Future Soldiers

[mrpyromania]

http://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?click_i...36F362&set_id=1

 

So I wonder to myself, is this a good or bad thing? Sure, it will protect soldiers, and it can be used for fire fighters, but making more powerful armor makes everyone else develope more powerful weaponry. And im sure that there are better places the money could be going. What is your opinion?

[Dark0ne]

I can't see this stuff ever becoming a wide-scale feature of any army, America or otherwise. I didn't read the whole article so didn't catch anything about the price of these battle suits, but I'd guess it'd be around $100,000 - $500,000 per suit. If we look at the amount of soldiers in Iraq at the moment, roughly 100,000...

 

$250,000 x 100,000 = $25,000,000,000 to suit up the US army in Iraq.

 

I think they'd be better off putting the money into cybernetics than battle suits that humans have to operate.

[Switch]

Haha sounds kind of like a good idea to me, but like Dark0ne says, it's really not practical. They'd never be able to suit up all their forces in that stuff anyway, it'd be too damn expensive. Unless they manage to find an extremely cheap way to manufacture all that advanced technology it wouldn't work.

 

As for more powerful weapons... maybe. But remember nowadays we're usually fighting against terrorists who wouldn't have the resources to build anything that advanced. However if someone else did as a precaution and terrorists got hold of it, that wouldn't be good. :P

 

Not to mention the uproar it would cause if the American army suddenly got this new soldier super armour, it might force more nervous nations to act (war), thinking that America had too much of an unfair advantage.

[Peregrine]

I guess none of you really read the article... it's full of idealistic dreaming, no more realistic than the articles from 50 years ago that said we'd all have flying cars and be living on the moon. Their "demonstration" was an idea of what the system might look like, assuming they can solve that minor problem of not having any of the technology it requires...

 

I can't see this stuff ever becoming a wide-scale feature of any army, America or otherwise. I didn't read the whole article so didn't catch anything about the price of these battle suits, but I'd guess it'd be around $100,000 - $500,000 per suit. If we look at the amount of soldiers in Iraq at the moment, roughly 100,000...

 

$250,000 x 100,000 = $25,000,000,000 to suit up the US army in Iraq.

 

I think they'd be better off putting the money into cybernetics than battle suits that humans have to operate.

 

That's assuming they used it for everyone. Not everyone would need it... a tank driver or pilot, for example, wouldn't be able to use it effectively. So that's a lot of those 100,000 soldiers taken off the list... and that's not even counting the reduction in numbers something that powerful would allow (assuming it is possible to be made as-described).

 

Oh, and just for comparison... one carrier costs about 6 billion, so the price is high, but within reach if the US military really wanted them.

 

As for more powerful weapons... maybe. But remember nowadays we're usually fighting against terrorists who wouldn't have the resources to build anything that advanced. However if someone else did as a precaution and terrorists got hold of it, that wouldn't be good. tongue.gif

 

Not likely. Simple physics puts a limit on how powerful a weapon a human can use. There isn't going to be anything for terrorists to get.

 

Not to mention the uproar it would cause if the American army suddenly got this new soldier super armour, it might force more nervous nations to act (war), thinking that America had too much of an unfair advantage.

 

Your point? You seem to forget the minor problem that in a defensive war (as opposed to invading China, for example) the US could probably defeat the entire rest of the world. The balance of power is just that one-sided... and that's not even counting the fact that you couldn't unite the rest of the world against us, or that our allies would rather have a chance at the armor than fight us in a suicidal war.

[Abramul]

Can you say:

http://www.chemistrydaily.com/chemistry/upload/thumb/9/92/200px-Fallout2.jpg

 

Power armor is always cool.

[Tammo_Korsai]

Neat, but I doubt it will affordable.

[Sticky Mick]

Then Windows crashes and he dies a terrible Blue Screen of Death :playful:

[loveme4whoiam]

hen Windows crashes and he dies a terrible Blue Screen of Death sq_yellow_playful.gif

 

Snigger. This is true, the technology is still years and years away, but I don't see why its such a bad vision for the future. As Dark0ne said, the costs will be astronomical, but would all the suits have to have all the features; for example, the remote control unit on the soldiers arm for controlling UAVs and whatnot wouldn't be needed by the regular soldier, or even most officers. I don't doubt that the US would have several different types for different applications in combat; they have them in everything else they use. I think that, yes, the money could probably be useful on something else, but this is still an interesting if hypothetical look at the future of (American) wars.

[Marxist ßastard]

Oh, ultra-tech nano-armor. I'd bet that even the most supercharged of microbullets won't be able to fracture it!

 

Besides being the best candidate for Bullshit Bingo I've seen all my life, this article describes something that only an ignorant, cowardly, and immature military would use -- at the very least, a military that can't get its objectives in order. If this is actually deployed in combat that is expected to last more than a matter of days, then the enemy gets desperate. If they can't fight our military on equal grounds, then I'll give you one guess as to what their next target would be.

 

...And then think about what sort of recruits we'd be getting with this army of invincible soldiers -- a bunch of cavalier high-school football heroes that enlist so that then can get their own page in the yearbook. We end up with a bunch of careless killing machines on the ground, and friendly fire, broken treaties, and complete lack of proper command follows. As bad as that may be when they're active abroad, I'd shudder to think what would happen once the war is over, and we release a bunch of ravenous thugs with absolutely no concept of death into the general population.

 

Simple physics puts a limit on how powerful a weapon a human can use.

 

What theorem of simple physics creates this limit?

[loveme4whoiam]

You make a good point Marxist; I didn't consider the psychology of making a group of soldiers, not the most modest of people anyway, invincible. Of course, if such technology was available the number of soldiers would be reduced so stricter recruiting could be conducted to filter out the ignorant fools. Ah well, it's not like this will ever happen, at least not in the next 30-odd years. Maybe by then we'll have world peace ;)