Korea To Build Front-line Combat Robot

christchurch wrote to mention the story of a plucky Korean robot that has been built for combat. From the article: "According to design blueprints released during a meeting of science-related ministers, the robot will have six or eight extendable legs with wheels allowing it to move like an insect over uneven terrain. The robot will be armed with various weapons and will operate both by remote control and its own artificial intelligence system"

Comments

Constantly hearing about combat-bots

[aussie_a]

We're constantly hearing about combat robots, but are any in use? The only ones I know of being in use are reconnaisance robots (of numerous types) and bomb-defusing robots.

Are there any bots out there that are designed to shoot people? I'm constantly hearing about designs for them, but I've never heard of them being put to use.

Re:Constantly hearing about combat-bots

[slashdotnickname]

Are there any bots out there that are designed to shoot people?
Yes, my aimbot is capable of clearing out a room of them.

Re:Constantly hearing about combat-bots

[jkuff]

There are many Military Robots that have been actively used in the past. Most of them are drones for mapping or reconnaissance. Note that the Ottawa Treaty of 1999 forbids the production of armed autonomous robots, but South Korea obviously refused to sign the treaty (as did China, Russia, the US, and about 40 others).

The US has used the PackBot in combat situations, but I believe it has never had munitions mounted on it. It looks like iRobot's vacuum cleaning and navigation technology in the Roomba can be reused to "sweep" for land mines in a minefield.

Re:Constantly hearing about combat-bots

[globalar]

Well, we can certainly mount guns on things and shoot remotely. The current, long-developing trend in military warfare is towards smaller, versatile units that are hard to pin down but are extremely coordinated. Hive-like would be a wet-dream, but I'm sure beaurocrat is having such a dream as we speak. Bottom line, robots don't yet play into this dream. They are really only good as disposable long-range swiss-army knives. This will improve over time, of course. And as you read, the border patrol part is a focus as well.

This particular focus from SK seems to be a politically-pushed idea. Perhaps similar to the U.S. Star Wars idea in the 1980's (i.e. makes people happy, makes some contractors rich). North Korea weighs heavily on SK citizen's minds, partly because they hear so much crazy, horrible stuff about what happens in the country. Remember there is a huge infrantry deployment (for U.S. particularly) along the North Korean border, so any press about being able to one day replace these forces with robots is good press (who will hopefully just be sentrys really, because no one south of the meridian wants war).

Also, the South Koreans are fairly keen on technology in general, similar to the Japanese. Like all of us, they love to find excuses to play with robots and grant government contracts. The SK government has invested heavily in certain industries in the past and now the market seems to be sensing the technological shift. Yesterday (way back) the hot things were conventional transport like shipbuilding. Today its robots. So the story goes, if you can get a copy of the student roster at MIT, you can find out just what the South Koreans want to become leaders in. Though, I would add a few Japanese and Chinese schools to the list now as well.

Re:Constantly hearing about combat-bots

[TitanBL]

There are a few in use currently in Iraq. There is the Talon which can fire many different weapons (M249, .50 cal, M4A1, M24, etc). They are very accurate, more accurate than any soldier. Every EOD team seems to have one of these which they use to detonate IEDs.

UAVs are everywhere and are common place in almost all operations. There is the Predator, which when armed with the hellfire missile system can be very leathal and the little Raven which can be utilized at the squad level. The new Viper Strike bombs, which are starting to be depoyed on UAVs, are very usefull in urban situations where you need to take out the enemy without harming innocents in say, the next room. This is a big development because the "insurgents" like to take shelter in mosques, schools, and hospitals, etc. The new Hardstop bombs help in this situation as well (but I do not think they are carried by UAVs). Anyways, here is an exellent video/story which mixes captured enemy video with the video from the UAV which nails them. I love UAVs.

I'll be baac

[AdityaG]

Now we just wait for the naked guys to drop outta the sky...

Minor clarification

[dtfinch]

South Korea To Build Front-line Combat Robot.

Some people think "North" when they hear about Korean military stuff.

Re:Minor clarification

[richdun]

Some people think "North" when they hear about Korean military stuff.

Of course, if the past Olympics, Asian Games, and other efforts are any indication, many Koreans are trying to disregard the directions altogether - most refer to the country as "Korea," no bloody North, South, C, or D.

"blueprints"

[Capt'n Hector]

haha those "blueprints" are from lightwave, aren't they? In that case, I have blueprints for several deep-space capital ships, a few space fighters, and a couple of plasma guns.

Yes

[Solr_Flare]

Yes, the USA, if I recall properly, has variations of their spy drone planes that are equipped with missle launchers. Likewise, there was an article a few months back about the US getting ready to deploy a heavily armed remote control tank-bot for "testing" in Iraq.

But, to date we have not yet equipped, to public knowledge, a robot with weaponry that is not purely remote controlled. Armed AI robots make people nervous, and for a variety of good reasons given our state of "AI".

Of course, we aren't talking a Skynet situation here(although some day that will likely be technically possible). Its more like not wanting a blue screen of death to literally kill you.

Re:Yes

[saskboy]

A robot doesn't have to have legs, or lack wings. Saying a robot can't have wings is robot discrimination, and is a violation of the Robot-Human treaty of 2001. Prepare to have your service line discontinued, to be in compliance.

Fragging nerds

[aussie_a]

You put a gun in an overweight nerds hand and shove him onto the battlefield and he's going to get killed very quickly. You put him behind the remote controls for one of these babies, and you'll have a lean-mean killing machine. Will nerds be the nest people to be drafted by the government? After all, all of those years training in Quake and Doom should make them experts wielding these babies.

I can see it now, Korea is at war with someone else using these on the battlefield. Kim and his friends want a LAN party, so they PAY the military to for an hours worth of time renting out 5 of these. They get behind their computers, and are suddenly transported to a battlefield and they go for it. Just make sure it's programmed so that the thing can't shoot allies (perhaps the allies emit a beacon) and the kids can go for their life, trying to frag as many people as they can. It'll be all the rage!

Welcome to 21st century

[ingo23]

It's all much simpler.

1. A robot must bring profit.

Re:Ethics and such...

[Samedi1971]

Who's to be reponsible if one of these malfunctions and kills a bus full of school children? The programmer? The tech operating it? The government? The manufaturer? The military? Noone?

The scapegoat, of course.

Re:has to be said.

[Sugar Moose]

I've noticed a lot of people welcoming pretty much anything as an overlord. In fact, there's so many, it's as if they're taking over Slashdot.

And may I be the first to welcome our new "welcomes everything as a new overlord" overlords. May your reign be long and prosper--aw, crap, it's over.

They already welcomed someone else as our new overlords.

Re:What about the Asimov rules?

[Manchot]

Three things: First of all, Asimov lived half a century ago, not half a decade ago. Secondly, he can hardly be called "the father of robotics." He neither conceived the idea of a robot nor built any. Since none of the technology came about as a direct result of him, saying that he is the father of the field does a disservice to those who actually pioneered it. Finally, the three rules of robotics were never meant to be guidelines for people to follow. They are essentially MacGuffins, used only to advance the plot of the stories.

Re:has to be said.

[NanoGator]

"has to be said."

Why? Does the one millionth copycat get a free iPod or something?

Not to worry...

[20th Century Boy]

As North Korea already has their own robotic countermeasures.

One step closer

[MacFury]

Commander: Solider! Kill that mother and small child!
Solider: No sir! I will not kill an innocent civilian
Commander: KillBot5000! Kill that mother and small child!
KillBot5000 Would you like me to toture them first?

I certainly can't wait!

Re:What about the Asimov rules?

[SkyFire360]

He neither conceived the idea of a robot nor built any.

False. From UTexas RRR (and many of the "forward" parts of his books):

The word 'robotics' was first used in Runaround, a short story published in 1942, by Isaac Asimov (born Jan. 2, 1920, died Apr. 6, 1992). I, Robot, a collection of several of these stories, was published in 1950.

...

In 1942, John P. Eckert, John W. Mauchly (left), and their associates at the Moore school of Electrical Engineering of University of Pennsylvania decided to build a high - speed electronic computer to do the job. This machine became known as ENIAC (Electrical Numerical Integrator And Calculator)
Courtesy http://www.softlord.com/comp/

He was a visionary, seeing events that would come about nearly half a century later. Computers were in their infancy; nothing more than a novelty that would barely fir into a room, much less a human-sized head... Building one was quite out of the question.

Those things have heads!

[Godwin O'Hitler]

Why would they build a battle robot with a head? To make it look more intimidating?

Why not fit a tail too. Is there any reason a robot should be directional at all?

The idea of armies of battle robots fighting each other all seems a bit burlesque to me. Can you imagine Robots vs Robots in a "take that hill" scenario. Who's going to surrender if there are only robots out there - and surrender what? Their sensors?