Editing Incendiary Weapons (section)

==Modern Use of Flamethrowers==
At present, flamethrowers in a military context are... [[wat|no longer used]]. [[derp|Kinda...]] See below.

Originally they were mainly used against bunkers, pillboxes, and other fortified positions since they're throwing flaming liquid, and that liquid can pass around corners, through narrow passages, and over barriers, all things you'd find in fortifications. Additionally, the flames would also cause oxygen issues in tightly enclosed areas like caves and bunkers again, which are actually the prime purpose of use in combat against fortifications and rarely against vehicles. It's not about burning/injuring/hurting the infantry, but simply suffocating them in seconds and forcing them to move and break cover or simply faint way before they burned to death.

Of course, there are two issues with flamethrowers. One is that to use them you need to carry the source of fuel around with you meaning you have to basically strap a small bomb's worth of fuel to yourself. And two, since nobody likes burning to death or seeing their friends burn to death, [[rage|'''EVERYBODY HATES YOU!''']] Being a flame thrower operator is like painting a big "shoot me" sign on yourself and even surrendering is likely to have them kill you anyway if they catch you. (On the other hand, flamethrowers were at least not as bad as chemical weapons, the obvious alternative for bunkers and the like.)

More practically, aside from various nations agreeing that being burnt alive is terrible and banning the thing, they're not very useful anymore. Nowadays if you were to find a bunker, you don't send some guys in to clear it by hand, you call in buddies to drop some artillery or air support or even drone strikes on the position. Since the heyday of the flamethrower, these weapons have gotten much, much more accurate.

And then there were flamer [[tank]]s: modified tanks designed to be flamethrowers. Just as with man-portable ones, they were disliked, and the crews were subject to special enemy reprisals if captured. They effectively only existed during WWII, as the need was only noticed during WWII, and said need went away as artillery and air support got good enough that driving in a giant fire hazard was no longer necessary.

So why did we say "Kinda..." up there? Well, while dedicated flamethrower (tanks) are no longer fielded; [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermobaric_weapon thermobaric ammunition] are still being used. They will also set anything close-by on fire and they are still perfectly legal to use against military targets under current international law. Why is that? Well they're in a [[Rules Lawyer|sweet spot]]. A thermobaric weapon is NOT an "incendiary weapon": fire is not their primary means of damage. They create a conventional explosion from liquid fuel. When you set one off you do create a fireball but also a massive shockwave from the explosion, and the collapse of the temporary vacuum that creates is the actual destructive element. [[Grim and dark|This ruptures the lungs of anyone nearby, or burns them, or poisons them if any of the liquid fuel does not fully burn]]. And so, since they're not "Incendiary weapons" but "Bombs with Liquid Explosives", well, [[anal circumference|yeah]]...

There are also valid civilian uses of flamethrowers, most notably for starting control fires (smaller fires intended to stop or prevent larger ones from spreading) and melting snow and ice. This is why some variants are actually sold to the general public (and only regulated as fire hazards). Such commercial flamethrowers typically do not have the range of military ones; a WW2 M2 flamethrower has an effective range of about 20 meters, well in excess of any civilian application.