Vienna Convention on Consular Relations.

Very interesting that varieties of these "non-lethal" but assuredly offensive weapons are being deployed against protesters simultaneously in the United States and Honduras on the same day.

Let's concentrate on the Honduran incident:

The Miami Herald engaged in an odious trivialization of the attack in its report today from Tegucigalpa. Rather than headlining the actual story -- that the Honduran golpistas are using offensive weapons against the Brazilian Embassy -- the Herald leads with a claim that Zelaya mistakenly thought the weapons employ radiation rather than sound, in an attempt to make him look ridiculous and make it look like the story is somehow being made up inside his head.

Zelaya's mistaken perceptions of what "non-lethal" force is being aimed at him and the other people inside the embassy - assuming that his statements are even being reported honestly by the Herald - are irrelevant to the news of the golpistas' latest violent crime.

By contrast, excellent and extensive coverage of this outrage is afforded today at narconews.com:

http://narcosphere.narconews.com/thefield/3460/honduran-coup-regime-mocks-un-security-council-embassy-attacks

Honduran Coup Regime Mocks UN Security Council with Embassy Attacks

By Al Giordano



After today’s emergency session of the United Nations Security Council in New York, http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2009/0925/breaking73.htm>US Ambassador Susan Rice emerged to read a warning to the Honduras coup regime: "We condemn acts of intimidation against the Brazilian embassy and call upon the de facto government of Honduras to cease harassing the Brazilian embassy.”

The wording is unequivocal. After investigating the claims (and the de facto regime’s denials) of constant technological and chemical attacks on the diplomatic seat in Tegucigalpa, an illegal impediment of ingress and egress to and from the embassy, where legitimate President Manuel Zelaya and at least 85 aides, supporters and some members of the news media are sheltered, the UN Security Council has concluded that said harassment is real and it is ongoing.

((SNIP: Coverage of relevant paragraphs of Vienna Convention))

In light of those international laws, the device you see in the photograph up top, deployed by Honduran coup regime security forces at the gates of the Brazilian Embassy, offers a smoking gun of proof that the regime is violating the Vienna Convention. Narco News and its team of technical engineers and counter-surveillance consultants has identified the apparatus as the http://www.atcsd.com/site/content/view/208/110/>LRAD-RX Remote Long Range Acoustic Device, manufactured by the American Technologies Corporation.

The instrument is an offensive weapon, used on US Navy warships and by other nations, which can emit sounds that, “Through the use of powerful voice commands and deterrent tones, large safety zones can be created while determining the intent and influencing the behavior of an intruder.” The LRAD-RX machine can shoot sounds of up to 151 decibels. According to the http://www.nidcd.nih.gov/health/hearing/noise.asp>US National Institute on Deafness and Other Communications Disorders sounds less loud than those it produces can cause Noise Induced Hearing Loss (NIHL): “Sources of noise that can cause NIHL include motorcycles, firecrackers, and small firearms, all emitting sounds from 120 to 150 decibels. Long or repeated exposure to sounds at or above 85 decibels can cause hearing loss. The louder the sound, the shorter the time period before NIHL can occur.”

The front of the device looks like this:



And this is the back of the device:



((CONTINUED AT LINK))