Robot army ready for duty in Iraq

[ECH1969]

THE US Army has deployed about 30 robots with troops in Iraq to scout out suspected roadside bombs, and has placed orders for several hundred more, an army official said in Washington overnight.

They are used only to visually identify mines or improvised explosives concealed animal carcasses, or plastic bags -- not to dispose of them.

"There's 30 out there now," he said. "I'm in the process, in the next probably six months, of putting another couple of hundred in the field." He said several hundred were on order. They cost $US8,000 ($A10,350) apiece.

Tubbs, who heads an army program that looks for relatively quick technological fixes for problems arising in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan, showed off a number of items at a Pentagon press conference.

http://www.theadvertiser.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,16245849%255E1702,00.html

[The_Casual_Observer]

Otherwise known as green painted $8.99 RC toy trucks

from radioshack.

[politicaholic]

1. Do they have saw blades and hammer arms?

I always wondered why they didn't integrate Robot Wars with the Iraq War.

[wli]

2. how long before combat vehicles are automated?

It's not entirely clear. Mostly it depends on how much image recognition and AI research is being kept secret.