The Terminator is Coming
We already have drone aircraft that can engage ground-based forces and kill them without human intervention. Currently under development are nuclear versions of same, which could “loiter in the air for months without refuelling, striking at will when a target comes into its sights.” A more complex problem - ground-based drones - is inching closer to a reality with the successful completion of a 132 mile race for driverless vehicles yesterday. I’m glad to see we have our priorities straight.
I suppose there may have been a time when there was honor in warfare, when a warrior would engage an enemy and fight a fair fight to the death in defense of home, family and future. Maybe not. I don’t know the first thing about it. I’ve never gone to war. I hope I never do. Our problem - our biggest problem - is the willingness of our most powerful countries to accept the use of remote killing technologies as legitimate.
If such honor ever existed, imagine the warrior who didn’t know his time had passed, standing in the battlefield awaiting an opponent, only to be struck down with an arrow. What shock and disbelief, life trickling away as the opponent stands at a distance, never in jeopardy.
If leaders can tell the public a convincing story about why a war is needed, all manner of remote technologies of death can be unleashed as a way to “save lives”, including nuclear weapons dropped on civilian populations in Hroshima and Nagasaki. What a crock. What incredible double-speak. Iraq was invaded by remote control with aerial bombardment cutting the swath. Daisy Cutters and napalm. Depleted uranium and cruise missles. Warthogs and Blackhawks. People say video games are unrealistinc because of the disproportionate power of the player. Not so.
It is the occupation that has killed 2000 US soldiers. The technology of occupation is not quite there yet.
Why this rant? Why today? Its because they are working on that technology of occupation as well, and they are doing so with glee.
“The impossible has been achieved,” cried Stanford University’s Sebastian Thrun, after the university’s customized Volkswagen crossed first. Students cheered, hoisting Thrun atop their shoulders.
Also finishing was a converted red Hummer named H1ghlander and a Humvee called Sandstorm from Carnegie Mellon University. The Stanford robot dubbed Stanley overtook the top-seeded H1ghlander at the 102-mile mark.
“I’m on top of the world,” said Carnegie Mellon robotics professor William “Red” Whittaker, who said a mechanical glitch allowed Stanley to pass H1ghlander.
The sentimental favorite, a Ford Escape Hybrid by students in Metarie, La., was the fourth vehicle to finish Saturday. The team lost about a week of practice and some lost their homes when Hurricane Katrina blew into the Gulf Coast.
The Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, plans to award $2 million to the fastest vehicle to cover the race in less than 10 hours. The taxpayer-funded race was intended to spur development of robots that could be used on the battlefield without remote controls.
These “scientists” are vying for 2M so the Pentagon can deploy remote forces of occupation. Terminators, minus the comedic personality, but fully capable of “deciding” to kill a target.
Great. When there is no human cost of war, what’s to stop them? Maybe that’s what honor in warfare was about in the first place, if it ever existed.
