First Post

Hello All! Here's my stab at one of those "blog" things. I'll plan on doing new commentary, especially as it relates to the military and homeland security...two things that I guess I have a little expertise on.

I figured that I'd better get of my ass and at least take a stab at blogging seeing as how I have an article coming out in the March WIRED (www.wired.com) about using blogging to do better intelligence. I'll keep you posted on how that goes.

Anyway, first up on the commentary:

_____________________________________________________________
From the Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/16/technology/16robots.html?th=&pagewanted=print&position=

February 16, 2005
A New Model Army Soldier Rolls Closer to the Battlefield
By TIM WEINER

The American military is working on a new generation of soldiers, far different from the army it has.
"They don't get hungry," said Gordon Johnson of the Joint Forces Command at the Pentagon. "They're not afraid. They don't forget their orders. They don't care if the guy next to them has just been shot. Will they do a better job than humans? Yes."
The robot soldier is coming.
The Pentagon predicts that robots will be a major fighting force in the American military in less than a decade, hunting and killing enemies in combat. Robots are a crucial part of the Army's effort to rebuild itself as a 21st-century fighting force, and a $127 billion project called Future Combat Systems is the biggest military contract in American history.

(follow the link for more)


Uh, yeah right. Most of the articles that I've read say that we're years away from AI of this type. Plus, what happens when your robotic infantryman fucks up? Do you press "CRTL" "ALT" "DELETE"? The current generation of UAVs (preds, hunter, etc ) take huge support staff to keep flying, and a highly skilled pilot is always in the loop. The current generation of "robots" on the ground are really just glorified remote control cars....with machineguns. How about we pump some of that money into making better infantrymen instead of a robotic pipe dream. Can you imagine the "Grunt-9000" trying to interact with Iraqi Civilians?

Noah over at defensetech (http://www.defensetech.org/) has a little to say about it too.

_______________________________________________________________
Next up: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6979481/

Syria and Iran say to build 'common front'

Interesting...