NON-LETHAL WEAPONS FOR PEACE CAMPAIGN

Brain injury from bomb blast the 'signature wound'

Brain injury from bomb blast is the new signature injury from the Afghan wars.  Professor  Richard Tanter of the Nautilus Institute (reported today in Australian Broadcasting Corporation News) says that soldiers are surviving better with kevlar armour only to suffer frequent brain inury from the blast of improvised explosive devices (IEDs). Says the professor:

"It's not just from Taliban IEDs, but it's actually from the much larger blast effects from allied bombs, for example American 2,000-pound bombs, which are principally, blast weapons not shrapnel type weapons."

Here's yet another indication that we need to think much more carefully about the technology we use in dealing with international conflict.

It's highly debatable whether foreign troops should still be in Afghanistan at all. Even if military intervention is justified, surely we should try to do it without damaging weaponry. It seems that some people (soldiers and civilians) may appear to survive a bomb blast - but then find that there was injury after all. 

More reasons to look towards non-lethal technology.

Media Release to the Australian Media on Police Firearms - 4th October 2011

 

 

The Non-Lethal Weapons for Peace Campaign

 

 

MEDIA RELEASE     4 October 2011 - FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

  

  

DO OUR POLICE NEED TO CARRY GUNS?

 

Thursday’s shooting of Mr Rodney Elkass in Castle Hill confirms the need for an urgent review of firearms use by police said Andrew Greig, who is coordinator of the Non-Lethal Weapons for Peace Campaign.

 

“This incident follows several other recent shootings by police officers” said Mr Greig. “Rodney Elkas is reported as having a gun, but Justin McMaster, shot in the stomach on 26 September, appears to have been carrying a curtain rod to deter intruders. Adam Salter, shot dead by police in November 2009, was apparently trying to cut himself with a kitchen knife”.

 

Andrew Greig questions whether deadly force was warranted in any of these cases. He believes that a number of people shot by police in recent years did not pose a major safety threat. Many could have been restrained by other means, such as stun-guns.

 

In addition to the risk of death or injury to passers-by, guns used by police are a significant occupational health risk to the police themselves. They encourage criminals to use firearms and there is the danger of police bullets striking other officers.  Handguns project a culture of violence

 

As Andrew Greig says, “there are other effective models of police protection in countries such as the United Kingdom, where only some 10% of the police are armed”.

 

“NSW Police now have the protection of Taser stun-guns. We need to ask whether every police officer on general duties needs to carry a firearm.”

 

“These recent police shootings highlight the need to debate why and how firearms are carried and used by police.”

 

Andrew Greig is the author of TAMING WAR - CULTURE AND TECHNOLOGY FOR PEACE and is a spokesperson for the Non-Lethal Weapons for Peace Campaign. He has been a Visiting Scholar at the University of Sydney Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies.

 

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