“One Shot provides the warfighter with a distinct advantage,” said Dan Schultz, vice president for Lockheed Martin’s Ship and Aviation Systems business. [More]I don't suppose it's in anyone's interests to ensure that those deemed necessary to the security of a free State have a distinct advantage...?
The Army’s Aviation Applied Technology Directorate also recently awarded Lockheed Martin a contract to incorporate One Shot technology into the Autonomous Rotorcraft Sniper System, which features a powerful rifle fitted into a highly stabilized turret mounted on board an unmanned helicopter or tower.I'm assuming this won't be available to We the People, either. If you were tasked with monkeywrenching this, how would you go about it? Might be best to have that theoretical discussion now...
[Via Thomas P]
7 comments:
Why do we keep seeing that word "Directorate" -- what's really going on?
Lasers, like tracers, work both ways; devices that can detect energy at the same wavelength as the laser would conceivably be able to pinpoint the On Shot device's location.
In some cases, even toy-grade products can detect such lasers - examples might include $10 web cams or cheap handheld video cameras.
Additionally, the automated system would share many of the same weaknesses as those described in a Time magazine article about another somewhat similar system.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1137653-1,00.html
"Starship Troopers":
"Sarge, what good is a knife in a nuke fight?"
Sarge: "Give me your knife. Now put your hand on that wall."
How soon will this end up with a SWAT in a small backwoods County with a very agressive sheriff?
Can the system track multiple gunshots occurring at the same time at different locations?
Fixed tower locations should be easily dealt with, but drone or helicopter solutions would be more difficult. Spoofing the lasers in some fashion might help.
Also, it is my understanding that simple IR LEDs, run off of a battery (I've seen them mounted on the bill of a ballcap), will spoof night vision equipment to some extent. At least to the point of being unable to identify the wearer of the IR LEDs, although the location, of course is still obvious. Multiple IR LED sets in different locations, but perhaps fairly close to each other, might make "homing in" the sniper equipmet mre difficult.
Good stuff, guys.
I wonder how autonomous that Autonomous Rotorcraft Sniper System will be. Are they building VTOL hunter-killers for Skynet or what?
Humanoid target terminated.
There was another movie, "Screamers," with Peter Weller. The future space military had robotic ground-burrowing buzzsaws they could drop on enemy territory. The Autonomous Mobile Sword, nicknamed Screamers for the whining of the blade. There was one problem. They stopped recognizing "friendlies."
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