Weaponizing Chili

"Weaponizing Chili" was almost but not quite published by The New Yorker (too farty, perhaps?)

Weaponizing Chili
by Michael R. Burch

I thought I had heard of everything, but then I heard India is weaponizing chili.

It seems India’s military is now using the world’s hottest chili, bhut jolokia or "ghost chili," in hand grenades. According to a TIME article, India’s ghost chili grenades are nontoxic and can render terrorists harmless with a "pungent smell" that can "choke terrorists and force them [to flee] their hideouts."

Since it would be pointless to reinvent the wheel, I have to assume India’s ghost chili grenades are more effective than ordinary tear gas grenades. But I believe I know how to make them even more effective, while lowering their cost substantially.

It was the "bhut" in bhut jolokia that got me thinking, and thinking is what I do best.

So please try to follow me, because my idea may help us win the war on terrorism, cost effectively:

(1) Chili can be made with beans.
(2) Beans induce flatulence.
(3) Beans are cheap: much cheaper than any other weapon known to man.
(4) The most powerful bombs use chain reactions to deliver knock-out blows.

Therefore, the CIA should work with Tex-Mex chefs and the Indian military to create a new, advanced, bean-based version of the bhut jolokia grenade: one that will produce chain reactions of eye-watering, explosive flatulence.

Once beans have been stirred into the mix, so to speak, a single grenade might take out legions of terrorists. Just imagine the first terrorist in line being enveloped in the fulsome fumes of a ghost chili grenade, while vaporized bean particles turn his anus into a tear gas cannon aimed conveniently at the terrorists behind him.

My idea will make the "domino theory" a reality, at long last, and help the CIA win its war on terrorism without spending billions of dollars on expensive robotic drones that keep killing the wrong people "accidentally."

All we have to do is find a single terrorist and persuade his anus to become our ally.

Then victory will be merely a matter of time and "wind" direction.

The HyperTexts