On 14Apr2018 1546, Kurt Feltenberger wrote:
> This evening a friend and I were discussing non-tradtional weapons of
> mass destruction from "fiction".  I put fiction in quotes because
> today's fiction is tomorrow's reality.  One that I remembered was from
> Ralph Peters' book, "The War in 2020" from the early 1990s.  In it, one
> of the proscribed WMDs is called a "scrambler", because it's a sort of
> super EMP/radio wave device that only effects the human neruo-muscular
> while leaving the brain undamaged and intact.  In short, the victim has
> no control over his voluntary muscles but can breath and otherwise
> function.
>
> Of the weapons we discussed, these were among the most horrific, edging
> out genetic/ethic targeted plagues.  My question to the list is thus:
> How possible are they in reality?  I know that a TASER disrupts the
> neuro-muscular response, but it is only short term and only lasts while
> there is current and then only in the area between the electrodes.

I can't see such a device only affecting the voluntary muscular system.
It'd almost certainly light up all your sensory nerves as well, and
affect your involuntary systems too, and that would quite likely kill
you (by heart attack, for starters).

Also, the biggest concentration of nervous tissue is the brain, so I
can't see it being unaffected, and that means seizures, at the least.

--
Rupert Boleyn <xxxxxx@gmail.com>
Chief Assistant to the Assistant Chief