Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles

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bsl RE:Unmanned Vehicles will not save lives 4/24/2002 9:41:33 PM

Rob, Wonderful. You know it all. So what's your thesis? You went on about how the sky is falling because we're moving towards extensive use of unmanned combat systems. You either support the thesis or get off of it. I gave a number of reasons why the matters you raised are NOT going to present insupperable obstacles. All you have to say, in reply, is that you already knew it. So, then, you know why your arguments lack logical force. It's up to YOU to explain why what turn out to be little more than OLD military problems will be serious issues. I won't waste my time talking to thin air, but I will reemphasize the very first point, again: Despite your little tap dance away from addressing the issue, if one side introduces military force into an area and the other side withdraws, then the attacker CONTROLS that area. If that happens in a large enough area, the attacker controls the whole country. All you have to offer is vague muttering about guerilla warfare? Let me help you with this little bit of military history and practice; you don't CHOOSE to wage a guerilla campaign out of strength. You do so out of weakness; because you CAN'T wage a conventional campaign or don't believe you can win one.

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bsl RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 4/24/2002 9:46:20 PM

First, care to point out where I have ever written about "killing them all"? Once again, rather than actually address any specifics, all you have is a spew against me and people who think in ways you don't approve of. And, btw, for all your claims of historical knowledge, you seem to know darned little about the history of the Middle East. Virtually nothing if you can claim the Hagganah was a "terrorist" group. Unless, of course, you have some new, personal definition of "terrorism" you care to share? I never claimed the Iraqis were religious fanatics. I wrote of level of motivation, not nature of ideology. You do understand there's a difference, don't you?

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Dr. Know RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 4/25/2002 12:12:13 AM

Hi Guys!, I slipped in from the China board onto this very interesting debate. A lot of good points have been raised by both Rob and BSL. I'll just add my 2 cents here. [Don't worry, I won't write as much on this board as I did on the China one. I was fishing for a new employer there.] Not to sound too partisan, but Rob presents a much more convincing argument than does bsl. I won't go over all the sundry details, but Rob seems to have a much better grasp of both history and politics. Specifically, Rob's cut to the heart of the matter when he explains how the low tolerance of Western, and particularly American, society for casualties has generated a delusional mind-set. This mind-set not only creates an over reliance on technology, but it has also spawned a political environment where a few more massive strikes on the scale of 9/11 - or a protracted terrorist campaign like the one raging in Palestinian territories - would probably convince the American public to accept a compromise peace with radical Islam. [Mind you, I'm talking here about a protracted campaign that drags on and on for the next 5 years or so. Even pres. Bush said that the American public would surely tire of this conflict before the 2 year mark was up. He's got a year and a half to go. This idea that the American public will tire of this conflict, if it drags on and on, is a judgement on my part (and Bush's). But it's an informed and considered professional judgement.] But getting back on point: Bsl said that "war is where the forces are ... if you refuse to fight" then you admit defeat - or some words to that effect. I'm sorry, but that's crazy talk. An enemy is defeated IFF 1 of the following 2 conditions is met: 1) You've killed every last man, woman, and child of the enemy. or much more commonly in the last 300 years ... 2) THE ENEMY HIMSELF THINKS HE IS DEFEATED. It isn't until the enemy himself admits that continued hostilies are not worth pursuing that he is actually beat. As Lt. Col. R Leonhard wrote so lucidly in his book "Manuever Warfare", DEFEAT IS A PURELY PSYCHOLOGICAL PHENOMENON. Therefore, all the gadgetry in the world won't help you if your enemy is determined to fight and you're not. I'll give an example of what I'm talking about. Supposing the US, w/ all of its technologial might, decided to wage war on a crappy, tin-pot, little country. Let's just say, ... uhhh .... I don't know ... Iraq? If the Iraqi enemy decides to "go guerilla" (as Liddell Hart puts it), then can anybody on this board actually imagine the American public supporting the use of American infantry in fighting a protracted street to street, house to house, urban warfare battle in Iraq lasting for more than few days? Of course not! Actually, can anybody imagine the American public supporting any kind of protracted anti-guerrilla or urban fight campaign, and for any reason other than for defending American soil? What's going to happen, if Saddam is smart and plays guerrilla, is that after a few days of watching a giant urban-brawl unfold on CNN; all those suburban 'Soccer moms' and nervous gen. Xers (who work in cushy office-jobs and who have become accustomed to a pampered upper-middle class lifestyle - I have to admit I'm one of them... I'm a gen. Xer, not a Soccer mom) will start quaking their Birkenstocks about Saddam's secret agents putting ground-up nuclear waste into their drinking water ... or worse. American public opinion will then call for a halt to hostilities. In effect, America will then have defeated itself. Period. End of story. [Even in Afghanistan, because of the American fear of casualties, the overwhelming majority of the infantry fighting was done by our mercenary allies (oops, I mean 'friends') the Northern Alliance. The few times we did send in large numbers of light infantry, the resulting fiasco meant that the missions were basically abandoned - for example, operation Anaconda and that first airborne assault. That's why "Allied forces" haven't won much of a victory in Afghanistan: the bulk of the Taliban escaped because we refused to send in enough ground troops to hunt them down and all that was accomplished in Afghanistan was that a shaky Taliban overlordship of various tribes and warlords was replaced by an even shakier 'foreign' imposed regime led by Karzai - who only controls Kabul with the help of tens of thousands of foreign occupation troops. But getting back to the point about robots replacing infantry...] And furthermore, please don't tell me that if we replaced our infantry with robots, then America could go after guerillas and fight urban battles again. The American public would be equally horrified by pictures of little American toy tanks and robot helicopters shooting-up unarmed enemy civilians caught in cross-fires, as it would be by images of American grunts getting machine gunned in some 3rd World hell-hole. Nasty images of that 'Iraqi Death March to Baghdad', during Desert Storm, was the major reason why George the 1st terminated hostilities w/ Saddam so fast. Grotesque pictures of all those charred Iraqi corpses in their stolem pick-up trucks and BMPs were making people back in the States quesy. [Oh horror of horrors! There's actually people in those cars and trucks getting smart-bombed !!! Who would have known?] So in the end, Rob is right, when he says that the problem w/ the West is its delusional attitude toward casualties and its worship of technology. And no amount of High-tech Iron-mongery will change that. For more on where warfare is going, I'd advise anyone to follow the Pentagon's advice and go and read Van Creveld's book on future warfare. Old-man Van Creveld is the most respected military historian alive: he's lectured at every major military academy - and along with a handful of political and international security analysts (like E. Luttwak), represents the cutting edge of serious academic thought on the future of war. In a single sentence, he says the future of warfare is not going to be dominated by robots and nuclear weapons, but instead, war is headed back to where it was centuries ago ...It's headed towards terrorism by non-state actors precisely because of the overwhelming conventional and nuclear advantage of the West. Last thing. One last point that I think I should mention. Certain people really should look up their history (and not the CNN version). Those early Jewish groups in British administered Palestine, that were active between the two World Wars, were considered terrorist groups by the British colonial administration. It's a point of historical fact. Now don't get me wrong here. I'm not out to insult or denigrate anybody. I just wanted to point out a fact. I'm also not taking sides on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. Nor am I anti-smeitic. I have the greatest respect for prof. Van Creveld, who is Jewish and holds a permanent appointment at the Hebrew university of Jerusalem. I'm just saying that the British authorites considered those Jewish groups active between the wars in Palestine as criminal and subversive organizations - just as they did the Arab ones. It's just an academic point of fact. Anyway, thanks for reading. Best regards

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bsl RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 4/25/2002 6:32:17 PM

1)I am familiar with the various definitions of "war" and what they relate to. I have a couple of notes up, right now, where I say that winning a war means getting an enemy to do what you want him to do (or not do), and I go on, in one note, to relate this to Von Clauswitz's observation that war is the continuation of politics by other means. Nevertheless, I answered Rob in the way I did because his notes have gone on, at some length, making points which don't bear scrutiny. The thrust of much of his argument seems to ignore the simple fact that when one side projects force into an area and the other side refuses engagement and withdraws, the first side is most of the way towards not just effective, but total control of that area. Rob goes on about a magic guerilla campaign which appears, as if by magic, in force, hither and yon, in friendly warfighting nexi. I spent some time trying to explain how the details he supplied all seemed to break down to various aspects of warfare which are not new, at all, but, instead, old issues which our military is ALREADY prepared to meet. I tried to address some of the stated weaknesses in the thesis. I'll move to an implicit one; that American force posture is going to be utterly and completely transformed into a small bunch of geeklike specialists sitting somewhere in theater, but well away from the fighting, ripe for assault by the valiant mujahadeen. Give me a break. Unmanned platforms are going to *supplement* existing forces; not replace them. We'll add small scale surveillance capabilities to the spearheads. We'll have larger craft at division or corps levels, plus some strategic platforms run out of Washington/Virginia. As we add *significant* fighting capability to drones - which we do NOT have and will not have for a good many years in the future; two Hellfires on a large drone run from theater HQ or America are NOT what we're talking about - they will be used as a sort of shock troop, to dull the sharpest part of the enemy spear or supplement defenses of major installations. We'll still put men with rifles into the field, in numbers, and we'll still have big guns shoved around by engines guided by real, living drivers. Your Iraq example is entirely wrong. Iraq is FAR from a minor power. "Crappy tin-pot". Sorry, but his is just, plain wrong. Iraq is a medium-sized power, in terms of manpower, economic resources, technical expertise, military prowess, etc.. This discussion isn't going anywhere if we can't separate Iraq from Libya or Congo. If you check around, you'll find a depressingly long series of notes I've posted on how things might go in an assault on Iraq. It doesn't look towards a trivial exercise or any minor things, at all. To the contrary, while I feel that conventional fighting will go very well, and the Iraqi military will perform relatively poorly against a well-considered, well prepared American campaign, I believe there's a strong possibility of an unconventional attack by Iraq on American forces in theater, Israel, or, conceivably, the continental United States, as well as a fair possibility the fighting will expand to encompass much of the region. The possibility of the campaign turning into a local, guerilla campaign, otoh, is relatively small. Hussein is far to widely hated by *Iraqis* and has far too little heartfelt support among his own armed elements for that. The moment he abandons control of very large, conventional forces (including police elements), his own life is at serious threat from his own people. And, any scenario which seriously examines HOW he'd have to wage a guerilla campaign needs to explain how he does so WITHOUT abandoning most of Iraq and, thus, allowing most Iraqis the freedom to decide if they want to die for him without having his guns aimed at their backs while they think it over. You also get some of the history wrong. Sorry, but I was around during the Gulf War, too. The only people getting noticably queasy were the media and Colin Powell. There was NO groudswell of public opinion to stop the fighting when it was stopped. That brilliant decision was made for *external*, not internal reasons. It had little to do with American politics, but a lot to do with "coalition" and UN politics. The notion that a few more days of hostilities would have damaged the Administration *in America* is sheer fantasy. You seriously misread domestic politics, too, if you believe that people would NOT tolerate a high level of American casualties IF they believe the fight to be a real American interest; the defense of AMERICA, rather than a matter of abstract geopolitics, or helping a distant and questionable ally. The past years of the real American queasiness about taking casualties is misread if it is considered purely a matter of distaste for violence. That was ONE aspect. Only one. The other was that Americans had felt that events had moved a LONG way from WW2, where they believed almost unanimously, that their own lives and liberties were on the line (Pace, reality. We're speaking of perceptions.) Korea and Vietnam were never perceived, domestically, to be of this nature, and years without victory had exhausted American patience with this sort of exercise. HOWEVER, let's do recall that American and Western Europe went through a very similar period of feelings after WW1. They passed when people became convinced that they had something real at stake. Similarly, American opinion changed, in a big way, on 9-11, and the REAL question visa vie Iraq is NOT how many casualties we take, but what Americans feel the fight is about. If they agree with Mr. Bush, you'll be shocked at how many casualties Americans will accept. If they don't, the Adminstration will have a very short leash. But, given that during the entire Clinton era, both Congress (including Congressional democrats) and the country consistently supported a stronger, harsher, more violent policy towards Saddam Hussein than Mr. Clinton did, I'm not overly concerned that the message can't be gotten out. Finally, let's get off it with regards to "terrorism". Rob didn't make the point you made. You cited what the British said. He cited his own opinion. Unless you want to entirely revise the definition of "terrorism", you can talk from now till December without ever proving that the Haganah were "terrorists". You'd need to define terrorism as fighting attackers and fighting colonial rule to do that, I don't believe for a minute that you really believe that. If you did, you'd be defining George Washington as a terrorist, too. Knowing history, I'm afraid, means knowing not just theories and rhetoric, but actual facts,too.

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Dr. Know RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 4/29/2002 6:09:54 AM

Hi Guys!, bsl's latest post is logical, literate, and generally well written. It's exactly the kind of reply that I like to see!!! ... Even if I don't agree with it. I'll give only a cursory reply now ... my vacation started last Friday and I'll be travelling for the next week or so. In Japan, it's "Golden Week" and I'm sitting in one of those smokey Korean internet cafes as we speak. 1)About that "magical guerrilla campaign" Though me and Rob were flippant in how we used some words in some of our posts, I'll stick with the gist of what I meant (and what I think Rob meant). What I meant, was that an enemy will take steps (not just to avoid American forces on the battlefield when they came, but he will) ensure that Amereican forces CANNOT come. IE, on the grand-strategic-level, a smart enemy will use diplomacy, propaganda, and economic leverage to forestall any American military action. What Saddam is doing right now, is the perfect example of this. He knows the US can't attack Iraq while the Palestinians are rising in rebellion against the Israeli occupation. (Notice here that I'm not taking anybody's side. I'm using "occupation" in its technical sense: 'there are currently Israeli military units in Palestinian-Arab inhabited areas while those same Arabs don't want them there'.) Strategically, Saddam (as you yourself say) can try and drag in other countries into any potential conflict - and thus throw a crowbar into American deployment plans. Operationally, Saddam can use or threaten to use his chemical and biological weapons. Such a move would weaken American public resolve. He can also fight a defensive urban campaign, that at least has the prospects for significant American casualities. That was what I meant to say, in my last post, when I said that it was "crazy talk" to assume that if the enemy refused to fight on your terms, then you've already won. (Come to think of it, I should have avoided the word guerilla too. I should have been more specific, and less tongue-in-cheek.) 2) My flippant remark about Iraq being a "tin-pot" little country I'm sorry but it is. Iraq IS more powerful than the Sudan or Libya. But I still think Iraq is a crappy little country because: a) Iraq is not a Super Power, b) Iraq is not a major-regional Power / Potential Super-Power like China, Europe, Japan, and Russia are, c) Iraq is not in the same league as the major Western European powers like France, Germany, Italy, Britain, or even Canada and India are, d) Iraq isn't even in the same league as Taiwan, Mexico, Brazil, Vietnam, South Africa and (of course) Israel. Ergo, following my criteria, Iraq is a "crappy little country". 4) Iraqi Barbecue not to American taste When I said that images of chared Iraqi's, is what got the administration of George I to cut short the first Gulf War, I'm just repeating discussions held in one of my graduate seminars that looked at some of the diplomatic papers and documents from the Gulf War. I'm not talking here about what CNN reported, or what "opinion on the street" said. I'm just saying, that regardless of how Americans felt at the time, the archival evidence tells us that the administration of George I was VERY worried about the effect of the Iraqi barbecue on public opinion. Similarly, the archival evidence also says that George I's cabinet was worried 'shitless' about Saddam making a partial withdrawal, or beginning serious negotiations, at the last minute before Bush's deadline past. That was called the "Nightmare scenario" by the Bush team, because it would have shaken the reslove of many alliance members to attack. If you want more either of these topics, I'll try to dig up the references if you want them - but it'll take some time because a)I'm currently on vacation b)I normally work a 55 hour week (hey, I work in Japan so I can't help it) so I'm pretty unmotivated and lethargic by the time the week rolls around c) I'll need to get to an academic library with extensive English holdings - quite a trip. 5) On American Resolve We can debate the current state of American public resolve, and morale, ad nauseam. But my point wasn't that "all" or even "most" Americans are fearful about finishing a campaign against Saddam... Far from it. My point was that a good many INFLUENTIAL people are fearful and hesitant to do so... I wasn't joking about those pampered gen X and Y types being panicky and lacking in resolve. These "men" that I'm talking about are those 20-something, professional, 'cool-guys' who drive around in flashy black sports cars, wear dark European-cut suits that are too tight for even their girl friends' bodies (and who secretly carry compact-mirrors to check their "men's make-up"; to my lasting shame I secretly considered doing this a few years ago when I saw all those adds in Men's Mags advertising for them), and who spend their off hours reading Maxim, watching Sex and The City, and playing on their X-Box's while thinking how "Cool" they are... These fellows are the spoiled children of Middle Class baby boomers who entered the work force when that whole internet- stock bubble started and who thought the world was their hi-tech oyster ... [To my embarassment, most of my friends belong to this sorry tribe of fools.] Believe me, these guys freak-out at the sight of a cockroach crawling over their Corona at a bar. I doubt that they'd support any bloody, multi-year campaign against terrorism (if the Radical Islamists keep quiet). A long struggle would mean that the stock market would collapse again and that many of them would stay unemployed - as they now are. And horror of horrors!!!..they might get conscripted! (Even if it's just to patrol an airport.) Remember all those Time stories about those Yuppies couldn't think about anything after 9/11, except how to escape from the "city" after the next attack came? Those are the guys I'm talking about here. Oh, and those soccer moms driving around in those SUV's won't like the idea of a long war either. And then there's those blasE college and highschool kids. And let's not forget the usual crew of lefty-nuts that'll start squaking for peace after America's won a few token victories. In the end, the problem is the 'small but vocal minority' of pampered gen. X and Yers, college kids, and the usual lefty-nuts just might push the political agenda enough to stop this war when they get organized. 6) That Israeli terorist thing. I'm running out of time - gotta go meet my friends for a beer. But I'll say a little more about my stance on terrorism next time. For now, like I said before, I'm not taking sides with either the Israeli's or the Palestinians. Actually, I try to never take "moral" sides: I'm a realist like Morganthau, Luttwak, and Kissinger. Like I said, I'm not not anti-semitic either, I have the greatest respect and admiration for those 3 scholars - all 3 are American Jews btw. (At least I think they are, correct me if I'm wrong) See you guys later. Best Regards

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Dr. Know typo in my last posy 4/29/2002 7:29:06 AM

I mistakenly typed "I'm not not anti-semitic" What I meant to type was "I'm NOT anti-semitic" Thanks

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bsl RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 4/29/2002 6:35:14 PM

D.N., I have a habit of throwing off a flip comment at moments of questionable appropriateness, too. Don't worry about it. And, btw, as far as typos go, my quote of Clauswitz ought to have read "diplomacy" rather than "politics". Re: Saddam & Iraq I agree that he is, even as we speak, trying to work the region to **prevent** the preconditions for a war with America to be created. This is an important observation, and needs to be made part of any general discussion of how regional countries are acting, and will act. We shouldn't be speaking, only, of abstract considerations concerning possible alignments, without taking this specific, timely factor into account. Indeed, in doing so, I think it is important to see that, since WW2, regional alignments in the Arab/Islamic Middle East have ebbed and flowed like the tide. There is ample precedent for countries whose leaders are virtually blood enemies to embrace and swear to help each other. (e.g. Egypt and Syria, in 1966-67). I also agree - to an extent - that Iraq, especially, is trying to play the Israeli card as part of a larger strategy to avoid American attack. I hasten to add that this in no way makes the present events a consequence of Iraqi international policy. But, the Iraqi element is most likely an exacerbating factor. OTOH, I don't quite agree that an ongoing Palestinian-Israeli fight **precludes** a contemporaneous American campaign in Iraq. It certainly complicates things, though. Generally, I'd be careful of how much I put on Saddam's head, specifically. He doesn't orginate or control much of what goes on in the Israeli sector. He can certainly almost always make things worse, but he didn't start things, he isn't anything remotely like the primary reason they keep going, and removing him from the equation would not end or settle things. The two areas of concern DO overlap; they're not identical. I agree that the *threat*, explicit or implicit, to use, somehow, WMD is a factor to be considered. I disagree that the threat will deter American action. Hussein's ability to cow the American public, in context, is quite limited. He'll find far more support in the media than in the public, and the media is pretty jumpy, these days, about turning around and seeing the public frowning at it over this constellation of issues. To the contrary, if there was any hesitation over whether or not to put Saddam's head on a pike, a public threat of use of WMD against America would create a groundswell of domestic anger which would justify almost literally the complete destruction of Iraq. Mr. Bush would be in the enviable position of being the *restraining* element on American policy. IOW, in effect, he would have a greenlight to make virtually any policy decision he thought necessary, secure that it would be supported by Congress and the public. However, I do see some room for Saddam to work the Europeans in this way, trying to create an overt split between Europe and America. The problem with this is that to the extent he succeeds, the results will probably be much more a long term problem for American policy than an effective impediment to action against Iraq, in the coming months. And, as such, would only strengthen American resolve against him, in Washington. Be seen, IOW, more of a scortched earth revenge than an effective counter, and, as such, make Hussein seem even more a barbarian, and even more necessary to remove. (I'll answer the rest of your note in my next note)

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bsl RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 4/29/2002 6:55:11 PM

Re: "Crappy little country" That's a good alternative to "Shitty little country" which is more applicable to France (as well as, apparently, current official French diplomatic language). Nope. Iraq isn't. Lebanon, Yemen, Somalia; yes. Iraq, no. Indeed, the countries you propose as real medium sized powers are, arguably, less so, right now. In potential, certainly, there are at least four EU members significantly more powerful than Iraq. (Germany, France, Britain, Italy). The caveat is "potential". The level of effective military power in Europe, these days, is low compared to the potential. Iraq creates power much nearer it's real potential. The result is an Iraq which NO European power could beat in a real fight, right now. It would take YEARS for any or all the EU to create the real power to defeat Iraq. They could CERTAINLY do so. But, they simply don't have the effective power right now. That, alone, ought be a giveaway as to how powerful Iraq really is. (For now, I'm limiting this discussion to "power" in the military sense.) Indeed , of the whole list of countries you provided, only Israel is clearly the military superior of Iraq, IN IRAQ. India and China can't project power on that level, right now. Russia would be hard pressed to. It COULD, probably, if it was made an absolute national interest, but it would require them to focus the national effort in a big way. That's it. None of the other countries you mention are clearly superior to Iraq in the military sense even on their own territory, save Japan, which has next to no ability to project power. "Potential" superpowerdom is a lot like a "potentially rewarding date". Nothing more than hot air till you actually score. We've seen something like a whole generation of "potential" (western)European military expansion, which has always turned out to be nothing more than a series of speeches. Ditto, the "potential" Arab destruction of Israel (based on the undeniable potential of a nation which outnumbers the Israelis by something like 50 to 1, AND has some important economic resources and a lot of international political influence based mostly on that.) If you're getting NSC or cabinet papers on the Gulf War, things have changed since I was in school, when it was 30 years for these kinds of papers to be declassified. (I got a copy of NSC 68 the day after it was released.) I think you're looking at the wrong people when you refer to those you think will get the wobblies. The folks inside the beltway who have the jobs who count seem to have concluded that the matters really at issue more than justify this campaign. This is one time I strongly suggest people look, carefully, at the official and semiofficial statments which have come out since 9-11. Apart from some recent wobbling on ISRAELI actions, they have been remarkably consistent and clear about what they thought was happening and what had to be done in response. In face of that, I strongly doubt the Adminstration will hesistate at hypothetically weak knees in Hollywood, or Wall Street. And, as someone who lives in the NY area, and knew people who were in and around the towers on 9-11, let me assure you that Wall Street - meaning the people actually working there - will cheer, loudly, as things explode and burn in Iraq, and some other places. This is personal. Believe me; it's personal. For that matter, the way any audible whining from groups generally perceived to be spoiled and immoral, anyway, will play so badly in the country that it will quickly disappear from the public arena.

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pfd RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 6/14/2002 5:34:26 PM

Sure Ain't elektronik-but I have to put my tiny oar in. Iraq doesn't have the logistical infastructure to place itself in a ' better than Europe' position. Secondly Israel hs Nukes up the Pazoo. Kinda skews the picture...

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fred79 RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 3/23/2003 11:46:06 PM

this has gotten away from the real subject manned verses unmanned/remotly manned vehicle. frankly i can only see this as a good thing. a remotly manned vehicle like the predator is not a man replacement but a man multiplier. The greatest use of UAV's in the near future is the unmanned fighter using a combination of remote flight and automated flight you can effectively multiply the power of your trained men. if a man could fly a UAV off the runway, set it on a path towards the target area. and weight untill it got their to use it then turn it around and send it home. so this way while a pilot is waiting for the plane to get there he can rest, eat, or do other functions. 1 pilot could control three planes. one fighting,taking off, landing, and two in transit. security for the time being could be handled by space or high altitude based microwave communication. This is force multiplication. so less of your pilots are in the air and more of them get the rest they need to perform. they can also design planes not based on the limits of the pilots but on the limits of physics. I also think that Tanks maybe replaced by a RCV(remote controled vehicle) they could be wire guided or use infared,microwave, or laser comunication. then yoou build the performance around the mission not the soldier. so now you don't need a tank that has NBC capabilities, you don't have to carry really heavy armor to protect the inhabitants from sabot weapons that kill by spall molten metal and heat, systems like the abrams with seperated fuel and munitions bunker could survive a sabot strike to be rebuilt and no human to clean out. in fact it may keep running if it doesn,t hit a critical component. so you can lead in with RCV tanks and follow with IFV's and armored control vehicles. this solves a major problem now in the tank force and that is that high power defendable tank platforms are too heavy. this could greatly reduce the weight of tanks from the 70 tonners to 30-40 tonners. so a c-17 could airlift a RCV tank and a LAV control vehicle in one flight. and then drones for city fighting would be extremely helpfull the first rule of combat is make them die not you. If a platoon of infantry can use a armed man carriable vehicle to enter rooms rather than men you increase the power of a unit so rather than giving up my life or taking even non leathal hits i could not be effected at all and still clear a house. I also want to say that a real advantage of UAV's is that they can amplify a human beings abilities. humans are rather weak systems our real benifit is brains, and a UAV can group many systems into one. so a pilot could have a 360* view in one view all sensor systems could be inclusive so radar, ladar, infrared, and vision could be viewed at ounce. this could be applied for tanks also using all of your sensors together and even more sensors you could utilize sensors to smell and feel the area(sense diesel fuel, gunpoweder residue, feel sysmic activity ect). could they be overriden yea, can the computers on a tomahawk be overridden yep are we still shooting them off by the hundreds aha. I don't think that you can replace human beings but you can always overcome our limitations. that really why thing are developed, the machine gun wasn't developed to replace people but to make them more effective, planes were developed so people could fly, tanks were developed because infantry got killed trying to take out machinguns. we develope tools to deal with our limitations. also the belief that american are scared to die or some crap like that is just that crap. do we see any need to waste life, no! since almost always we a re now fighting against people who are on teh defensive we develope ways to take that advantage away from them. the defender always has the advantage since he knows were he is, and he knows were we are. so we develope technology to take that away. and developing something to protect us while we discover where the enemy is. and I think BSL said this that if saddam used NBC weapons Bush could do what he wanted and i think that is pretty close to teh truth if he used WMD against our troops he could use MOAB's all over teh place and eliminate every soldier. if saddam used WMD against american mainland he could nuke teh whole area. he could take out the saudis, iraq, iran, every one of our enemies there.

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robots RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 4/27/2003 2:16:07 PM

Here's an interesting article that refutes many of the claims that unmanned vehicles will replace humans. link "If a man?s trust is in a robot that will go around the earth of its own volition and utterly destroy even the largest cities on impact, he is still pitiably vulnerable to the enemy who appears on his doorstep, equipped and willing to cut his throat with a penknife, or beat him to death with a cobblestone. It is well to remember two things: no weapon is absolute, and the second of even greater import- no weapon, whose potential is once recognized as of any degree of value, ever becomes obsolete." - J. M. Cameron

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robots RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 4/27/2003 2:23:32 PM

another interesting quote from the article: "The notion that UCAVs could replace humans in warfare echoes of something out of a science-fiction novel. I think back to the time when a general told me that the movie Star Wars taught us three lessons: there will always be fighter pilots, there will always be fighter-pilot bars, and the dive toss never works. He was right."

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Shaka of Carthage RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 4/27/2003 2:52:11 PM

I don't get that same answer. Forget the different abilities of the two. The main thing was that a human in the pit has the ability to 360 degree vision and process what he sees. So what happens when that UCAV operator has something mounted on his head so that when he turns he sees that view? Isn't that now giving him the same 360 degree vision without him having to actually be in the pit? Maybe thats not true today. But its coming.

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robots RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 4/29/2003 9:15:51 PM

<> You have still have not address the issue that by completely relying on a robot to fight wars thousands of miles from home, you leave the human controllers vulunerable to many guerrilla/terrorist style attacks on the human controller. Since the controller is no longer trained to fight in the conventional sense, they're more vulunerable. "Why attack the robot when you can take out the human controller? Why just destroy the robot, they'll just produce new ones?" Our enemies could be asking themselves. Attack the source, "the center of gravity". We all seem to realize the risks coming with human causualities, since that's probally the number #1 reason people advocate for unmanned vehicles. Why make our soldiers potentially more vulunerbale? This is will not be "Robot Wars" like you see on TV where the robots do all the fighting will the human controllers smile at each other, the human will still be a target because without the human controller the robot can't do anything. So the goal of sparing lives by using robots is offering a false sense of security. Do robots have a place on the battlefield? Absolutely YES! But as far as replacing human involvment completely is totally ridiculas. Machiavelli once said that a military establishment tends to reflect the the qualities of the civil society for which it is a part. A military that fights only with robots and seeks to replace human involvement altogether often tells you that the society its seeks to defend is one of cowards who will not fight to defend itself. A nation that cannot depend on own its citizens to defend their country is a nation of cowards. A nation of cowards that refuses to defend itself deserves whatever enslavement and tyranny comes their way. The Catholic theologian Fr. Benedict Groeschel once remarked that sacrifice was a lost art in the West. Well the discussions here seem to prove he's right! "God grants liberty only to those who love it, and are always ready to guard and defend it." Daniel Webster

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Shaka of Carthage RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 4/30/2003 1:31:03 PM

Interesting point about the controller being vulnerable. I would assume that the controller will operate from a base, the same one with the support infrastructure aircraft use now. Or else there will be units deployed to protect them. Either way the UCAV's will supplement, then replace pilots. I don't believe the UCAV drive is related to human losses. More a cost effectiveness issue. It sounds more like you are referring to "robots" taking the place of Infantry. Many, many years ago, they did in a way. Its just that we called them Tanks back then. I agree that a nation needs to be defended by its citizens. I'll even take it a step further and state that you really aren't a citizen unless you have defended your country. But the rhetoric you are talking about stopped working about WWI/WWII. There is no reason to throw away the lives of your citizens when there are much smarter ways for them to be of service.

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