Army Readies Robot Soldier for Iraq

[DoveTurnedHawk]

The rain is turning to snow on a blustery January morning, and all the men gathered in a parking lot here surely would prefer to be inside.

But the weather couldn't matter less to the robotic sharpshooter they are here to watch as it splashes through puddles, the barrel of its machine gun pointing the way like Pinocchio's nose.

The Army is preparing to send 18 of these remote-controlled robotic warriors to fight in Iraq beginning in March or April.

Made by a small Massachusetts company, the SWORDS, short for Special Weapons Observation Reconnaissance Detection Systems, will be the first armed robotic vehicles to see combat, years ahead of the larger Future Combat System vehicles currently under development by big defense contractors such as Lockheed Martin and General Dynamics Corp.

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http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6852832/

DTH

[THUNDER HANDS]

1. Judgement Day is coming

Wow, who knew that the Terminator was a documentary?

[MikeG]

2. #By your comand#

[Ian David]

3. There go more jobs

You can't work in a factory.

You can't work in front of a computer.

You can't even KILL for a job anymore.

What's left?

Oh, I know.

They'll start putting our brains in the robots!

[underpants]

4. S.W.O.R.D.-one pillar of neo-con belief is the use of technology

and eventually needing less and less (maybe none) human involvement.

[antigop]

5. Oh, my! It's the Carlyle Group

>>
It was a joint development process between the Army and Foster-Miller, a robotics firm bought in November by QinetiQ Group PLC, which is a partnership between the British Ministry of Defence and the Washington holding company The Carlyle Group.
>>

[Moderator]

6. duplicate topic

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=1174060