Armed Robots Malfunction in Iraq
April 12th, 2008It’s tough to know what to believe on this one. The statement below is ambiguous. The Army spokesperson said, “It can take 10 or 20 years to try it again.” But then the piece says, “Fahey expects another armed ground bot to be deployed within the year.”
Take your pick.
I had been wondering what happened with the SWORDS program. There was no news for a long time after they were deployed to Iraq.
Via: Popular Mechanics:
Last year, three armed ground bots were deployed to Iraq. But the remote-operated SWORDS units were almost immediately pulled off the battlefield, before firing a single shot at the enemy. Here at the conference, the Army’s Program Executive Officer for Ground Forces, Kevin Fahey, was asked what happened to SWORDS. After all, no specific reason for the 11th-hour withdrawal ever came from the military or its contractors at Foster-Miller. Fahey’s answer was vague, but he confirmed that the robots never opened fire when they weren’t supposed to. His understanding is that “the gun started moving when it was not intended to move.” In other words, the SWORDS swung around in the wrong direction, and the plug got pulled fast. No humans were hurt, but as Fahey pointed out, “once you’ve done something that’s really bad, it can take 10 or 20 years to try it again.”
So SWORDS was yanked because it made people nervous. Meanwhile, the V-22 Osprey program has killed 30 people during test flights, but the tiltrotor aircraft is currently in active service. Fahey expects another armed ground bot to be deployed within the year, but the point has been made: For robots, there is no margin for error.
These stopgap computer driven systems are just inferior stepping stones to more adaptable units with real nervous systems. Friendly fire is probably always going to be an possibility, but ultimately they’ll do all their fighting alone, so it won’t be nearly as big a deal.
“For robots, there is no margin for error.”
And I would be suprised if any one of the 30 who died because of the Osprey were big brass – they know better than to trust the newest (poorly built, barely tested) weapons.
Be on the lookout for the models
that look like a dirty homeless starving kid
carrying a teddybear
(“Screamers” starring Peter Weller).
Spooky that they even have the same name as the movie.