Slashdot Mirror
New and Improved - SmarTruck II
jmoriarty writes "The Army's next generation SmarTruck is on display in Detroit. The original version of the SmarTruck was covered back in May, but the Army now admits that version was 'hardly ready for the real world'. Apparently the real world version needed interchangable nodules, and the absolute must-have for every Slashdotter's vehicle - a 'hacker in a box'."
but can bill murray drive it back from eastern europe?
...or is the military run by 7-year-old boys? In third grade, I too would have been very excited about a truck with missile launchers and a huge artillery system termed "Crusader".
Don't even get me started on the names of operations. "Infinite Justice", anybody? It sounds like something out of the Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers.
This is deceptively like taking a standard flatbed truck, with no fancy cab interior, providing an easy way to link the cab to the bed (oh, like say a data and power cable or 2), then tossing on/in any old modular box for the mission...
Humm, didn't we do this with the HEMTT series? The MTV series, hell even the old 2.5 ton series (complete with "modular" 5 ton wrecker for mobility to/from the motorpool), the list goes on.
Oh, just noticed from the article, they cost more. Wow, some innovation.
Eve Fairbanks says I drive a hybrid!LOL
Over-exposed schoolgirl victim of high-tech bullying
Apparently the real world version needed interchangable nodules, and the absolute must-have for every Slashdotter's vehicle - a 'hacker in a box'."
I suppose this gives new meaning to the term "wardriving."
Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball(TM)
. . .but a news conference featuring a marching color guard and a military band playing patriotic songs such as "God Bless America" to introduce a truck seems straight outta the Simpsons. Like an inanimate carbon rod getting a medal from the president or something.
Insert a chemical or biological agent of your choice into a base substance of similar consitency and you have yourself a bringer of mass death on wheels.
The pepper spray bit in the article is just to make you feel Warm And Fuzzy because you know how much They Care.
No, Beowulf clusters can't imagine in Soviet Russia.
I mean, it is obvious this thing wasn't really intended for a desert. I mean, the hacker in a box thing, and all the modifications to fight off crowds. We already had one story recently about drones being used over US air, and we all know about Tempest and Carnivore. I think it is clear that this thing is designed to either operate in America or other countries similarly structured, not against any target the administration is likely to publicly attack (i.e. 'heathen desert living primitive terrorist types').
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Crudely Drawn Games
To me this just seems up there with the color coding terror warning system; something to make it look like the people in charge are making us safer but without any real effect.
What role would this truck ever really play in the army? It seems to me that the curent Humvee is probably modular enough to perform any of the tasks that the SmarTruck is designed for.
Oh well, who really expects common sense from the government, if it's for the army of course its a good idea.
Sounds and looks like designers having fun with themselves. Lines like 'we wanted to make something which would make people know that we mean business' lead me to believe that this is not a deployable vehicle. Even if it was, why use a commercial pick-up platform? The military has several wheeled, all-terrain platforms that are suitable to this job (armored personel carriers spring to mind).
So, I at least think that its just more standard auto-show fluff.
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Phil
Look, it's got some nice bells and whistles, but hand me an RPG or drive this over a mine and all it'll be good for in the future is roasting marshmallows. Wouldn't it make a hell of a lot more sense to mount this sort of electronic warfare gear onto Humvees or (better yet) APCs? Which vehicle would you rather have when even the Somali militia opens up on you, much less anyone with training?
The general quoted in the interview acknowledged that there was no mission in mind for the first generation SmarTruck. Well, that's the mission for this thing? A next-gen friendly casualty generator?
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
Um yeah... pepper spray is useful, but I can't see it being used in many military situations when a fully-automatic gets the job better and has much more range. Unless they're going for disabling the enemy instead of mortally wounding, but even in that case there are probably things much better than pepper spray, especially considering range.
Non leathal weapons have some neet capabilites: you don't have to worry about firendly-fire. Just zap them all and sort them out at your leasure.
If someone looks suspicious - zap them first and ask questions later. No need to be coy, zap away!
Imagine this: A crowd of anti-american protesters starts protesting when we occupy France. With curent technology, you can do much if you don't want to be a murdurer. With with non-lethal weapons you could zap the whole crowd and process them one at a time - seperating common citiziens from the truly nasty McDonalds/Nike/Hollywood hating French terrorists.
Moneyed corporations, non-working 'poor' and criminal prisoners are turning productive citizens into tax-slaves.
Hmm, reminds me of a story I heard regarding the much-maligned SA80 rifle over here in the UK.. apparently top brass invited over Mr Kalashnikov one day (designer of AK47 fame). Mr K. had a good look at the SA80 and turned to the generals and said "You must have really clever soldiers".
SmarTruckII could just sit and listen, send bogus e-mails to confuse an enemy, or, if it is not amused, kill the enemy communications system altogether.
The US military has discovered the destructive power of Slashdotting. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
Where does the school board find them and why do they keep sending them to ME?
One of the big issues facing the U.S. military is it doesn't have a clue where the next battle will be. Three years ago would anybody have predicted that we would go to war in Afghanistan? Consequently, the military has to have a capability to fight anywhere, and certainly having a capability to fight in an urban environment makes sense. And for those following the news, the military's big concern in Iraq is not desert fighting, but urban warfare. Why do you think the Marines and the Army have been training heavily in their urban warfare training centers. I'm not saying the military should buy this thing, but I am glad that they're thinking about what to do and how to do it. The alternative being, "if something happens, I sure hope we have the right weapons..."
i'll try not to be a troll here, i'm really trying.
umm what the fuck? we went from a $500 40 hp, 4wd jeep that seemed to do a pretty damn good job of transporting 4 humans up a 40 degree incline with no problem. they are inherently simple, and weigh nothing. with today's design/production technology, they'd weigh less and cary more, and probably be stackable.
enter the 1980's. we get $100,000 hummers. they hold exactly the same number of people, don't accelerate any faster, and aren't any better at navigating the offroad. they also weigh two tons.
i like the idea of mass producing an F-250/350 for certian needs, like a portable rocket launcher, but you do not need 6-10 wheeled F-550's that cost 100,000 a piece. there's no reason the truck needs more than 200 hp, and there's no reason why you can't use slightly beefed up suspension parts for this sort of job out of the ford/chevy/dodge parts box to cut prices down to the 12,000-20,000 price range. i can understand the price inflating with a bed-mounted rocket launcher, but the initial cost of the chassis is unbelivably absurd. what ever happened tt back to basics?
moox. for a new generation.
The prototype vehicle cost between $500,000 and $1 million, Fuller said, although she said it is tough to estimate precisely because it involved partnerships with several firms.
The military said it has no plans to produce the truck any time soon, although Bran Ferren, a designer of SmarTruck II, said that if an order came through it could be put in production in a year.
As I read it, after Sept. 11 some military command folks said--wow, that changes a lot.
They concluded the military might need some new ideas for lightweight vehicles and told some researches to play around with what they could come up with.
This isn't going to the battlefield--it's a prototype of a number of new ideas. And if one of those ideas can save an American soldiers life it's well worth it in U.S. Military (as well as Political) economics.
Soldiers are expensive to train (and thus lose) and its even more expensive to explain their death to the public.
So close and yet so far from the world's perfect ID number
..hate to be a spoilsport but a huge amount of the latest military training and equipment developed and deployed is intended for domestic use. This is an involved topic not readily addressed in a few posts, but doing some research it becomes *fairly* apparent.
Part of my own personal research is talking to active or retired or semi recently quit members of various US "forces". I have heard some rather disturbing *things* along these lines. Very disturbing. Here's one just at random, a lot of training now revolves around indoctrination that US civilians have no constitutional "right" to bear arms. Another is training for manning roadblocks and for doing house to house searches in regards firearms confiscation.
The model states health emergency act is an eye opener as well. You can see/guess what's coming and it ain't nice. Forced... everything. Reading on "less than lethal" weaponry you can find out more, microwave beam weapons, sonic weapons, various gasses, etc, all designed for mass riot control, and to deflect any immediate criticism that it's only for "foreigners" overseas someplace in some war, these weapons are being provided to US police forces as well. Another clue is the intense militarization of US police forces, emphasizing military styled training and hiring ex military personnel over traditional policing and maintaining that police are civilians. Nowadays police refer to non police as "civilians", noting therefore they are "not". It's a mindset and series of occurrences that should be setting off a lot of alarm bells in people's minds now.
It's also a big clue why the army has started on adopting a lot more wheeled armor over tracked, much easier to use in cities and on roads. Yes, easier to transport as well, but still...
From my experience, HMMWVs rock. I've driven over everything with them, including small trees and boulders. Four-wheel independent suspension and eight-feet wide, baby.
They take a licking and keep on ticking. I've never had a problem with them -- oh yeah, but that's also because we take care of them.
It's honestly really too bad that the people you were around weren't doing their jobs. Don't fault the vehicle for the operator's negligence. The HMMWV is an amazing and versatile vehicle.
The Army people now days don't know anything.
I gotta believe this is nothing more than a troll... you obviously don't know what you're talking about.
But I'll save my breath.
Please, do.
"Truth is not decided by majority vote" consensus gentium -- Norman Geisler