Sound of death
It is known that sound waves and their use for military purposes have long attracted the attention of specialists. Even in the period before the Second World War, in a number of countries, including the Soviet Union, acoustic systems for detecting the location of enemy artillery batteries by the sound of their shots followed by striking them were developed. Such sound systems performed essentially passive, "defensive" nature. However, already in 1960-1970, interest in using sound sources to create "offensive" weaponsable to inflict damage to people of varying degrees of severity or limit their capacity. At that time, the work on it was not widely advertised; they were largely closed in nature and, judging by later publications, no special achievements were made in the scientific and technical field at that time. It turned out that such devices were too expensive, quite complex and most importantly did not have the necessary direction of action. The situation with acoustic weapons changed significantly after the end of the cold war, when research on the creation of a "non-lethal weapon" (NSO) was launched on a wide front in a number of countries (especially in the United States, Great Britain, and Japan). Various modifications of these weapons have become regarded as a very effective means for neutralizing large masses of people, especially in cases where it is necessary to avoid causing them fatal injury or serious injury.
When considering the problems of creating and damaging the action of acoustic weapons, it should be borne in mind that in general it covers three frequency ranges: infrasonic - the frequency range is lower than 20 Hertz (Hz), although sounds with lower frequencies can also be heard, especially when sound pressure is large enough; audible - from 20 Hz to 20 kHz. It was found that the thresholds of hearing, pain and the negative impact on the human body decreases with increasing frequency of sound from several Hz to 250 Hz. For frequencies above 20 kHz, the term "ultrasound" is usually used. This gradation is determined by the characteristics of the impact of sound on the human body and, above all, on its hearing aid.
Considering the effect of acoustic weapons on the human body, it should be noted that it is very diverse and covers a wide range of possible consequences. The SARA report for 1996 provides some summary of the research conducted in this area. Thus, it is indicated that the infrasound at the 110-130 dB level has a negative effect on the organs of the gastrointestinal tract, causes pain and nausea, while high levels of anxiety and disorder are achieved at minute exposures already at levels from 90 to 120 dB at low frequencies (from 5 to 200 Hz), and severe physical injury and tissue damage occur at the level of 140-150 dB. Instant injuries, such as injuries from shock waves, occur at a sound pressure of about 170 dB. At low frequencies, excited resonances of the internal organs can cause bleeding and spasms, and in the medium frequency range (0,5-2,5 kHz), resonances in the air cavities of the body will cause nervous excitement, tissue injury and overheating of the internal organs.
At high and ultrasonic frequencies (from 5 to 30 kHz), their overheating up to deadly high temperatures, tissue burns and their dehydration can be created. At higher frequencies or at short pulses, bubbles and micro-tears may form as a result of cavitation. In this case, the author of the study stipulates that in his opinion, some such allegations about the effectiveness of the action of acoustic weapons raise serious doubts, especially in the infrasonic and audible area. According to him, in contrast to a number of articles in the defense press, high-power infrasound does not have as high an impact on humans as claimed; pain threshold is higher than in the sound range and there are still no reliable facts regarding the alleged effects on the internal organs, the vestibular apparatus.
Many people think that acoustic weapons are something from the realm of fantasy. But it not only exists, but also applies. For example, in November 2005, the “acoustic gun” helped the crew of the Seabourn Spirit cruise ship to repel the attack of the sea pirates who attacked the ship off the coast of Somalia. Pirates fired the ship with machine guns and grenade launchers, and then tried to take him to the boarding. However, the Seabourn Spirit was equipped with an LRAD - Long Range Acoustic Device system. After the device was powered, the pirates fled.
LRAD is a sound weapon that belongs to the category of "non-lethal". Although the effects of its effects on the human body have not yet been studied, experts believe that it can be hazardous to health. This "acoustic cannon" was developed by American Technology Corp. by order of the Pentagon after a terrorist attack on the American destroyer Cole in Yemen in 2000. For several years now, the device has been used on US Navy ships. For example, it is installed on ships that are in the Persian Gulf.
It is known that the installation weighs about 20 kg, has a “plate” of hemispherical shape with a diameter of about one meter and looks like a searchlight or locator. It produces a narrow, high-pitched, high-pitched sound, similar to a fire siren, but much louder. The LRAD volume reaches 150 dB and can even damage the human hearing aid (for comparison: the fire siren has 80-90 dB). The frequency of sound vibrations is 2100-3100 Hz. But the sound has such characteristics only inside a narrow beam, so a sound impact does not harm the operator, but only affects enemies. The “gun” acts on the opponent with the power of sound, stunning it and causing a painful shock.
Before the advent of LRAD, all attempts to create effective acoustic weapons ended in failure. Although the first case of its successful application is described in the Bible. It tells how Jews, led by Joshua, destroyed the walls of ancient Jericho with the sound of sacred trumpets. To create their "Jericho pipe" to shoot down enemy planes, the Germans tried during the Second World War. Fortunately, they failed.
Dr. Ziepermeyer from the Luftwaffe Technical Academy developed the Windkanone machine (“Wind Cannon”). A gas mixture also exploded in her combustion chamber, but compressed air vortices twisted in a tight ring with special nozzles were used as a striking factor. It was assumed that such rings, released into the sky, will break American planes into pieces. The Zippermeier cannon model smashed the boards into 150 meters, but when the ammunition ministry created a full-scale installation at the Hillersleben test site, it turned out that the impact force of the vortex rings weakened quickly and could not cause damage to the aircraft.
The sabotage against Great Britain also failed: the Nazis intended to send the British special records with records of popular melodies that were supposed to emit infrasound during playback.
But back to Tbilisi. According to the rally participants, during the gas attack, they instinctively grabbed a cell phone to call relatives. But the conversation was always immediately interrupted. And after that, something strange was happening to their psyche: they felt a terrible fear, an irresistible desire to run, shout, jump somewhere. People thought they were going crazy or dying. Then they lost control of themselves, and there was a period of complete loss of memory, which lasted from one and a half to five hours. After that, people found themselves in the most unexpected places of the city.
Those who were not gassed said they had terrible pressure in their ears and head, fear and panic. They also had memory lapses. As a result, everyone had a persistent fear of participating in any public events, demonstrations and rallies.
But the most interesting thing is that when the next day people asked for medical help in Tbilisi polyclinics, some strange foreign specialists, without any requests from the victims, removed their electroencephalograms (that is, they recorded the electrical activity of the brain). For some reason, encephalograms were not given to patients. It was the stories about these strange studies that caused Mikhailov to suspect that an experiment had been conducted on people in Tbilisi.
All this seems like a fantasy. However, the browser has found out that theoretically it is quite possible. Moreover, in the development of methods for managing the consciousness of people, our country once was far ahead of the West. I was able to visit the laboratory, where they are engaged in similar investigations.
... The dull gray outskirts of Moscow, typically Soviet surroundings, shabby walls. It is unlikely that many people realize that here, under the roof of the Stalinist machine-building scientific research institute, students and followers of the “father of Russian psychotronic weapons” Igor Smirnov, who died several years ago, found shelter. By the way, the father of Smirnov was the head of Stalin’s Smersh, Viktor Abakumov, who was arrested when his son was 4 of the month, and three years later was shot. So the "sovereign eye" carefully watched Smirnov all his life - first because of his father, and then because of his own discoveries. His work was conducted in secrecy and under the close supervision of the KGB. Even patents registered by him have no names, only numbers.
- We do not develop psychotronic weapons, we are peaceful people, - says Maxim Konobeevsky, an employee of the Institute of Psychotechnologies,. “But our dual-use technologies.” It's like a kitchen knife: they can cut vegetables for salad, and you can kill a person. Therefore, the prohibition of special services on their distribution.
In general, the essence of the technology developed by Smirnov consists in referring directly to the subconscious of a person, bypassing his consciousness. This allows, on the one hand, to read out hidden information from there, for example, identifying potential criminals. And on the other - to influence the thoughts, motivation and behavior of a person.
In 1993, the US government turned to Smirnov for help in resolving the conflict with the David Branch sect. Sectarians were going to commit self-immolation and barricaded themselves at the ranch. We had to somehow force them to abandon this intention. Smirnov proposed to transmit music through the speakers, and against its background - coded appeals to the sectarians of their relatives. However, the idea failed: the Americans did not understand and began to broadcast the appeals of relatives openly. It only angered sectarians.
“Our technology can also be used to influence the crowd,” says Maxim Konobeevsky. “Having it, it is easy to create the necessary technological tools.
The device "sound guns", equipped with a computer, as we remember, allows you to broadcast any digitized sound, including encoded semantic messages. Maybe this is exactly what they did in Tbilisi?
Americans could easily supply such equipment and methods to their Georgian partners. But most likely not to disperse opposition demonstrations. And for use in conflict regions - Abkhazia and South Ossetia. In addition, US law is quite rigidly regulating the activities of special services in the United States. Therefore, they prefer to conduct tests of dubious methods in humans in less developed countries.
The long-range acoustic gun LRAD does not look too belligerent, but it has an impressive effect on the modern successors of the case of Captain Flint and Henry Morgan: they can be taken with bare hands.
In the fall of 2005, off the coast of Somalia, speedboats of pirates surrounded the peaceful cruise liner "Seabourn Spirit". Confident in their superiority, the sea robbers demanded that the ladder be lowered, but after a few minutes they were forced to throw their machine guns and grenade launchers, clamping their ears from the unbearable pain ...
This was the first successful combat use of the LRAD acoustic gun, which was on the liner - one of the non-lethal weapons that many countries have been actively developing in recent years.
However, the sound "weapon of fear", as a rule, has a big drawback - it affects those who use it. Attempts to create narrowly focused sound sources were of short-term success - everything was very simple at the open range, but in the city sound waves reflected off the walls of houses and echoed back. What to do - to put the calculations "sound guns" in expensive soundproof vans?
Fully sealed armored vehicles provide effective protection against low-frequency sound emissions. Regular road transport, which does not have reliable insulation, can let in low-frequency vibrations. If low-frequency sound penetrates through the slots and windows of a building, high internal pressure may occur as a result of room resonance.
The phenomenon of resonance can be used during the siege of the building in which the terrorists are located. In case high frequencies are used, metal coatings, walls and windows can provide a significant attenuation of sound. In conclusion, it should be emphasized that with regard to the destructive effect of acoustic weapons there are still quite a few "white" spots, the scientific and technical analysis of which is still awaiting its researchers.
When considering the problems of creating and damaging the action of acoustic weapons, it should be borne in mind that in general it covers three frequency ranges: infrasonic - the frequency range is lower than 20 Hertz (Hz), although sounds with lower frequencies can also be heard, especially when sound pressure is large enough; audible - from 20 Hz to 20 kHz. It was found that the thresholds of hearing, pain and the negative impact on the human body decreases with increasing frequency of sound from several Hz to 250 Hz. For frequencies above 20 kHz, the term "ultrasound" is usually used. This gradation is determined by the characteristics of the impact of sound on the human body and, above all, on its hearing aid.
Considering the effect of acoustic weapons on the human body, it should be noted that it is very diverse and covers a wide range of possible consequences. The SARA report for 1996 provides some summary of the research conducted in this area. Thus, it is indicated that the infrasound at the 110-130 dB level has a negative effect on the organs of the gastrointestinal tract, causes pain and nausea, while high levels of anxiety and disorder are achieved at minute exposures already at levels from 90 to 120 dB at low frequencies (from 5 to 200 Hz), and severe physical injury and tissue damage occur at the level of 140-150 dB. Instant injuries, such as injuries from shock waves, occur at a sound pressure of about 170 dB. At low frequencies, excited resonances of the internal organs can cause bleeding and spasms, and in the medium frequency range (0,5-2,5 kHz), resonances in the air cavities of the body will cause nervous excitement, tissue injury and overheating of the internal organs.
At high and ultrasonic frequencies (from 5 to 30 kHz), their overheating up to deadly high temperatures, tissue burns and their dehydration can be created. At higher frequencies or at short pulses, bubbles and micro-tears may form as a result of cavitation. In this case, the author of the study stipulates that in his opinion, some such allegations about the effectiveness of the action of acoustic weapons raise serious doubts, especially in the infrasonic and audible area. According to him, in contrast to a number of articles in the defense press, high-power infrasound does not have as high an impact on humans as claimed; pain threshold is higher than in the sound range and there are still no reliable facts regarding the alleged effects on the internal organs, the vestibular apparatus.
Many people think that acoustic weapons are something from the realm of fantasy. But it not only exists, but also applies. For example, in November 2005, the “acoustic gun” helped the crew of the Seabourn Spirit cruise ship to repel the attack of the sea pirates who attacked the ship off the coast of Somalia. Pirates fired the ship with machine guns and grenade launchers, and then tried to take him to the boarding. However, the Seabourn Spirit was equipped with an LRAD - Long Range Acoustic Device system. After the device was powered, the pirates fled.
LRAD is a sound weapon that belongs to the category of "non-lethal". Although the effects of its effects on the human body have not yet been studied, experts believe that it can be hazardous to health. This "acoustic cannon" was developed by American Technology Corp. by order of the Pentagon after a terrorist attack on the American destroyer Cole in Yemen in 2000. For several years now, the device has been used on US Navy ships. For example, it is installed on ships that are in the Persian Gulf.
It is known that the installation weighs about 20 kg, has a “plate” of hemispherical shape with a diameter of about one meter and looks like a searchlight or locator. It produces a narrow, high-pitched, high-pitched sound, similar to a fire siren, but much louder. The LRAD volume reaches 150 dB and can even damage the human hearing aid (for comparison: the fire siren has 80-90 dB). The frequency of sound vibrations is 2100-3100 Hz. But the sound has such characteristics only inside a narrow beam, so a sound impact does not harm the operator, but only affects enemies. The “gun” acts on the opponent with the power of sound, stunning it and causing a painful shock.
Before the advent of LRAD, all attempts to create effective acoustic weapons ended in failure. Although the first case of its successful application is described in the Bible. It tells how Jews, led by Joshua, destroyed the walls of ancient Jericho with the sound of sacred trumpets. To create their "Jericho pipe" to shoot down enemy planes, the Germans tried during the Second World War. Fortunately, they failed.
Dr. Ziepermeyer from the Luftwaffe Technical Academy developed the Windkanone machine (“Wind Cannon”). A gas mixture also exploded in her combustion chamber, but compressed air vortices twisted in a tight ring with special nozzles were used as a striking factor. It was assumed that such rings, released into the sky, will break American planes into pieces. The Zippermeier cannon model smashed the boards into 150 meters, but when the ammunition ministry created a full-scale installation at the Hillersleben test site, it turned out that the impact force of the vortex rings weakened quickly and could not cause damage to the aircraft.
The sabotage against Great Britain also failed: the Nazis intended to send the British special records with records of popular melodies that were supposed to emit infrasound during playback.
But back to Tbilisi. According to the rally participants, during the gas attack, they instinctively grabbed a cell phone to call relatives. But the conversation was always immediately interrupted. And after that, something strange was happening to their psyche: they felt a terrible fear, an irresistible desire to run, shout, jump somewhere. People thought they were going crazy or dying. Then they lost control of themselves, and there was a period of complete loss of memory, which lasted from one and a half to five hours. After that, people found themselves in the most unexpected places of the city.
Those who were not gassed said they had terrible pressure in their ears and head, fear and panic. They also had memory lapses. As a result, everyone had a persistent fear of participating in any public events, demonstrations and rallies.
But the most interesting thing is that when the next day people asked for medical help in Tbilisi polyclinics, some strange foreign specialists, without any requests from the victims, removed their electroencephalograms (that is, they recorded the electrical activity of the brain). For some reason, encephalograms were not given to patients. It was the stories about these strange studies that caused Mikhailov to suspect that an experiment had been conducted on people in Tbilisi.
All this seems like a fantasy. However, the browser has found out that theoretically it is quite possible. Moreover, in the development of methods for managing the consciousness of people, our country once was far ahead of the West. I was able to visit the laboratory, where they are engaged in similar investigations.
... The dull gray outskirts of Moscow, typically Soviet surroundings, shabby walls. It is unlikely that many people realize that here, under the roof of the Stalinist machine-building scientific research institute, students and followers of the “father of Russian psychotronic weapons” Igor Smirnov, who died several years ago, found shelter. By the way, the father of Smirnov was the head of Stalin’s Smersh, Viktor Abakumov, who was arrested when his son was 4 of the month, and three years later was shot. So the "sovereign eye" carefully watched Smirnov all his life - first because of his father, and then because of his own discoveries. His work was conducted in secrecy and under the close supervision of the KGB. Even patents registered by him have no names, only numbers.
- We do not develop psychotronic weapons, we are peaceful people, - says Maxim Konobeevsky, an employee of the Institute of Psychotechnologies,. “But our dual-use technologies.” It's like a kitchen knife: they can cut vegetables for salad, and you can kill a person. Therefore, the prohibition of special services on their distribution.
In general, the essence of the technology developed by Smirnov consists in referring directly to the subconscious of a person, bypassing his consciousness. This allows, on the one hand, to read out hidden information from there, for example, identifying potential criminals. And on the other - to influence the thoughts, motivation and behavior of a person.
In 1993, the US government turned to Smirnov for help in resolving the conflict with the David Branch sect. Sectarians were going to commit self-immolation and barricaded themselves at the ranch. We had to somehow force them to abandon this intention. Smirnov proposed to transmit music through the speakers, and against its background - coded appeals to the sectarians of their relatives. However, the idea failed: the Americans did not understand and began to broadcast the appeals of relatives openly. It only angered sectarians.
“Our technology can also be used to influence the crowd,” says Maxim Konobeevsky. “Having it, it is easy to create the necessary technological tools.
The device "sound guns", equipped with a computer, as we remember, allows you to broadcast any digitized sound, including encoded semantic messages. Maybe this is exactly what they did in Tbilisi?
Americans could easily supply such equipment and methods to their Georgian partners. But most likely not to disperse opposition demonstrations. And for use in conflict regions - Abkhazia and South Ossetia. In addition, US law is quite rigidly regulating the activities of special services in the United States. Therefore, they prefer to conduct tests of dubious methods in humans in less developed countries.
The long-range acoustic gun LRAD does not look too belligerent, but it has an impressive effect on the modern successors of the case of Captain Flint and Henry Morgan: they can be taken with bare hands.
In the fall of 2005, off the coast of Somalia, speedboats of pirates surrounded the peaceful cruise liner "Seabourn Spirit". Confident in their superiority, the sea robbers demanded that the ladder be lowered, but after a few minutes they were forced to throw their machine guns and grenade launchers, clamping their ears from the unbearable pain ...
This was the first successful combat use of the LRAD acoustic gun, which was on the liner - one of the non-lethal weapons that many countries have been actively developing in recent years.
However, the sound "weapon of fear", as a rule, has a big drawback - it affects those who use it. Attempts to create narrowly focused sound sources were of short-term success - everything was very simple at the open range, but in the city sound waves reflected off the walls of houses and echoed back. What to do - to put the calculations "sound guns" in expensive soundproof vans?
Fully sealed armored vehicles provide effective protection against low-frequency sound emissions. Regular road transport, which does not have reliable insulation, can let in low-frequency vibrations. If low-frequency sound penetrates through the slots and windows of a building, high internal pressure may occur as a result of room resonance.
The phenomenon of resonance can be used during the siege of the building in which the terrorists are located. In case high frequencies are used, metal coatings, walls and windows can provide a significant attenuation of sound. In conclusion, it should be emphasized that with regard to the destructive effect of acoustic weapons there are still quite a few "white" spots, the scientific and technical analysis of which is still awaiting its researchers.
Information