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US Military Using $600K 'Drone Buggies' To Patrol Camps In Africa (cnbc.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from CNBC: The U.S. military is using an unmanned robotic vehicle to patrol around its camps in the Horn of Africa. The remote controlled vehicle is the result of a 30-year plan after military chiefs approved the concept of a robotic security system in 1985. Now the Mobile Detection Assessment and Response System, known as MDARS, are carrying out patrols in the east African country of Djibouti, under the control of the Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa. The area is known as home to a number of hostile militant groups including the al-Qaeda-affiliated al-Shabaab. An operator sits in a remote location away from the vehicle watching the terrain via a camera link which is fixed to the chassis. U.S. military software engineer Joshua Kordanai said in a video presentation that the vehicle drives itself, freeing the remote operator to monitor video. "The vehicle has an intruder detection payload, consisting of radar, a night vision camera, a PTZ [pan-tilt-zoom] camera and two-way audio, so the system will be able to detect motion," he added. One report prices the cost of an earlier version of the military 'drone buggy' at $600,000 each.
Policing the world so he can prove how much of a big shot he is. Expect more of the same when he gets elected. Nothing but a third world dictator bully.
For all I care he's free to take out my current rulers & government at any time he want.
Instead of lame camera-toting trucks, I thought we'd get cool laser-armed chrome titans striding across the battlefield.
I'm beginning to think I won't get a flying car either.
It took 30 years to come up with a Roomba with night vision?
Policing the world so he can prove how much of a big shot he is. Expect more of the same when he gets elected. Nothing but a third world dictator bully.
You do realize that's the opposite of what he wants to do, right?
He wants the US to spend less time, effort, and money patrolling the world, and wants other countries to take up the slack.
But go ahead and throw insults. It is, after all, the only thing Democrats do.
Considering the cost of useless toys like the F-35, this is a steal in both utility and price.
oh really? this came about under Obama administration
maybe you have a problem
Robots of the rich and powerful being used to subjugate the masses. It will not be long before this tech is available beyond the military. I guess those taxi drivers are not going to become security guards.
Apropos of nothing...
Just how hard is it to disable one of these $600,000 mobile golf carts?
For example, can a high powered rifle pierce any of the antennas, control electronics, or motive hardware? Would an IED be sufficient?
And having done so, what dangers might the recovery team face?
Yet another country the US has zero fucking business being in.
Bullshit. This is a Republican congress doing Republican shit. Trump is going to do the same.
Sorry but there will be no Trump in my rump, faggot. Queer for The Donald... what a bitch you are.
All of those false flag "terrorist groups" are funded by the CIA. Tax payers fund the CIA. Tax payers fund those groups and fund to allegedly defend from those groups at the same time.
You can see here how much they actually spend on this shit. Africa is not a satellite continent of North America the last time I checked.
It's not a combat vehicle, it's meant to patrol around US bases (and not very far out looking at it). It's not meant to defend or attack, it's just meant to alert and take a more vulnerable solider off patrol. Anything energetic enough to take it offline instantly is going to make a lot of noise (RPG, Mine, IED, etc.) and anything that doesn't make a lot of noise probably isn't going to be able to disable it completely before it relays back information. The area has known hostiles so if one just goes off line they're not just going to go strolling out to fix it. I'm sure they'd send and armed force out to investigate and save the actual recovery for daylight hours.
Besides, the bases it's patrolling around are staging areas for US (and allied) SOCOM forces, so a better question is what dangers might someone who disabled it face?
Unless you can get bulk of Americans to lower their standard of living by a wide margin, jobs coming back to America from (insert favorite outsourcing whipping boy of the week) is about as likely as ... oh... I dunno, Vatican nominating Trump for sainthood?
What could be more suitable to guard your drone aircraft's landing field and associated infrastructure than drone vehicles?
Forcing countries like Japan and South Korea to build nuclear weapons because his resolve to continue US's longstanding defense of its allies is not going to make a better world.
Then say that.
Printing lies and insults doesn't make your case, but it to be the only thing the Democrats can do.
Speaking from my many years of experience in Africa -
If a car, tractor, bus, motorcycle or similar vehicle is left unattended by real people, it will be taken, stripped clean and used for parts in the blink of an eye. The local mechanics are resourceful and can work miracles with castoff parts and homebrew adapter kits.
Good luck with those drones, Bubba.
$600,000 for one of these?
Hell, I could build a functionally similar unit for less than $100K, and it would be better than this glorified golf-cart.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
This sentry combines the grace and agility of a robot with the reflexes and continuous attention of a human! Something like this could never be tricked into carrying a bomb back to base.
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
good thing it has two-way communications, so they can voice-threaten the terrorists.
Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
Back in the day enlisted men pulled guard duty for pennies an hour. How is this machine better?
Not a Luddite, but this sounds dumb.
We have integrated several weapons systems as payloads in the past
"Surely we wouldn't be stupid enough to develop Skynet!" .. except in the west the definition of a terrorist is the person who act without authority of the group who think they should be in power and be the only ones able to use force of violence.
So.. here we have the drones who will act against humans and try to stop any human using violence .. Now, what if the humans started to attack the machines?