Slashdot Mirror
Military Robots from 2007 to 2032
Roland Piquepaille writes "A new report from the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) looks at the future of the military's unmanned systems over the next 25 years. This 188-page report covers air-, land- and sea-based unmanned technology from 2007 to 2032. The long document notes that drone aircraft and ground-based robots have already proved they could be useful in Iraq and Afghanistan by saving soldiers' lives. The report also integrates contributions of combat commanders pointing out possible improvements to today's systems, such as 'better sensor technology for use on unmanned systems to identify underwater mines and land-based improvised explosive devices.' This report also looks at how developments in artificial intelligence and robotics might lead to 'autonomous, 'thinking' unmanned systems that could, for example, be used in aerial platforms to suppress enemy air defenses.'"
We all know that armed, autonomous military robots are a bad idea. It is a sign of the apocalypse.
What's worse is that current military brass take a move toward autonomy as a given
Worse still is the trend of law enforcement paralleling the military's psychotic view of population control and 'providing security'. It's no secret, police departments of major cities use UAV's for traditional law enforcement applications (murders, theft, drugs, etc). Most urban warfare device manufacturers treat law enforcement as a secondary market when designing new weapons. Just look at how Blackwater is bidding on domestic law enforcement contracts if you need further proof.
Before I start bashing Neo-cons I just have to express my amazement that the move towards a command/control/surveillance society is progressing at such a startling rate. There are always the doom and gloom futurists and their opponents who call them 'chicken little's', but what has to happen before the skeptics realize that the US and world at large really ARE heading for some sort of dystopian future as imagined in so many sci-fi movies?
It really is only a matter of time until some cheesey neo-con governor uses public panic from a horrific crime (Michael Devlin, Jon Bennet Ramsey, Columbine, etc) to justify some really scary law enforcement policies in the name of 'being tough on crime'...and the kind of thinking in TFA sets the table for that to happen.
Neo-cons are ruining America...tell your friends
Thank you Dave Raggett
DoD is all about buzzword bingo. Think of it as being run by PHBs who can kill a man a dozen different ways.
Once we manage to replace meat machines with metal and silicon ones, it'll be great.
Robotic soldiers will go and kill whoever you tell them to kill, terrorists or American citizens.
They'll never snitch about the crimes they commit.
They don't create flag-draped caskets or teary funerals.
There will never be a memorial for the unknown killbot.
The warmongers won't have to justify sending our finest men and women to go die.
No more recruiting shortages.
No complaints from robots about having not seen their families in 3 years.
No more field medics, or wounded, or veteran's administration.
The promise of war being a nasty, ugly, fucking horrible affair is the best way to prevent it.
When thinking about projects such as this, and comparing them to the ruthless and efficient way a few motivated individuals were able to bring
down a symbol of American might with a handful of box-cutters and some cheap flying lessons on 09/11, I think that it is starting to become
abundantely clear that this nation might very well be in the process of losing its collective bearings, by refusing to do the obvious, such as old-fashioned
intelligence gathering from people in the field, multiple secure contacts and authoritative sources, (which could have avoided the faulty intel about Iraq)
and the likes, which are set to cost us in excess of a bleeping TRILLION $ that could arguably have instead been spent on much more pressing issues,
besides repeatedly bombing some sand dunes, many rocks and a few camels.
Rather than settings our priorities on high-fallutin' technology items that will more than likely prove to be flawed, hard to control and guaranteed to cause
many innocents to lose their lives, (good old 'collateral damage') not to say anything of the possibility of an AI takeover making our worst nightmare scenarios
become true, one would think that we should invest far more of our resources in what is proven to prevent and anticipate conflicts with greater certainty.
Like for example not acting like arrogant saber-rattling a**holes on a divine mission to bring order to the rest of the planet? Or making sure that we can bring
containment and methods to prevent hostilities to new, greater levels of efficiency.
It is disconcerting to see such a drive to have our tax $ being spent on projects that do not appear to have any other purpose but that of de-humanizing all of
these situations, just because they look great on paper to some administration bureaucrats trying at all cost to minimize the human casualties to their own
armed forces, which in recent times has historically always been the factor that drives otherwise-brainwashed public opinion against US war campaigns.
When seeing how Diebold has handled e-voting, or even many other comparable government-funded IT projects, we should never forget that this childish
fascination with high-technology could possibly blind us to much in future conflicts.
All of this high-tech circus will - as always - be ultimately brought down by cunning, resourceful fighting by people motivated to do so.
I am not one for conspiracy theories, but I am REALLY not liking the turn of recent events. It points to very bleak possibilities I'd rather not even contemplate.
Z.