America's Robot Army 139
Popular Mechanics explores the increasing level of reliance the US military has when it comes to robotic assistance. In the last few years, robot drones have reached an all-new level of sophistication, with several models already deployed in the field. Now, the next generation of robot helpers is nearing the end of its test phase. PM offers up a preview of what we could expect to see in the field within the next five years. "The MULE (Multifunction Utility/Logistics and Equipment) is roughly the size of a Humvee, but it has a trick worthy of monster truck rallies. Each of its six wheels is mounted on an articulated leg, allowing the robot to clamber up obstacles that other cars would simply bump against ... Barely a year old, the prototype is a product of the Army's Unmanned Ground Vehicle program, which began in 2001. It has yet to fire a single bullet or missile, or even be fitted with a weapon. Here at the test track it's loaded down with rucksacks and boxes, two squads' worth of equipment."
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Re:More tanks (Score:5, Insightful)
I highly doubt if that will happen though.
To truly fight guerilla you must fight them like you fight pirates. You take away the economic/political incentive for it to begin with.
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GREAT THING of course if robots dont kill... (Score:1)
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Re:More tanks (Score:4, Funny)
... with Ninjas?
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Just carpet-bomb them with RIAA cease-and-desist lawyer letters until they are bankrupt from lawyers fees, and then confiscate their CD collections if they fail to comply.
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Next time they try to pirate music, we can remotely detonate their PC (kaa boom !!!)
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Without arguing on whether the above "donts" apply to our most recent Iraq invasion, is there — in your opinion — ever a situation, when wrongs committed by a country's government justify invasion aiming at correcting those wrongs?
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They tried. Really hard...
First, he was not a guerrilla — he headed a national militia/army of the United States. He and his soldiers fought in uniform and had allegiance to a state.
Second, the list of grievances, that caused him and others to revolt, is well documented [archives.gov]. Are you aware of the legitimated grievances of the guerrillas we are facing (al-Qaeda,
Bush isn't fighting the war you think he is... (Score:2)
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It helps to treat the civilians with respect once you have liberated them, for example, treating them as human beings, not pointing guns at them and learning some of their language so that you can communicate with them effectively, thus not requiring the gun in all situations.
Re:More tanks (Score:5, Insightful)
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Many long time Slashdot readers remember the days when...they were able to comment on what an intelligent foreign policy would look like... Sadly, those days are gone, as you have just demonstrated.
Please. Those days were never here. We just didn't talk about foreign policy on a tech/nerd website. Whiny hippy peaceniks? Gun toting yahoos? Pretty much all have always been represented here, we just didn't have lamers turning every cool gadget story into a discussion of politics.
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As for your other comments, if you read my post I don't agree with the invasion of Iraq, Afghanistan wasn't smart but might be justifiable.
Also invading germany even though they didn't have anything to do with the bombing of Pearl harbor was a decent decision even though it opened us up to a war on two fronts. pearl Harbor was totally done by japan and Japan alone.
So yes there are times. but those
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Don't have a go at ACs, or Slashdots excellent idea of allowing people to hide behind their posts. Just think about how hard it would be for people to publish information secretly if they had to log in and do it.
Hold on...
Sorry, I've just been told that anyone can create as many accounts as they like on Slashdot, and there's no onus on them to use their real names.
Why does Slashdot allow AC pos
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Also invading germany even though they didn't have anything to do with the bombing of Pearl harbor was a decent decision even though it opened us up to a war on two fronts ...
Invading Germany was not doing a good deed. Better read a bit more, before commenting. Germany declared war on the U.S. after the Japanese attack. Moreover, U.S. shipping was being sunk of the East coast by Germany U. boats, hence, attacking Germany was not an option as you perceive it to be. Lest you forget, Germany was a major military power that intended to attack when they were ready. Hitler committed two major blunders, they attacked the USSR late in the year and they declared war prematurely aga
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The second quotes me, claiming I said the exact opposite of what I did.
Israel gives citizenship based upon belief in Judaism. Furthermore, I don't see how granting citizenship based upon the random chance of being born in a certain place is a better system. It's far less likely to result in a body of citizens with a shared common vision and sense of togetherness. In any case, my point was that 200 years ago (before the nation-state sy
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Sounds really like a tank with no one to get injured in it.
It's pretty much a "more of it"-approach. They want to solve all the problems with more technology. The rational behind it is the wish to reduce one's own side's casualties as far as possible. Although it is a legitimate and very sane goal, the strategy employed, air strikes and cruise missiles, causes a lot of civilian casualties.
An thus, on the long run, this approach prepares the ground for a guerrilla force that has a footing in the country
Re:More tanks (Score:4, Insightful)
You really have no clue what a tank is? Or the difference between a tank and a truck? This is *not* a tank. It is a utility vehicle! The variant currently being shown is design to haul crap around so soldiers don't need to. Of course it does have armed variants that are designed to shoot weapons, keeping soldiers from harm. But, still, it is not heavy armor.
And w.r.t. air strikes, do you realize what the alternative is to our current approach of guided weapons? Yes, carpet bombing. Creates a lot more civilian casualties. Instead of killing civilians who the bad guys are hiding next to, they'll also kill the civilians in the buildings down the street.
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Oh, I can. I just kept the label my parent-poster gave it. AFV (or reconnaissance AFV) would probably the best manned correspondence, but I'm not going to argue about it.You are right, but please see that it was not my point.
> And w.r.t. air strikes, do you realize what the alternative is to our current approach of guided weapons? Yes, carpet bombing.
So, cruise missiles and carpet bombing are the only alternatives you can see? I think, that's what I meant with not getting the problem right. In some
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I will offer that it really takes an external leadership to recruit and organize militants during times of artificial hardship, typically one with their own agenda...
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Of course when it comes to providing assistance in the event of natural disasters, the lack of trained personal will be missed, but it can always be contracted out, the loss of life of due to profits ahead of rapid response, well, tha
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It does? are you sure I think you are confusing a BGM-109 Tomahawk [wikipedia.org] or a AGM-84H/K Harpoon [wikipedia.org] with a AGM-114 Hellfire [wikipedia.org]. The Hellfire is a semi-active homing anti-tank weapon not a cruise missile that is primarily air-launched from army helicopters or occasionaly fron a MQ-1 Predator [wikipedia.org].
If you want to know how they are really used read Michael Yon's Guitar Heroes [michaelyon-online.com] posting.
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To be fair Iran has tanks... Whoops did I say Iran... I meant "possible future liberation targets" have tanks.
But in all seriousness, if the thing has anti-tank missiles on it, its not meant for anti-guerrilla warfare. There are a handful of countries that its intended for. Mostly the ones
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"The MULE (Multifunction Utility/Logistics and Equipment) is roughly the size of a Humvee, but it has a trick worthy of monster truck rallies. Each of its six wheels is mounted on an articulated leg, allowing the robot to clamber up obstacles that other cars would simply bump against.
Sounds like a tank. And haven't retired generals criticized the DoD in the last couple of decades for developing the tank technology we wished that we had in World War II instead of concentrating on anti-guerilla strategy?
Several things to note here. First, the MULE is much more mobile than a tank in an urban environment (the bit about the "articulated legs"). It's much smaller than a tank. For example, it probably weighs about a tenth (when fully loaded) of a main battle tank (which weighs around 40-50 tons), maybe less. It uses wheels rather than treads. And it's not manned. And one of the uses is to carry cargo for a couple of infantry squads. Doesn't sound like a tank to me.
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A Main Battle Tank is characterized by overwhelming offensive power and survivability, which generally translates into big gun, big optics, heavy armor and powerful engine. I am in an armor MOS, incidentally, though I'm not a tanker.
The MULE looks like it complements counter-insurgency measures. A necessity of counter-insurgency is patrolling, and having a robot help haul gear in places where vehicles can't go allows for more extensive patrols.
Personally, (Score:2, Interesting)
And in the meantime, to fight our wars, I think we should send the folks who would benefit from the wars and the arm chair generals who are really quick to send other people's kids over to fight while justifying their haste with the attitude of "well they volunteered
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Here is a reason I (and most people) always find interesting... people who want to kill you because they don't like you. People who want to kill you because your way of life is simply intolerable to them (even though you are over half a planet away). I'm not saying the war is noble or anything like that, because its not. However, I would rather take the fight to the enemy, rather tha
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Another bit of balance to consider is effectiveness. Let's say you start with 100 people who want to kill you because your are heathen Christian who watches Hollywood films with American whores who show their facial skin even whe
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As to "bringing the fight to them," the entire premise of terrorism is it doesn't work
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Um you are away that's real reason we invaded Iraq right? To remake an oil rich country that is in our pocket. Of course it's not going so well, but that's not surprising given the executive's track record. [sprynet.com] I don't think the idea of having close ties to an oil rich country is a bad idea, but I think we when about it completely backwards. We were in
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Hmmm, if I recall correctly, Desert Storm occured in 1991, so the time to "grow that into a lasting friendship" would have been from 1992 onward? Whose fault would that be, exactly?
By that "entire mess" I assume you mean
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Robots? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Robots? (Score:4, Informative)
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Obviously, there are degrees to which we wish to automate our control over our tools, but, we definitely, absolutely, want our robots to be under human control. For example, the robotic arms and turntables in the CMU Robotics Institute when I worked there c. 1983 were, um, meant to be controlled. Also, that control, was meant to originate from humans.
People refer to bionics -- especiall
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Irony of ironies (Score:3, Interesting)
Bring it to consumers (Score:1)
Toss in a fraction of the automated control that they're talking about, and you have the ultimate off-road vehicle and the ride can be as smooth as you want.
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- i would be willing to bet the electronic that would go in to a system would be plenty complicated, n
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with separate electric motors for each wheel then you must have a way to synchronize all the motors to run at the same speed... i would be willing to bet the electronic that would go in to a system would be plenty complicated, not impossible - but not a brainless task either...
Code for that is in most of the better vehicle traction and stability control systems right now. Ordinary cars now have two axes of rate gyro, steering wheel sensors, wheel encoders, and computer-controlled individual wheel brak
Over-reliance on tech (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Over-reliance on tech (Score:5, Funny)
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This is has been the case since the first primate picked up a rock to bash in his neighbors head. It will likely be the case until the last primate is dead and gone. I would guess that it is harder to hijack a radio controlled device than it is to hijack a knife or gun.
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I remember reading something online about the specs being requested by the military on one of these UAV aircraft before. One of the criteria being investigated is how well its stands up to an EMP attack or something natural like a lightning strike. The more worrying one was the spec requesting how well it stood up to a nuclear attack.
In that regard, the militar
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However in response to your post, many (not all) military vehicles are hardened to some degree to EMP.
Also, at Paxtuxent River MD the capacitors that are used to generate an EMP (used to test Navy aircraft in this regard) are the size of a semi trailer. This is just the capacitors (i have laid eyes on them) - and the generated EMP is tiny.
A feasable EMP generator is known as an atomic bomb - but use one of those again
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Wah, wah, wah....
Well than we just send in a flight of 10 unmanned UAV's loaded with hellfires and airdrop a squad of 20 battle bots to seek out the EMP device; which was easily detected by the Air Forces satellites in the area or radar. EMP can't go off all day long and we have reinforcements. All of this is ready to launch from the base or on the carrier hundreds of miles away, hell they already might have a manned/un-manned B-52 loaded with all those things in
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What good are bridges that can be taken down with a few pounds of explosive?
What good are airplanes that can taken down with a rocket?
What good is trying if someone can just spoil things?
Electronic devices have unique weaknesses just like other kinds of hardware (and wetware). I think a good rebuttal to your question would be that the benefits of electronic equipment far, far outweigh the remote chances of some kind of catastrophic EMP (not going
They should consider low tech options. (Score:5, Insightful)
All of it to be ultimately undone by a hundred dollars worth of high explosive, some household shrapnel and a triggering device operated by a guy living a cave who MAY have spent a total of three weeks at the local militant training camp.
We are living in the age of guerilla warfare. It's no longer about the size of your Deathstar. Its about how many plucky farm kids you can convince to join the cause.
I guess there new moto could be "Army of 00000001"
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So I guess it's worth the money.
Re:They should consider low tech options. (Score:5, Insightful)
When we hear news reports of raids on insurgent strongholds by our forces you often hear about how 10s, 100s were killed compared to maybe 2 or 3 allied soldiers. It's the very fact we have high tech. weaponry that allows this, be it simple things such as night vision to full on portable video link ups with drones above the battlefield - the fact is high tech. weaponry is saving the lives of our soldiers.
Similarly, I understand that an expensive roboting land vehicle like this could be blown apart but if it can traverse more difficult terrain than your average hummer can then surely that allows us to transport things off standard roadways and across tougher terrain hence avoiding the sides of the road where IEDs are often hidden? Surely the best defense against a trap is to be able to not walk into it in the first place?
There's a lot to be said for the point you make - that we mustn't start using technology in warzones for the sake of it. Used well however it can and already is making our forces a lot better off than they ever have been previously. Whilst 4,000 odd US soldiers may have died in Iraq to insurgents, that figure is dwarfed by the number of insurgents that have died to high tech. weaponry in US hands.
One final point is that Iraq and Afghanistan are fairly different in terms of weaponry and tactics used, the typical IED made by a taliban tribesman living in the mountains isn't going to do an awful lot to an MBT, but as soon as you go to Iraq where you have insurgents potentially armed by the Iranians using charges shaped specifically to penetrate tank armour it's a different story. The insurgents the US is dealing with in Iraq aren't the same insurgents you describe in your post (i.e. next to no training and only using cheap weaponry) that are more commonly found in Afghanistan. Many insurgents in Iraq have been given vast amounts of training and are aquiring some pretty expensive weaponry themselves. The problem is now that some of the tactics in Iraq are spilling over into Afghanistan.
Technology does matter in the warzone when it comes to saving soldiers lives, sure a multi-million dollar MULE may get blown to pieces, but I'd rather see that than a patrol of actual humans suffer the same fate.
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You've pretty much nailed the weakness of IEDs: they can very effectively cover a linear route, but are far less effective against an area.
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While some of the parts for an explosively formed penetrator [wikipedia.org] can be machined in Iraq, critical devices and explosives used in some of their Iraqi incarnations originate unmistakably from Iran. It's rather unfortunate that this administration has pissed away its own credibility, to the point where actual evidence (as in not made up
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The question is how long, and can the general public ever been convinced to accept that if we're to win it's going to require a whole lot more US sons and daughters to die also?
The best options were passed up - that of either not going into Iraq at all or that of keeping Saddam or at least his military in power to maintain stab
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...yeah, that's what the world needs... (Score:1, Troll)
Good one, America. Nice to see those sessions with the shrink are working.
What are the chances (Score:3, Interesting)
Enjoy the music of the game here [youtube.com]. Ah, nostalgia...
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I'm thinking they didn't come up with that acronym by coincidence.
If course, when I saw the pictures my impression immediately changed from M.U.L.E. to "Rise of the Machines".
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Here is the Atari 800 version [youtube.com]
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That'll get you the answer you want. Heh.
It's all fun and games now (Score:2)
But what happens when one of these things goes off the reservation and kills innocents? Or a UAV collides with an airliner. Or suppose some clever hacker figures out how to take control of our drones and uses them to bomb us. Is that an act of war even though it was our weapon system?
There's a real danger in relying too much on gadget war fighting devices, even one as simple as a pack mule. It starts out as a luxury and pretty soon no squad can't operate without one. You give them capacity, they'll f
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It's a good thing that NEVER happens with trusty humans at the wheel...
A duck can take down an airplane. Let's not get too wound up about rogue UAVs being the coming apocalypse quite yet.
-b
To save everyone some time... (Score:1)
Our Future (Score:2, Insightful)
Commandant: The wars of the future will not be fought on the battlefield or at sea. They will be fought in space, or possibly on top of a very tall mountain. In either case, most of the actual fighting will be done by small robots. And as you go forth today remember always your duty is clear: To build and maintain those robots. Thank you.
An answer to the article (Score:2)
Are Unmanned Fighters Ready for Combat?
Yes sir. Since the 40's [wikipedia.org]
In America's army, the old is new again ! The tech to make drones has been available since more than half a century, it just took that long for US officials to realize that it could be a good idea.
Wake me up when they plan deploying autonomous vehicles. Yes, we have the tech [wikipedia.org] for these also.
This is nothing new... (Score:2)
http://atarimule.neotechgaming.com/ [neotechgaming.com]
For more details:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M.U.L.E [wikipedia.org].
Mod parent up! (Score:2)
I was a huge fan of the C64 version, and honestly, I think that better computer games are very rare - MULE was just brilliant, and far, far ahead of its time.
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Damn, I lost a whole round of Crystite production!
What?? "Fire in the Store"?! NOOO!!!
Robots, Crimes and Rule of Law (Score:1)
Old News (Score:1)
Case against battlefield TDD ping-pong? (Score:1)
Weight: 235 lb.
Speed: 7 mph
Weapons: M240B medium machine gun
Notable feature: Programmable no-fire zones to prevent fratricide.
Butch: Hurry up! We're taking heavy fire.
Andy: Hold on we're still writing our test cases.
Paul: No, Andy, that code protects soldiers on both the left and right sides. My test case only requires you to protect the left side. You're clearly gold plating.
The Taser Problem/Risk Homeostasis (Score:1)
But from the standpoint of what's good for the world, I don't think this is. We see the same thing over and over again as we reduce the lethality of certain acts. Now that tasers are widespread, police are using them on people that ju
The Terminator (Score:1)
X-box remote controller (Score:2)
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a tele-presence robot being pelted by rocks is less likely to use deadly force to defend it's life than a frustrated, exhausted and injured human being.