Future Army Battle Uniforms - Wired, Lethal 756
ssyladin writes "CNN is running an article about the future US army battle dress, code-named 'Scorpion'. It says that "..soldiers of 2011 will step into wired uniforms that incorporate all the equipment they need. The uniforms will monitor vital signs and plug them into a massive network of satellites, unmanned planes and robotic vehicles the military has planned." There will be sensors to monitor heartrate and blood-pressure, built-in tourniquets, a HUD to connect to GPS info, overhead maps, infrared and starlight cameras, and even the venerable M16 rifles are slated for an overhaul."
Nostalgia (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Nostalgia (Score:5, Funny)
thinking things through (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:thinking things through (Score:5, Funny)
Re:thinking things through (Score:4, Interesting)
Taking the opposite strategy let Australia defeat the US in wargames a few years ago.
Australia took the part of defenders of a large (anonymous) desert country, and the US the attackers from the sea. US plans included a lot of electronic surveillance. The Aussies passed commands using runners and pieces of paper, sent fake messages to each other implying that the most heavily defended area of beach was completely empty, and foiled the US landing.
The script said this wouldn't happen, so the referees allowed the game to continue as if the landing was successful.
Re:thinking things through (Score:4, Informative)
That's probably not quite how the matter was dealt with.
When the military, or at least the US military, does one of these exercises, there is a list of training objectives for that exercise that participating units need to meet. During the flow of the exercise, if the BLUFOR (training units) gets creamed unexpectedly by the OPFOR (bad guys) or else something else goes badly, it is noted, and then the exercise moves on so that the units can train the other tasks they have to do. At the end of the exercise, an After-Action Review (AAR) is conducted, where all flaws, failures and mistakes come out in the wash, often brutally so. At the end of all this, the units are sent home with a package of training objectives for the coming year or 6 months, with recommendations on what to correct and what to reinforce.
In all the wargames I've participated in, I can't remember "winning" a single one. They are designed specifically so that a BLUFOR win is very rare, because you learn more by losing.
I have no idea what exercise you are referring to, but in US-run exercises that's how it goes.
Kinda brings a whole new meaning (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Kinda brings a whole new meaning (Score:5, Funny)
*Prays his bandwidth will survivs*
MS jokes [troll warning] (Score:5, Funny)
DirectFCS (fire control system) and
ActiveWarhead
seamlessly integrated in the new Microsoft LookOut Below communications software.
Where do you want the bombs to fall today
Re:Kinda brings a whole new meaning (Score:5, Funny)
ERROR: AMMO_COUNT_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL
RIFLE.DLL caused a general application fault in module INFANTRY.EXE. Your battle dress uniform has been shut down to protect your data. Please reboot your helmet. If the problem persists, contact technical support or your local coroner.
Re:Kinda brings a whole new meaning (Score:3, Informative)
Good Riddance (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Good Riddance (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Good Riddance (Score:4, Informative)
Maximum effective range:
Area target: 2,624.8 feet (800 meters)
Point target: 1,804.5 feet (550 meters)
Source: http://www.hqmc.usmc.mil/factfile.nsf/7e931335d51
If I was a soldier I wouldn't want to have to packaround an OICW. They are significantly heavier than the M16A2 and the last thing our soldiers need at this point is more weight to pack around.
Re:Good Riddance (Score:5, Informative)
Given that the M16 and the OICW are both chambered in
The OICW is a waste. Give any soldier the choice between a set of combat gear or the scorpion suit, and he'll choose the combat gear. Give him a choice between the OICW or an M16, and he'll choose the M16. Why? Because when your life is on the line complex systems fail more often than simple systems and they can also get in the way. When you're on the battlefield and people are shooting at you, you want to be able to shoot back. When you have to reboot your gun or your combat helmet is on the frits, these are bad things. Moving to the latest new fangled gadgets does not make a successful armed force.
This is why smart guns will be a flop. The Glock firearm design is currently the most popular modern design on the market because it is a simple design that works. It has very few moving parts compared to other semi-auto pistols, and that means it tends to be much more reliable than other designs. When you start introducing computer controls, fingerprint scanners, and the like things get much more complicated much quicker and I personally would hate to lose my life because my smartgun crashed while someone was kicking down my door.
The most venerable machine gun designs were from guys who weren't working for the government. Guys like John Moses Browning who designed the majority of the military machine guns in US history and many still in use today. The
Today's combat weapons are made by large military contractors who move at a snails pace. Browning was turning out multiple designs per year. You'd think with all the backing these big defense contractors have, they could at least keep up.
Re:Good Riddance (Score:5, Insightful)
And speaking of computer control - did you notice the mention of autonomous robotic artillery vehicles? Doesn't that bother anyone? Currently, robots function as spy planes, spy jeeps, bomber planes, and now artillery tanks. This is a bad trend. They seem to be giving the robots all the heavy firepower. Whether the catastrophe is SkyNet or some ham radio guy who knows his crypto, this does not seem to be a good trend.
Re:Good Riddance (Score:3, Insightful)
To a certain extent this is true, but remember the M16 was able to replace the M14. At the time the M14 was much more reliable, and it fired a round with a lot more stopping power. Next thing you know the US army is in Vietnam - sure you can carry a lot more 5.56 ammo and fire it full auto, but the 7.62
Re:Good Riddance (Score:3, Insightful)
Having been a soldier for a number of years I can tell you this is all too true. The German MG-42 isn't still in use just for fun but because it's a good, simple and battle field proven design.
I am looking forward to soldiers in wired combat suits jammed by high-power microwave or EMP transmitters, grinding them to a sudden halt.
All this is good for is breastfeeding an industry
Re:Good Riddance (Score:3, Insightful)
That said, the vast majority of infantry engagements are done within 150 meters. That's why we can get away with using a weapon with shitty ballistics (velocity namely), like an M4. I don't ca
Re:Good Riddance (Score:5, Insightful)
In all of the years I qualified on the KD (Known Distance) course, I had only one failure to feed (which can happen to *any* semi-auto firearm), and I never had a 'jam'. Of the others firing the same course with me that did have jams, the overwhelming majority were due to having a 'dry rifle'; ie: no, or improper lubrication. The others did have mechanical failures, but that is to be expected when you consider the age and actual use of those rifles.
To answer to some of the other replies below: M16s are pretty damned accurate as well with the proper load. The Army Marksmanship Unit shoots the M16 now... And they have won some pretty tough matches with those rifles. Even out to 1000 yards. I left the Corps a few years back, but it wouldn't shock me to hear that the USMC Rifle Team switched from the M14 to the M16.
For what its worth, with the exception of boot camp and the first year afterward, I qualified expert every year averaging 230 out of a possible 250 points. (And 286 out of 300 shooting an off the rack M16 on the NRA High Power course during Marine intramural competition.)
Re:Good Riddance (Score:3, Informative)
Which is exactly the problem: the M16 wasn't designed to be used in battlefield conditions. A little sand here, or lack of lube there, and you've got a glorified bayonet.
The M16 is a classic example of textbook engineering - it is a very well designed, very accurate rifle. But unlike the soviet and chinese counterparts, it has no tolerance for dirt; without proper lubrication, it jams. Compound this with the
Re:Good Riddance (Score:4, Interesting)
You are way overstating the case. Yes, the original marks of the M16 in the Vietnam era had a lot of problems, but those were worked out in the A1 and especially A2 versions of the rifle. You need to clean and lubricate your weapon but this is true of all weapons. The current M16 is no different than most other modern battle rifles in reliability. A military that doesn't train its troops to maintain their equipment is a poor military and probably has other problems beyond dirty weapons.
I don't know what platoons you were in, but in the units I was in, every soldier got a little bottle of CLP, and as much of that and patches as he could ask for. Soldiers who use magazines as hammers need to be corrected of that habit, maybe some extra duty or a statement of charges will do the trick. Never use a tool for something other than what it was intended to do.
Re:Good Riddance (Score:5, Informative)
I must respectfully disagree with my Marine Corps fellow traveller here. As a former U.S. Army officer, I wielded an M-16A1 in the first Persian Gulf War. I found my M-16 was okay during peacetime, but had some doubts about it for wartime, due to my copious research beforehand. When the more senior officers traded in their M1911A1 Colt .45 ACP pistols for M-16A1's, I acquired one of those pistols as an addition to my personal armoury. I wanted the .45 with me on the off chance that I got into a firefight and the M-16 jammed.
The M-16 spokesman here says that it works fine if kept properly lubricated. I NEVER lubricated my M-16 during PGWI because I couldn't. The first (and last) time I did, it became utterly encrusted with sand. There was no escaping the sand in the Arabian deserts as it is a fine powder easily blown into the air or stirred into the air by vehicles and troops moving about. I wiped it down to a "near dry" condition and it was still caked in sand. It was only after a few more days and wipedowns that it finally dried out and quit being covered in sand. From then on, I just wiped it down with a dry cloth every day. Assuming the Marine above is correct, my M-16 was rendered just about useless. Basically, I would have had to begin dousing it in lubricant right when I actually needed it. Hopefully, that would not have been during one of the frequent "shamals" (sandstorms) we endured.
The most egregious design flaw of the M-16 is the reloading arrangement to support semi-automatic fire. A small gas tube taps the barrel near the front sight and carries some of the hot gas from the cartidge's detonation back to a very short tube or "catcher" just above the rotary bolt that houses the firing pin. This means you have crappy, government gunpowder blowing crap right into the most critical part of the weapon. This residue rapidly gums up the area where bullet meets bolt and firing pin. (This area is called the firing chamber.) This problem calls for either frequent lubrication to loosen the deposits or a tolerance for the occasional jam. An old neighbour of mine was fortunate enough to not have his M-16 jam when he found himself three feet from a Viet Cong in the jungles of Viet Nam. In that case, the M-16 beat the Kalashnikov.
Another M-16 design flaw is the weak recoil spring that pushes the bolt back into place to chamber the next round after one is fired. This spring and the earlier-mentioned fouling problem caused the addition of the "forward assist" for the M-16A1. Inevitably, experienced shooters will forget that forward assist at the wrong moment because no other weapon I know of has such a jury-rigged loading process as the M-16. Talk about cruft... The operator's manual for an M-16A1 or the current M-16A2 recommends the forward assist be pushed forward with the heel of the hand following each loading of a fresh magazine's first round. The M-16's predecessors; M-14, M-1 Garand, M1903 Springfield, the Krag- Jorgensen and "Trapdoor Springfields" had no need for such a procedure to be followed in the middle of a firefight.
The Kalashnikov designs use a metal rod to collect the gas from a bullet's detonation to push the bolt back. This small but significant difference from the M-16 means the vast majority of the gunpowder residue never reaches the firing chamber of an AK. This is a huge help in not gumming up a Kalashnikov when it is being used. Another tremendous advantage of the Kalashnikovs on campaign is the small number of parts they have. Having field stripped AK's and M-16's many, many times, an M-16 has about three times as many parts. These parts are typically much smaller and more prone to breakage on the lighter M-16. Some of those parts are not "idiot proofed" either. When it's 3 am and you are running on six hours sleep in the last three nights, the last thing you need is to be sure to put some cotter pin in only from the right as the weapon won't fire if that pin was inserted from the lef
Re:Good Riddance (Score:4, Interesting)
like a video game (Score:5, Funny)
I wonder if the "network" keeps track of Frags?
Re:like a video game (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:like a video game (Score:4, Insightful)
What I'm trying to say is, the military is very upfront about how video games and military are pretty damn similar.
Re:like a video game (Score:5, Interesting)
As for the connection between AWACS and sonar operators learning how to read their screen by arcade games, I'd say that you're vastly underestimating the complexity of said military applications. Since when do arcade games use the same symbology, labeling conventions and settings as radars? How could staring at a bunch of pixelated space ships help in reading a waterfall display on a sub?
The Quake thing is kind of true- a modified version of Doom was used for reaction training, and now a system based off Operation Flashpoint is in development. Based off of it, but still heavily modified.
Might I ask whether you have any references for your other claims?
The only games I've found to be similar to military activities are the ones that actually try to portray it realistically. Even with those there are significant sacrifices made for gameplay or development reasons.
Re:like a video game (Score:3, Funny)
btw....If you are completely without a clue, said studies proved that heavy gamers have increased spatial reasoning abilities. I.e. while one person can only track so many moving objects at one time, the gamer can track *up to* 50% more. This is good for both jet pilots & RADAR operators.
As for references, it was just in the news (and I believe Nature) last week, Google's your friend.
Jaysyn
America's Army does! (Score:4, Interesting)
Good... (Score:5, Funny)
CE
Re:Good... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Good... (Score:3, Funny)
Yourselves? Don't you mean your British and Australian allies? And journalists of course.
Re:Good... (Score:5, Funny)
"When the German flew overhead, the Allied took cover. When the British flew overhead, the German took cover. When the Americans flew overhead, everybody took cover".
Doesn't seem like things have changed that much.
Soldier, you are way out of line... (Score:5, Funny)
Sarge: "Dang, that remote works well."
With all this stuff (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:With all this stuff (Score:3, Interesting)
And did anyone else notice the picutre looked like somthing out of tiberian sun?
Re:With all this stuff (Score:2)
Maybe, this would be great for asymetric warfare. You just need one smart kid to break into the system and you simultaniously give all the enemy troops a lethal dose of amphetamines....
Or, if not, just send all the American troops into attacks on each other.
You can already do that though, communication is already very bad. A lot of the nuclear and intelligence stuff is on private isolated networks, but a bunch of stuff is go
Haven't we heard this all before? (Score:5, Insightful)
This seems to be just your average pork barrel gee whiz military contracting.
For real though (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Haven't we heard this all before? (Score:2)
Re:Haven't we heard this all before? (Score:3, Insightful)
The military is smarter than making a soldier solely relia
Train the soldiers (Score:3, Insightful)
At first the military would teach soldiers to be soldiers, and the gear would be supplementary, but it would most l
No substitute... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:No substitute... (Score:4, Insightful)
EMP was the first thing that came to mind when I saw the article. If you're fighting an enemy that has no compunction about using nukes, then they can make at least some of this fancy hardware useless. But then again, nuclear weapons tend to make a lot of things useless by physically destroying them. (Just to save someone the trouble of correcting me, I know EMP has a greater area of effect than the radiation and shock wave, and I know there are non-nuclear means of generating an EMP capable of disabling electronic hardware.)
EMP aside, the not-so-reliable weapons systems of today will pave the way for reliable versions in the future. History is full of examples where newfangled technology was introduced to the battlefield, and probably got a lot of people killed, but the lessons learned from it eventually resulted in reliable weapons or defenses that provided an advantage. That's just the way things seem to work.
More beta testing for... (Score:4, Funny)
Anyhow, it's inevitable (Score:2)
News Flash (Score:2, Funny)
Will they still be fighting... (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes (Score:5, Insightful)
The point is not to worry about future opponents, the point is to be modular, to quick deploy and to be tactical - all at the same time. Send soldiers to police a public demonstration in NYC, equip them with body armor, gas mask and non-lethal projecticles. Send soldiers to police Baghdad, same equipment as above but include lethal projecticles, GPS with maps and translation software.
Re:Yes (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Yes (Score:5, Informative)
No, you don't send soldiers to a public demonstration in NYC.
You send the police, and maybe the National Guard in really, really extreme cases.
Posse Comitatus [uscg.mil] prohibits the US military from performing general police functions within the borders of the US.
There are some things they can do, but mostly just assistance and transport.
america is scary (Score:5, Insightful)
As a non american i feel threatened.
Am i to be 'liberated' next?
Remember the romans (Score:4, Interesting)
Then in the winter of around 495 the legions of the Rhine and Danube fronteers just saw something strange. Hundreds of thousands of people were camping in the borders of the rivers. But not Soldiers. Not young and strong man. But Old men and women and children...
As soon as the rivers got frozen by the lower winter temperatures, they just crossed it. Thousands of people, unarmed, weak, starving. And the legions could do nothing, even with better equipment and better training and all the money Rome spent with them. There were simply not enough of them to stop thousands of "civilians" to invade the empire.
I guess the US are just not willing to incur in the same mistakes as the romans did.
Re:america is scary (Score:3, Insightful)
Why? (Score:3, Insightful)
We need to realize that government is a business. Like any business, government's objective is to serve its own interests: to profit. The main difference between government
Re:america is scary (Score:5, Insightful)
and how will all that new hardware prevent terrorist attacks? souped-up soldiers on every internal flight? x-ray goggles to determine the contents of every passing truck?
the US is easily capable of defeating any army in the field. unless military intelligence is expecting alien invaders to land in the near future, this hardware will in no practical way affect US military superiority. Dictators won't suddenly think, shit, now the US can defeat me in 24 hours instead of a 48, so I'd better fall into line. It's hard to see why any of this stuff is necessary for anything except justifying ever-increasing military spending.
If the US govt put a fraction of the money and effort it expends on the military into addressing the grievances of dispossessed people around the world, it wouldn't have a problem with terrorism. Most current anti-American terrorist activities is focussed in countries where either the US maintains an unpopular and repressive regime (eg Saudi Arabia, and to some extent Israel - if you're a Palestinian), countries where the US formerly maintained an unpopular and repressive regime (Iran), or countries where the US made explicit or covert military interventions which did nothing to help its people (Lebanon, Afghanistan in the 1980s)
Unless the US govt changes its m.o. since the end of the Marshall Plan and returns to a long-term commitment to building sustainable states -- based on the needs of their people, not US corporations -- in countries that it has helped to devastate, we can expect Iraq and Afghanistan to become major sources of terrorists in the next few years.
Re:america is scary (Score:4, Insightful)
Better yet, why not invest this money into social programs and infrastructure at home? I've never quite understod why we can send billions of dollars overseas as foreign aid, yet still have people at home who are homeless, illiterate, and without healthcare.
Re:america is scary (Score:3, Insightful)
From IRS statistics:
Income
Percentile Taxable
Income Percent of Total
U. S. Income Percent of Total
taxes paid
Top 1% $313,469 20.81% 37.42%
Top 5% $128,336 35.3% 56.47%
Top 10% $92,144 46.01% 67.33%
Top 25% $55,225 67.15% 84.01%
Top 50% $27,682 87.01% 96.09%
So the bottom 50% pay 3.81% of taxes in America. The bottom 40% pay nothing. (BTW, the 50% number is currently $55,225)
Re:america is scary (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:america is scary (Score:5, Insightful)
And how long would we have to meet these needs? Would this include getting 3rd world countries to stop wasting time killing each other, spreading AIDS, dumping garbage and sewage in the streets and rivers, rallying around the latest thug with a gun that claims he is their savior? Or would it just allow them a couple of years to have a few more kids to add to the problem?
Real change needs to happen from within, and can only happen when the people are willing to work for it. No amount of relief is going to make a difference in the long run against superstition and bigotry.
Re:america is scary (Score:3, Insightful)
Sorry, I'm not afraid to make value judgments on cultures. If your culture is anti-intellectual, highly authoritarian, unfair based on race, religion or gender, brutal in law-enforcement... then I think Western civilization is better, thank you very much. I know it's very hip and even normal among the University crowd to be anti-West despite all the comfort and freedom it gives us, but I no longer buy that crap.
How do you propose to get rid of these thugs? By dropping supplies at them? By somehow convincin
Re:america is scary (Score:4, Insightful)
Nothing except the dumping of subsidised Western food on their markets, that drives local farmers out of business. And the pressure to use GM crops whose terms of use prevent farmers from saving seed and replanting it next year.
Nothing except AIDs rates affecting in some cases up to half the population, made far worse by short-sighted US policies that won't give money to any aid organisation that promotes birth control (so no condoms) and by grasping pharma companies that won't let them have cheap drugs.
Nothing except Western governments that are happy to decry the use of repressive measures while selling those same repressive governments the tools of repression. (Saddam's chemical weapons were aquired with the help of the US government, after all. What did they think he'd do with them? Go fishing?)
Nothing except IMF- and World Bank-imposed policies that force governments to sign up to neo-liberal "austerity" packages that destroy their industries and leave them open to corporate takeovers by the West. (Take a look at economic history. You'll see that free-market countries like the US and Britain got rich through fiercely protective and anti-competitive policies. Only once they were economically dominant did they embrace free markets.)
Oh, and of course, there's one other thing stopping dozens of countries (from Columbia to Saudi Arabia to Khazakhstan) from becoming "civilised". US government support for governments and organisations that "commit murder against their own people and terrorism against others". (Let's not forget who funded and trained Osama and his friends in the first place...America.)
And please, don't patronise the intelligence of the world by insisting that the US went to war to liberate Iraq from a tyrannical regime and that those who resisted did so for financial gain. The war was never sold as a humanitarian war -- it was sold on the basis of WMD and terrorism. We've found no evidence of either. And those who claim it was about liberating the Iraqi people had better explain why the Iraqis needed liberating so much more than the Cubans, the Zimbabweans, the North Koreans etc.
Re:america is scary (Score:3, Insightful)
Communism is bad: Check (diluted to "socialism is evil" and applied to non-socialist nations)
People are capable of helping themselves, so we shouldn't offer any assistance to them: Check (Love this defense, it's such "rape is the woman's fault" bullshit)
Liberals are bad people: Check
Association of poverty with barbarism: Check
"White Man's Burden" (civilize or die): Check
Accusation of impoverished nations being murderous: Check (Civillians killed by
Re:america is scary (Score:5, Insightful)
Since the Second World War, the US has bombed China, Korea, Guatemala, Indonesia, Cuba, Guatemala (again), Peru, Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia, Guatemala (third time lucky), Grenada, Lebanon, Libya, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Iran, Panama, Iraq, Kuwait, Somalia, Bosnia, Afghanistan and Yugoslavia - in that order - and in not a single case did the bombing produce a democratic government as a direct result.
And that is scary.
Re:america is scary (Score:5, Insightful)
Blowing up a cocaine factory in Columbia, for example, is a form of self-defense as the drug industry negatively impacts our people, both the users and the dealers. People die and go to jail, in no small numbers, because of the drug trade.
And you might want to not believe every quote you hear. Go read about the former Yugoslavia and the governments that now are in charge of the independent countries.
Also, just because an American bomb exploded on a certain piece of geography doesn't mean we 'bombed' that country. During WWII we accidentally dropped bombs on Switzerland, but we didn't BOMB Switzerland. Shit, we had to explode ordnance in France during WWII, but France doesn't run around saying we BOMBED them.
There are reasons for what we did in every country that article mentions. I'll just take Somalia as an example, because I recently sailed off its coast.
We tried to FEED the Somalis. That is why we were there. Local militia took OUR food and started 'selling' it to the very population we were trying to feed. They demanded money, valuables, and if the person didn't have anything, sex. Or, sometimes they would demand to have sex with the person's child.
You object to kicking the shit out of such people?
Such people DESERVE to have bombs shoved up their asses.
Awwwwww.... POOR SOMALIS!
Do you realize Somalia is now regarded as the most dangerous coast in the world for piracy? The *minimum* recommended distance from shore is 50 miles. 100 is preferable.
Don't be so quick with the knee-jerk anti-U.S. reactions.
When you find yourself defending countries like Iraq, you are probably on the wrong side of the argument. Dictators *love* people like you.
Re:america is scary (Score:4, Informative)
To quote Bill Maher - "We can't stop doing coke, so you have to die."
You have no idea what you're talking about. Our foreign policy is largely responsible for farmers in places like Columbia resorting to coca farming in the first place. Columbia was a wheat-producer forty years ago, but wheat production was undermined by the US under the Food for Peace program in the 50s, which flooded Columbia with subsidized agricultural products. Of course, regardless of the name of the program, it is clear we were not really after peace in Columbia. Take one look at our history in the region, including the various banana republics of South America. The U.S. has been a huge force of opposition against democracy. By propping up and supported corrupt dictators, and by giving them immense military aid (Columbia was the largest receiver of US military aid) to fight pro-democracy rebels, many of these countries have been at war for decades. Out of desperation, these farmers plant the one crop that will guarantee food on their tables - and you want to kill them for it.
Re:america is scary (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually, the "war on drugs" is the most successful snowjob ever pulled on the american people. In limited situations cocaine is STILL used for pharmaceutical purposes,
Re:america is scary (Score:3, Insightful)
US liberations are purely based on goodwill will you say? I have trouble believing that when you look at economic interests tied to the Iraq war. The fact that your president is a loony who refers to "god almighty" in his public appearance speeches, also has free-thinking people worried.
It
Rude awakening (Score:3, Informative)
What are his achievements? Look at what he has promised, and what he has achieved. The economy is dragging, the p
Re:america is scary (Score:4, Insightful)
Oh, and what about the Philippines, a former colony of the US? That too was liberated after WWII, but it's still steeped in considerable poverty. Trust me, I've been there and seen it myself. I was shocked and I knew that wasn't even the worst as far as impoverished nations go. It was still very heartbreaking. It's now improving, but at a very, very slow rate.
I'm not trying to vindicate the UN here, and I wouldn't even want to. They've done a pretty shitty job of rebuilding countries too.
As far as Japan goes, I wouldn't give all the credit to the US. Japanese culture made it a lot easier for the US to rebuild the country. There is a big emphasis in their culture on pragmatism and hard work. That and the Korean war (which helped to boost Japan's industrial sectors by quite a bit) had a lot to do with their success. However, Japan still went through quite a number of hardships during its rebuilding process.
Western Europe still had a lot of money in the banks after WWII, which really helped them to bounce back.
Finally, I want to point out that once the seed of corruption is planted into a country, the plant that grows afterwards is very difficult to destroy. Western Europe and Japan had the benefit of suffering from much less internal corruption than other nations (particularly former European colonies, whose seeds of corruption were planted by the European colonizers.) The longer that the plant of corruption is allowed to grow, the more difficult it becomes to destroy because the people in that country grow used to it, and so if a new government is put in place, any corruption within the new government would be expected. The UN and the US have both underestimated the amount of effort that it would take to destroy this plant. Nation rebuilding is still extremely new, and no one really truly has any truly proven ways of doing it.
Re:america is scary (Score:5, Informative)
Wrong. It was Soviets who defeated Germany. Anyone who claims otherwise doesn't know what they are talking about. Even after Normandy, about 70% of German troops were fighting the Soviets, and Soviets fought them ALOT longer than Americans did.
Germanys fate was sealed at Stalingrad. After that, it was all downhill for them. And that took place long before Normandy or tangible US involvement in the war.
Now, war in Pacific was mostly american show with some Commonwealth troops thrown in.
This might come as a shock to you, but the training of US troops is not superior to training of other armies. No, your training doesn't suck as such, but it's not that great either. That hes been demonstrated in missions where US Troops have worked with troops from other countries. In Bosnia for example US Troops did many stupid things (built bridges on the worst possible locations, had unsuitable equipment for the terrain etc. etc.). And the core training isn't superior either. They held a sharpshooting-competition in Kosovo. Teams were formed based on nationality. Finnish army took the #1 and #2 spots (they had two teams), Swedes were third and Germans (if I remember correctly) were fourth. Americans didn't do that good.
So... (Score:4, Funny)
US forces are starting to look like Imperial Storm Troopers? Well, they already aim pretty lousy... That was a start, this is just the finishing touch I guess.
The force.. (Score:3, Funny)
"donÂt underestimate the powers of the force"
While pressing the neck tourniquette of one of the commanders with his remote.
Blocking on battery technology (Score:5, Insightful)
Technology is great and all, but until they can pack it all down to a few ounces, I really don't see it taking off. Every soldier knows how much burden something like just an extra pound adds to a pack. It can really make a difference. In the end it seems to always come down to the battery. They can shrink LCD screens, keyboards, earpieces, whatever. But to have a useful lifetime they still need a heavy battery pack and I think that's what's really holding this back.
The military is all about "total information access" or whatever they call it. But in fact, sheer information alone is useless. I was at Quantico a few years ago presenting a research project and during a presentation, the director of this program emphasized that current technology gives them boatloads of data, the rub is in making sense of it and presenting in a useful way -- both to the soldier and to the people at base camp (or whatever.) So just strapping a GPS module, encrypted digital radio, digicam, etc. on a soldier's back isn't neccessarily useful for anyone involved. Somehow you've got to figure out how to make it all useful.
Re:Blocking on battery technology (Score:2, Interesting)
hack attack! (Score:2, Insightful)
Imagine half the US army's uniforms activating their automated tourniqets at once, whilst it would no doubt be hilarious to watch it probably wouldn't do them much good
...And yet.... (Score:5, Insightful)
whoa. (Score:2, Funny)
Sweet! Wall hacks for US soldiers. What else will we learn from counterstrike and quake 3 kids?
Then comes a uniform with built-in tourniquets (Score:5, Funny)
Bored Soldier: Base I'm bleeding bad, I need my "arm" tightened.
Base: Our sensors show that isn't your arm.
Missing feature (Score:4, Funny)
ouch - this is really bad for the eyes.. Zaphod
Re:Missing feature (Score:2, Funny)
Let's hope they come with Peril Sensitive Sunglasses as well. That would be helpful.
CS? (Score:2)
Hmm... (Score:2)
Reminds me of "Aliens" (Score:3, Interesting)
Propaganda? (Score:5, Interesting)
I've been seeing a _lot_ of articles and "special features" lately about The Weapon and The Soldier of The Future. I can't help but be reminded of the pro-army propaganda in Starship Troopers (the antiwar movie, not the conservative novel). The Future Soldier that CNN is featuring somehow reminds me of a wimped-down version of Heinlein's powered armor suits.
There have been many instances of media covering the weapons of the future (I submitted a story on future robots a couple of weeks ago); what I'm worried about is why that focus is there. Are we getting ready for a long series of wars, ones that we expect to last until at least 2011, when these super-wired Counterstrike uniforms will come into service? That's kind of scary.
(sorry for the blatant US-centrism)
"Controlling their military with drugs" (Score:2, Interesting)
What's your rank and unit soldier?
Corporal, 1055 Berserker Division Sir.
============
Skins (Score:3, Funny)
but seriously how about not putting the money into armies and not having wars.
Re:Skins (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Skins (Score:3, Insightful)
Sure, and how about not putting money into police departments and not having crime? Sound real logical, doesn't it?
Perhaps we could put up several large signs that read "Shhhh! Do Not Disturb." along our borders. I'm sure the rest of the world would respect our wishes.
In the Army now (Score:3, Funny)
Welcome to two new high level members of the Army:
General Protection Fault
and
Major Error!
And good luck to their subordinates.
Useless without bandwidth (Score:3, Informative)
Power Source (Score:5, Insightful)
In fact, power storage is really what is hampering any major advances into the portable, semi-autonomous electronics. Wireless phones, laptops, robotic flies, cybersoldiers, etc. -- we need some sort of a major breaktrhough in power storage until we can produce actual designs as opposed to mockups that you need to plug into the wall socket.
Great idea, but... (Score:3, Insightful)
Give these systems to Marines at CAX, and give them an order to see how easy it is to break. I guarantee you the failure rate will be astronomical. Don't field it to regular forces until the Marine Corps cannot break it any more regularly than they can the current gear, AND don't field it until the weight is brought down.
The article mentioned lower weight... Quite a bit of a combat load is things like tents, shovels, extra uniforms, socks, another pair of boots, food, water, how does this system propose to deal with that? Especially with the requirement to carry spare batteries. What I read of the article, the equipment this stuff replaces is not any heavier- the gear involved in this is a fraction of a real combat load. IT might be significantly lighter for a heavily armed sentry, but for an infantryman in the field, any gain would be marginal, and not worth the greater potential for failure. The OICW is about twice the weight of an M-16... Even if the overall system weight is less, thats still double the weight on the arms in combat. Anyone who has used the M-16 in rifle PT knows how quickly even a lightweight rifle can become extremely heavy.
Military forces do best when they stick to simple gear that gets the job done. Aviation and naval forces may be able to get away with more complexity by the nature of their jobs, but the basic infantryman doesn't have time to worry about all that crap. Field simple to use, lightweight, and reliable gear and go out and raise hell. Thats how the infantry wins.
Did some work on this.... (Score:3, Interesting)
We were experimenting with placing small devices that measure acceleration in various places and attempting to determine from a frequency-time analysis (i.e. imagine a frequency spectrum vs time) using neural networks and wavelet analysis to try and differentiate between the acceleration profiles caused by walking, running, moving, etc vs shivering....
The alternative was to stick a small thermometer up the soldier's "rear" which I don't think anyone wanted
Re:It has to be done... (Score:2)
Re:Inspired by MIT?... (Score:2)
Re:What would be really useful (Score:3, Insightful)
Derek
Especially with cheap EMP bombs. (Score:3, Insightful)
For example, a bomb with a big capacitor inside surrounded by a jacket of carbon filaments could send a shockwave of EMP that will disable any electronics within a couple of hundred meters of the explosion point. And of course we know what happens when you detonate a nuclear warhead at high altitude; I believe that one Soviet tacti
Re:Mod parent up! (Score:5, Insightful)
An AC wrote:
You, and all those like you, are wrong. The Constitution and the Bill of Rights enshrine free speech and dissent as the right of every US citizen, and the basis of freedom. Without free speech, there can be no free country. And don't give me this "wartime" idiocy. If dissent during wartime was unAmerican, then sign Abraham Lincoln up as unAmerican. He dissented during a war, from the Senate floor.
You might want to do some reading to brush up on what is and isn't "American". I would suggest the Declaration of Independence, the US Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the Gettysburg Address, president John Quincy Adams' speech to the U.S. House of Representatives on July 4, 1821, and Emma Lazarus' poem "The New Colossus" (Lady Liberty).
I don't know about the other poster, but I will only be happy:
From someone with a better grasp of what America is all about:
John Quincy Adams, July 4, 1821