Weapons

Marines Test Nonlethal Mortar Round for Crowd Control

They may not be deadly, but some of the nonlethal weapons the Marine Corps is working on look pretty devastating.

The Marine Corps Joint Nonlethal Weapons Directorate is currently testing an 81mm mortar round that delivers a shower of flashbang grenades to disperse troublemakers. There is also an electric vehicle-stopper that delivers an electrical pulse to shut down a vehicle's powertrain, designed for use at access control points.

"When you hear nonlethal, you are thinking rubber bullets and batons and tear gas; it's way more than that," Marine Col. Wendell Leimbach Jr., director of the Joint Nonlethal Weapons Directorate, told an audience at the Modern Day Marine 2019 expo.

Leimbach, a former tank officer, is trying to convince the combat units in the Corps, and the other services, that intermediate force capabilities are needed more than ever to deal with threats that show up in humanitarian assistance, disaster relief, nation-building -- scenarios that are just below armed conflict and often referred to as "gray zone" operations.