Armed Robots Not Actually Gone From Iraq

NightFalcon90909 writes "You may have heard that armed robots were yanked from Iraq after a gun started to swivel without it being told to do so. 'A recent news report that armed robots had been pulled out of Iraq is mistaken, according to the company that makes the robot [Foster-Miller] and the Army program manager. 'The whole thing is an urban legend,' says Foster Miller spokesperson Cynthia Black, of the reports about SWORDS moving its gun without a command.'"

Someone who works on robot sensors

[usul294]

I'm an engineer for a company that writes some of the signal analysis for robots, mostly military. They are designed to look for people, noise, or something easily sensible and train their guns on that location and await further instruction. Its a de facto law for military robot design that a human makes every firing decision, but the robot is allowed to aim and ask if it can fire. If a US soldier did something loud (shoot a gun, slam a door, yell) theres a good chance thats what set off the targeting routine. There was never any chance of a weapon being fired, except of course if there was a malicious operator. I have not worked on this type of robot, so I can't be sure of the process. There might be a user command that says "go look for target". If the robot looked for a target without ever being commanded that'd be a pretty horrendous software error.

Do the words "Aegis Class Cruiser" ring any bells?

[mmell]

During initial testing, the automated vessel identified Catalina Island as a fast moving object and proceeded to lock her guns on her escort vessel (which was nowhere near Catalina at the time). The system (NT 4.0 based, IIRC) had to be shut down, as there was no manual override and the Navy didn't feel like burying that many seamen at sea.

After which (with engines and navigation offline) she had to be towed back to port.

Y'know, after those problems were addressed, the Aegis-class cruiser entered service and is still a very effective platform for the US Navy. Not that I think it wise of us to arm automated robots, but from the military perspective this is only a minor setback.

Re:Do the words "Aegis Class Cruiser" ring any bel

[bcdm]

Y'know, after those problems were addressed, the Aegis-class cruiser entered service...

For which the passengers of Iran Air Flight 655 [wikipedia.org] are eternally grateful.

Re:No autonomous but....

[SwordsmanLuke]

Disclaimer: I haven't worked on SWORD robots, but I have worked with the TALON on which the SWORDS are based.

The sort of scenario you describe is prevented with a heartbeat based killswitch. E.g. a signal is sent to the robot at a regular interval. If, for some reason, the heartbeat is not received, the robot immediately shuts down and stops moving. So, as you said, the robot "stops cold any time the transmission is having a hiccup." It can be a pain sometimes, but it's hell of a lot better than the alternative.

In the same way, dangerous commands (such as "shoot gun") require the robot to receive said command constantly in order to continue that action. So a robot being commanded to turn and fire just before losing comms would at worst, just turn, and typically do nothing.

Also: +1 Ironic Sig.

Re:It's Inevitable

[SwordsmanLuke]

I work for a robotics company and (among other things) have worked on modifying a TALON (on which these SWORD robots are based) to work with our control software.

if the bit that makes it swivel engages without being told, what on Earth makes you so confident that the bit that makes it shoot will not engage without it being told?

To answer your question, not a damn thing. The TALON I worked with was really flaky. It shook and twitched so frequently the guys who owned the TALON referred to the bot has having the "Foster-Miller shakes."

I hope the SWORD bots are much better quality than the TALON bot, because, quite frankly, there is no fraking way I'd trust one of those things with a gun.

Re:Hey, its the ED 209

[sm62704]

Um, the guy it's aimed at?

Is this a trick question?

Re:Do the words "Aegis Class Cruiser" ring any bel

[hcdejong]

Sounds fishy to me.
None of the ships involved in the initial Aegis tests can be described as "automated vessels". The initial radar tests were aboard USS Norton Sound, later tests would have been on USS Ticonderoga. Neither use Windows NT, and in neither ship was/is the Aegis system connected to the propulsion or navigation. Pulling the plug to the point where the ship was dead in the water wouldn't have been necessary on either.

Also, there is no "Aegis Class Cruiser". The Ticonderoga class cruisers use the Aegis combat system, but so do several other ship classes (Arleigh Burke, some Japanese and Spanish ships as well).

There was an incident where an experimental Windows-based ship management system (again, separate from the combat system) caused a Ticonderoga-class ship to lose propulsion.

Re:The Government Said So...

[alan_dershowitz]

This isn't rocket science, an illegal combatant is any combatant that does not conform to set Geneva Convention requirements for a LEGAL combatant. The Geneva Conventions specify the requirements for LAWFUL REGULAR forces. If you do not conform to this definition, you are by implication an "unlawful", ILLEGAL or irregular combatant. It's the inverse of a defined LEGAL combatant. Stop perpetuating this dumb semantic argument. If you want to take it up with the Bush Administration, it's really easy to do, because they are liars and only quote the Conventions where it's convenient and omit arguments that contradict their interpretation. For example, when referring to illegal combatants, they conspicuously do not mention the following:

4. A combatant who falls into the power of an adverse Party while failing to meet the requirements set forth in the second sentence of paragraph 3 shall forfeit his right to be a prisoner of war, but he shall, nevertheless, be given protections equivalent in all respects to those accorded to prisoners of war by the Third Convention and by this Protocol. This protection includes protections equivalent to those accorded to prisoners of war by the Third Convention in the case where such a person is tried and punished for any offences he has committed.

In other words, the part that says illegal combatants STILL HAVE RIGHTS, and the right to a trial is explicitly mentioned.

Re:Hey, its the ED 209

[Marcion]

I think it is a quote from Robocop, referring to Dick Jones' speech

"I had a guaranteed military sale with ED-209. Renovation program. Spare parts for the next decade. Who cares if it worked or not?"

Re:Never Say Never

[supermank17]

Wasn't that malfunction not actually a problem with the robotic aspect of the weapon, but mechanical though? According to this article http://technology.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn12812&feedId=online-news_rss20 [newscientist.com], it looks like a shell exploded in the breach, causing an uncontrollable chain fire. Not a problem with the robotics.

Re:Never Say Never

[indiechild]

That's a case of an automated gun system malfunctioning, like supermank17 said it was due to a mechanical rather than a computer/robotics problem.

And the gun didn't automatically reload, that's why it stopped firing after the 2x250 rounds.

I'm guessing the malfunction might have resulted in a "runaway" gun which is sometimes seen in some small arms such as the M249 SAW -- if you hold down the trigger long enough the gun will sometimes keep firing all on its own (even if you let go) until the magazine is exhausted.

The problem is usually caused by bad gun design.

Re:The Government Said So...

[qbast]

What a nice world you live in. See http://action.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/102405/3235.pdf [aclu.org] - scan of official autopsy report. The victim was Iraqi soldier, not 'unlawful combatant'. Did they read him Geneva convention? No, just hanged from doorframe and beaten to death. So much for US military behaving as civilized people. By the way who are 'they' that killed civilians 9/11? Iraqi soldiers are just any convenient target?