What would the U.S.'s response be if the Chinese fielded something laser based, something beyond inhumane that takes out the eyes of a whole battlefield enemy soldiers? At some point some country is going to field something horrific that leverages today's technology, and other countries will have to follow suit lest they stand zero chance on the battle field. Maybe at that point battle will be forced to become battle between competing swarms of autonomous drones because it'd too horrific to put people out there. I can envision the days of small kinetic weapons waning.