Skynet is now.
Posted on 01/31/2004 1:36:27 AM PST by yhwhsman
Robots for No Man's Land
Defense Companies Developing the 'Brains' to Remake War
By Yuki Noguchi
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, January 30, 2004; Page E01
The education of Stryker, an 18-ton military monster truck, begins in the warehouse lab of General Dynamics in Westminster, Md.
There, Stryker, one of the U.S. Army's newest infantry vehicles, is fitted with a "ladar" scanner, the equivalent of a mounted pair of eyes that see by emitting 400,000 laser and radar beams and snap 120 camera images every second. Its brain -- a 40-pound computer system tucked inside its body -- processes that data, and makes instant judgments on how to act and where to go.
The eight-wheeled Stryker has already seen service in Iraq as an armored troop carrier with human drivers. The idea is to teach Stryker to accomplish a mission on its own, as a robot. By 2010, robotic Strykers and similar contrivances are slated to be in use as all-purpose battlefield vehicles, surveying battlegrounds, sniffing for land mines, or transporting supplies and troops to the front line.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Companies throughout the defense industry, among them United Defense LP of Arlington, Lockheed Martin Corp. of Bethesda and the smaller Gaithersburg-based Robotics Research LLC, are developing robotic systems to fill a variety of military functions. For General Dynamics' robotic systems department, making robot brains -- called autonomous navigation systems -- represents the largest business deal in the unit's 14-year history. In November, it won a $185 million award to develop between 30 and 60 automated-navigation prototypes that can be fitted onto vehicles of different size and function, not just Stryker vehicles.
Creating automated navigation systems for combat vehicles is part of the Future Combat System project to remake warfare. The Army plans to spend $14.78 billion on a new combat system over the next six years, of which autonomous navigation systems is one part, according to Maj. Gary Tallman, public affairs officer for the Army.
Founded in 1990 as F&M Manufacturing, the Westminster plant where Stryker's brain is being developed started out designing small, remote-controlled vehicles. Over time, the 80,000-square-foot facility made robots that sorted mail, read bar codes and packaged pharmaceuticals. General Dynamics purchased F&M, which employs 268 people, for an undisclosed amount of money in 1995.
Using autonomous machines in the military became possible in the mid-1980s, when computer processors became faster. In the 1990s, the development of improved sensor technology allowed machines to pick up more information about their environment. Now, autonomous systems can keep track of their whereabouts using global-positioning satellite links, and talk to comrades and commanders through wireless links that shut off automatically if the signal is in danger of being intercepted.
The first unmanned military vehicles made in the early 1980s by the Defense Department were huge vans the size of UPS delivery trucks, filled with hundreds of pounds of clunky computers that could barely navigate at 5 miles an hour in relatively flat terrain. By comparison, Stryker can navigate through forests and desert environments, or drive on the road at top speeds of 60 miles an hour.
Even with these developments, robots still have a lot to learn.
Our guys deserve our best. I'm not sure this stryker is our best, not by what the armor guys on FR tell me.
Skynet is now.
Everything I know about the vehicle I got off the internet. A lot of what is on the internet is not very reassuring, but much of that is because of the agendas of the people posting the negative information. On the other hand, the Army and General Dynamics will definitely blow smoke up your butt, so in the end you have to rely on your own judgement in figuring out who to believe.
I was an armor guy a long time ago. Eight-wheeled armored cars have their uses. You can put computer monitor screens in them, and give them internet connections, and email, and Blue Force Tracker, and Remote Weapons Stations, and you still only have an eight-wheeled armor car that you don't dare get wet lest you fry the electronics.
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