The implicit message of the previous chapters must not be overread. The roster of emerging non-lethal weapon technologies might, at first, generate a breathless anticipation about future “bloodless conflict,” in which American troops and police one day could prevail with only minimal costs to themselves, to innocent civilians, and even to the hostile forces. The five case studies, and the speculations about how NLWs of various sorts might have ameliorated the confrontations in Waco, Rwanda, Lima, Moscow, and Basra, might generate a knee-jerk mandate to develop, procure, and deploy more of those devices as soon as possible.

But there are important reasons to hesitate before blindly pursuing non-lethals. Three classes of caveats must be surveyed in any balanced consideration of the future of NLWs for police and military applications: concerns that might be labeled “operational” considerations about how the mechanisms might suit the realities of modern law enforcement and conflict; apprehensions about proliferation of the technologies to other, malign users; and the dangers of encouraging facile overreliance on force that must, even with non-lethal capabilities, be exercised with restraint.

OPERATIONAL CONSTRAINTS ON NON-LETHAL WEAPONS

The transition from drawing board to operational field is laden with impediments, and any of the NLW concepts we have discussed must address several potential pitfalls. This section briefly notes some of the constraints that NLWs (as any new weapon) must overcome – and, not coincidentally, some of the reasons why non-lethals have not yet succeeded in flooding the market for police and military arsenals.