The US Army plans to issue a contract to General Atomics to develop an electro-thermal chemical cannon for use in the Future Combat System. Such a weapon, it is thought, would not be ready before 2012, and plans to accelerate the FCS program could mean that an interim weapon would arm the first vehicles. The ETC cannon is theoretically 30% more powerful than a conventional gun, which would allow a smaller gun to have the same lethality (and be easier to carry) or a gun of the same size to attack targets farther away.--Stephen V Cole