Meet "Orca" - The Insanely Large Apocalyptic Drone of the Seas

[727Sky]

I'm pretty dubious of this push to mechanize the battlefield. Now, keep in mind all my fights have been on the ground, in the mud and the snow and the rain and the oppressive heat, and never in the air nor the sea, so I'm probably talking out of my ass.

Humans have something that "autonomous" machines do not, and can not, have - intuition. A machine cannot just "feel" the presence of the enemy like people can.

Once we get all the soldiers off the battlefields and fill them up with bots, who is going to be there to attack? Not soldiers. They're off the battlefield. Only civilians will be attackable. I can't see how that is going to be a good thing. There is no incentive to avoid war when there is no pain, no loss, no injury. Blowing up another bot doesn't carry the same emotional cost as capping a person - someone's son, husband, father who will never come back. It makes war just another video game with infinite re-spawns and no repercussions... and no incentive NOT to fight.

This machine has a hybrid power plant? Diesel and, of all things, Li-ion batteries? Aren't the Li-ion batteries what are causing electric cars and e-bikes to explode and burn down when they... get wet?

Until they develop fire-bots and maintenance 'droids, there can be no such thing as "autonomous" machinery. There has to be someone to do maintenance and repairs at sea to be effective.

I was - and still am - dubious when they started "Buck Rogers"-ing ground-pounders with all kinds of battery operated geegaws. Sure, I've got a red-dot sight, a flashlight, and a green laser mounted to my AR, but they are just battery operated gadgets, not something I would actually depend upon in a firefight. Murphy's Law dictates that the batteries in your geegaws are going to either die or explode just when you need them the most. So, my primary sighting system is good old fashioned iron sights. As if to prove my point, the laser on my AR is in a bad way right now - seems to be a problem with the switch rather than the batteries or the laser diode... but the iron sights are just as functional as they were in 1776.

A few years ago, a guy tried to sell me an AR at what I considered an exorbitant rate. I looked at it, and the first thing i noticed is that it had no sights. Charging that much money, and the damned thing could not even be aimed. So I said "it's got no sights". The guy said "of course not - it's 'optics ready' ". So I said "but it's-got-no-damned-sights. Ya can't even aim the fuckin' thing for that much money!" He just stuck with "but it's optics-ready" So I said "Optics break. It's GOT NO GOD-DAMNED SIGHTS! It ain't any-damned thing ready! You can sell this piece of shit to some wannabe poser who ain't never heard a shot fired in anger and don't know any better, 'coz I sure as hell ain't plunking real money down for a fake gun!" and left. I mean, you don't want a half-assed rifle when your one and only whole life might depend on it!

How much worse can it get when there is no human around to circumvent the inevitable breakdowns and emergencies that Murphy's Law insists are going to happen on these "autonomous" vehicles?

Nope, I ain't for none of this mechanized battlefield crap... but the money tossers can - and will - throw big bucks at whatever they like. It ain't like that money is coming out of THEIR pockets!

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While I agree with most of what you have said the "Puzzle Palace" boys and girls think stuff is going to be happening so fast that the human mind can not keep up with the flow of a new warfare scenario. A.I. will identify a target that is moving 5 times the speed of a bullet, plot an intercept and fire before a human can say, "Oh shit!"

Just be glad we are both old and will not have to fight in the next one unless there is an invasion which as long as we are armed in America would be a hard nut to crack with an old time invasion IMO. I am in favor of an EMP followed by a Neutron bomb against any country that wants to mess with us..... but, when it comes to war Genghis and I are brothers in arms when dealing with a confirmed enemy....