|
A weapon is a tool to damage life or property, and as a result, also to threaten and defend. When weapons are
used skillfully, they are used according to doctrines that maximize their desirable effects, while minimizing collateral
damage.
Metaphorically, anything used to damage (even psychologically) can be referred to as a weapon. Weapons can be as simple as a
club, or as advanced as a nuclear warhead.
Norse knife (photo Uwe Kils)
For a comprehensive list of weapons and doctrines see military technology and equipment.
Weapon history is believed to begin in the stone age with flint knives, handaxes and heads for lances. There is, however, no evidence for handaxes being through but very good evidence for them having been used to
butcher animals. If hunted rather than scavenged (which is probably the most likely way hominds obtained meat), then wooden
spears were likely used.
The earliest stone weapons are probably 'projectile points' (it is often difficult to ascertain whether a point was an
arrowhead or spearhead, as they overlap in size and weight to a certain degree) made on flint (chert) dating to the Middle
Palaeolithic (ca. 300,000 to 40,000 BC), found all over Europe and the Middle East. Incontrovertable direct evidence of levallois
points (a type of tool made by Neanderthals) having been used to hunt comes from the recovery of animal bones with impact damage
and embedded points in their skeletons. In the Upper Palaeolithic (ca. 40,000 to 10,000 BC) the use of spears and spear throwers
were used.
When thrown from a spear-thrower, a lever to extend the arm, the lance bends, storing energy, and then straightens. It then
strikes animals at effective ranges to over thirty meters. The range is definitely limited by aim, not power. Anthropologists
constructing lances and throwers have thrown lances through several inches of oak. The broad, leaf-shaped heads penetrate deeply,
and cut arteries well.
Some of the earliest evidence for arrows are from ca. 20,000 BC in the Levant (the so-called 'Geometric Kebaran' period), made
with several very small sharp pieces of stone embedded in an arrowshaft.
Archery and swords have been crucial for
warfare. Archery, because of its firepower, short swords because of their lethality in close combat. The most effective defense
to these was a fortress. The doctrines to support fortresses in the age of edged
weapons may have caused much of medieval and noble history. Of course, medieval siege weapons were used in countervailing doctrines.
During the 16th century to 19th century firearms became increasingly important and effective.
During the U.S. Civil War various technologies including the machine gun and ironclad ship emerged that would be recognizable and useful weapons of war today, in lower-tech
regions of the world. In the 19th century warships shifted also to use of
fossil fuels and were no longer dependent on sail.
The age of edged weapons ended abruptly just before World War I with
rifled artillery, such as howitzers
which are able to destroy any masonry fortress. This single invention caused a revolution in military affairs and doctrines that
continues to this day. See military technology during World War I for a detailed discussion.
An important feature of industrial age warfare was technological escalation - an innovation could, and would, be rapidly matched by copying it, and
often with yet another innovation to counter it. The technological escalation during World War I was profound, and produced armed
aircraft, the hand grenade, and the tank.
This continued in the interim period between that war and the next, with continuous improvements of all weapons by all major powers.
Many modern weapons of war, particularly ground-based weapons, are mild improvements on those of World War II. See military technology during World War II for a detailed discussion.
The greatest development in weaponry since World War II has been the combination and further development of two weapons first
used in it - nuclear weapons and the ballistic missile and its ultimate
configuration the ICBM. The mutual possession of these by the United States and Russia
ensured that either nation could inflict terrible damage on the other; so terrible, in fact, that neither nation was prepared to
go to war with the other. The indiscriminate nature of the destruction has made nuclear-tipped missiles essentially useless for
the smaller wars fought since. However computer-guided weaponry of all kinds, from smart bombs to computer-aimed tank rounds, has greatly increased weaponry's accuracy.
In modern warfare, since all redoubts are traps, maneuver and coordination of forces is decisive, overshadowing particular
weapons. The goal of every modern commander is therefore to "operate within the observation-decision-action cycle of the enemy."
In this way, the modern commander can bring overwhelming force to bear on isolated groups of the enemy, and tactically
overwhelm an enemy. See military technology of the late 20th century.
Traditional military maneuvers tried to achieve this coordination with "fronts" made of lines of military assets. These were
formerly the only way to prevent harm to friendly forces. Close-order marching and drill (a traditional military skill) was an
early method to get relative superiority of coordination. Derivative methods (such as "leapfrogging units to advance a line")
survived into combined arms warfare to coordinate aircraft, artillery, armor and infantry.
Computers are changing this. The most extreme example so far (2003) is the use of "swarm" tactics by the U.S. military in
Iraq. The U.S. had instantaneous, reliably encrypted communications, perfect navigation using GPS and computer-mediated communications to aim precision weapons.
In swarm tactics, small units pass through possible enemy territory. When attacked, they try to survive, and call down
immediate overwhelming showers of precision-guided air-dropped munitions for armor, and cluster bombs for enemy troops. To
consolidate such a region, nearby artillery begin bombardment, and ground units rush in on safe vectors through the bombardments,
avoiding them by computer-mediated navigation aids.
Thus in modern warfare, satellite navigation
systems and especially computers create decisive advantages for ordinary
military personnel with weapons that are serviceable, but otherwise unremarkable.
See also riot control agent, non-lethal, weapon of mass
destruction. Netwar contains a discussion on using information technology as a
weapon - more commonly called information warfare. See also
persuasion technology and propaganda for discussions of the way information technology plays a role in the changing of the minds of
subject populations - both branches of psychological
warfare.
Time Periods
See also toy weapons, fictional technology, technological escalation, List of fictional weapons
|