Armed Robots in Iraq...good or bad idea?

Question

http://blog.wired.com/defense/2007/08/httpwwwnational.html

Answer 1

I am in the middle of a 12 month tour in Iraq and travel the roads all over Iraq on a daily basis, so I feel somewhat qualified to answer this.

Robots are already in use in Iraq - although not in quite the way in which you might envision.

Whenever we spot a roadside bomb (IEDs and EFPs) - or any type of suspected explosive - we call Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD). When EOD comes out, they send a robot with a camera up to take a look at the suspicious object. If they even think it could possibly be an explosive, the robot sets explosives and they remotely blow up the object.

This is by no means new technology. Most of the larger police and sheriff's departments around the country have and utilize the same equipment.

Now, if you are talking about completely autonomous robots with the ability to make decisions and grab rifles and go fight the insurgents, several problems exist. First of all, the technology does not exist. Hell, the Japanese just made the first robot jump a year or so ago. Armed robots would need to jump, run, crawl, climb, etc. And that is just not possible with today's technology.

Secondly, the artifical intelligence technology that would allow the robots to make independent decisions of who is a combatant vs. who is a non-combatant does not exist. Nine times out of ten, the bad guy over here looks just like the good guy. Trained, professional American soldiers have a difficult time telling who is who ... let alone a robot confined to decisions based on scenarios programmed by computer geeks.

Third - at this is going to sound horrible - but the death toll as high as one would expect for a war this long. I don't keep track, but I think the death toll is somewhere around 3500. 3500 killed in six years. About 750,000 American troops have rotated into and out of Iraq since the "end of hostilities". That is a 4/10 of 1% (.0046) mortality rate. It is statistically the safest prolonged conflict ever to be deployed to. The numbers just don't warrant the expenditure.

Every American over here volunteered to join the armed services. The vast majority stationed in Iraq want to be here. Ground can only be taken and held by the proverbial "boots on ground".

Did you know that Americans took 50,000 casualties in ONE MONTH during World War II? It was the Battle of the Bulge, and we liberated Belgium from a dictator.

Don't know if this helped, but it's my rant for the day. :-)

Have a GREAT Army day!! Hooah!!

EDIT - To IZZY N:

You are so very wrong. The government cares very much about the lives of its soldiers. It is why millions upon millions upon millions of dollars is spent developing better armor, better weapons, better vehicles and better tactics for us to use. By your logic - that of the Almighty Dollar - the government should just send us into battle naked with a couple of rocks and sticks to throw at the enemy. Much more cost effective that the thousands of dollars of equipment I strap on each day, huh?

One more reason your logic is not too sound. For each soldier that dies, the government pays out a $400,000 life insurance policy plus a lifetime monthly payment to the surviving spouse and a monthly payment for any children until they are 18.

And if you can find me a robot that can do what the American soldier can do for $180,000, you could only be in fantasy land. Do some research before you post such nonsense.

Have a GREAT Army day!! Hooah!!

Answer 2

If your definition of "robots" means autonomous, completely self decision making devices, those do not exist. All the mechanical constructions in existence now with the label "robot" have been programmed with parameters thought up and designed by humans. There is no robot in existence that gets turned out and sent out without human supervision.
Now, if the choice is between putting a human into harm's way or putting a compilation of mechanical and electronic parts into harm's way, I pick the robot. It may be more fun to make new humans :P, but it's it's not good to lose any in the first place causing a need for replacements.
Also, the enemy wants to hurt us, not our stuff. If they realise they're not going to get the chance to personally confront us, they'll eventually lose their motivation. It's just regrettably taking them awhile to figure that out. We've got the cooler toys and we know how to make more.

Answer 3

What a wast of money!

They look quite fragile. I bet an AK-47 or shrapnel grenade going off next to it would tear it apart (just as they do humans).

How about if a smoke grenade goes off? The operator would be lost and run it into a building or end up shooting friendlies.

As for clearing buildings, the average soldier/militant man could be behind a door, pop out and literally roll it over on to it's side or top (it only weighs about 200lbs).

Not to mention they cost about $180,000. I've read the average infantry soldiers training is $100,000 (right). Uncle Sam is NOT going to pay more for a robot with such limited abilities when Joe Redneck is happy to sign up and get killed for a realistic $25,000 worth of training.

I just read on a tech site that there are only 3, count that 3 of these in Iraq.




*EDIT* in response to sgt_k

If the governemnt cares so much, what was the whole deal with the lack of decent body armor?

I've read that the average citizen with a few thousand dollars can purchase top notch body armor, while our soldiers have to make do with out of date, inferior armor.

Same with the lack of armored Humvees and other personal carriers?

About your $400,000 comment....as you stated in your post, it's the safest conflict the US has been in based on deaths over occupation / exposure time.
3500 x $400k = ($1.4 billion) a cheap price for our government. What's the war total at? About $500+ billion...so that means the payout for dead soldiers is only is only about 1/4 of 1% of the war total. Add the kids under 18 and it might jump to 1/2 of 1%. Add to that the raw treatment the wounded and mentally unstable get, and the soldiers are VERY CHEAP in Uncle Sams eyes. They've always been and always will. That's war.

http://www.nationalpriorities.org/Cost-of-War/Cost-of-War-3.html

If you actually read my post, you would realise that my opinion of the "robots" is very negative.

"The vast majority stationed in Iraq want to be here"

Do they know the facts of the occupation?
How it's all a sham, how 9/11 was a false flag to get the US public to back an invasion to Iraq, where there was never WMD's, and that the whole reason we're there is OIL.
How Saddam was attempting to sell Iraqi oil to Russia/China/etc. using the Euro, instead of the US Dollar?
You do know that the US has a sort of monopoly on the OIL market, in that every country must purchase OIL in our currency, requiring them to stock-pile huge sums of the US Dollar. Do you know what would happen if Saddam actually sold his oil using the Euro instead of our US Dollar? The rest of the Arab world would follow and our Dollar would go down the drain.

And what do you think about Haliburton, and there no-bid government contracts?

How about our censored US news? Iraq gets maybe 30 seconds on the local news each night.

Or how about the fact that there hasn't been another terror attack in the US, even on a small scale of some C4 in a shopping mall, or suicide bomber in a crowded urban area...YET 20,000+ illegal Mexicans cross over each month.
So, the terrorists are able to hijack a bunch of planes with box cutters and expertly fly them into their targets, yet now they can't do anything? Get real....it wasn't terrorists to begin with.

Open your mind man.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_flag
http://video.google.ca/videoplay?docid=-6708190071483512003
http://veritas.20m.com/

Answer 4

we do have many kinds of robots in Iraq. They all have humans running them tho. We tested one out that you can mount any of the heavier machine guns. It was pretty sweet.

Answer 5

At the end of the day to do the job right you have to use humans on the ground, not any fancy toys!
Go back to watching "Terminator".

Answer 6

those don't know how to respond to certain thing and they would break if a group of people just throw rocks at them

Answer 7

I don't know why we don't already use them. Let the Saudis and the Kuwaitis pay for them.

Answer 8

could this robot differiniate between shiite and sunni, good iraqi and dirty american hatin' terrorist.