Anti-sniper gun holds fire

AMERICAN scientists have invented an automatic device which can spot and shoot a sniper within a split second of him firing at a target.

Had the device, named Lifeguard, been invented 30 years earlier, it might have saved President Kennedy's life and would have solved the riddle of whether there was one gunman or two. It would be ideal for protecting civilians from sniper fire in Sarajevo - but political considerations have so far prevented its deployment there.

It was developed a year ago by Livermore Lawrence National Laboratory in California, one of two centres in America where scientists were formerly fully employed building nuclear bombs. It was supposed to be part of the post-Cold war peace dividend. But Livermore, who invested $750,000 (pounds 470,000) and a year's work to develop the device, has yet to find a buyer. "We have the system," said Gordon Yano, a Livermore spokesman. "It's been tested. But we're still looking for funding and collaborative efforts. The big step that remains is for Lifeguard to be deployed. All we have so far is the prototype."

Scientists at Livermore are frustrated because they went about their task with enthusiasm and high hopes of making the world a safer place.

"Where you need Lifeguard is obviously in a place like Sarajevo," Mr Yano said. "It was news reports coming out of there that prompted our scientists to think about this. They saw that all these people were killed by sniper fire and they thought maybe they could do something about it. So they did. And it works. You can mount a camera on it to identify the sniper or you can adapt it to return fire immediately so it shoots the sniper before he can squeeze off a second round." Police officers who inspected the device in May rubbed their hands with glee. What they saw was a small box, the sensor, which identifies the track of a speeding bullet. The sensor transmits a signal to a computer which in turn communicates with a camera or a firing device or both, telling them the precise location of the sniper.

However, political considerations sometimes mean that the precise location - and identity -of a sniper is not what the authorities' forces want to know. In Bosnia, for example, it is convenient to say that no one knows whether a gunman was a Serb or a Muslim, thus avoiding any need for a reaction That may be one reason why the device has not yet been seen in place.