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Topic: Emerging Tech

10 military technologies that will change the face of battle

Summary: Technology advances make tomorrow's battlefield look like a sci-fi movie.

Chris Jablonski

By Chris Jablonski |

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Lockheed Martin’s new, ruggedized combat version of the Human Universal Load Carrier exoskeleton could be headed to Afghanistan for combat trials within a few months. Lighter and energy-efficient, HULC has enough power to last eight hours on marches or days just standing. The machine extremities, powered by a lithium-ion battery, redistribute and transfer up to 200 pounds of weight down and off the wearer’s body, allowing him to carry more, longer.

Image: Lockheed Martin

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Topic: Emerging Tech

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  • error in 8/9 frames

    The associated text for image 8 should be with 9, and text for image 9 should be with image 8.
    jessepollard
    Reply Vote

    • fixed!

      Thank you.
      christopher_jablonski
      Reply Vote

  • Are all these susceptilble

    to EMP? We might be worse-off for reliance on hi-tech.

    And we already are too broke to pay for these systems.
    NatanElias
    Reply Vote

    • Actually

      Most military equipment are design to be resistance to EMP, the UK MOD has a lab which was shown off to the media a few years ago, through its location is still classified, where they test all military equipment to see whether they can withstand an EMP blast and still remain operational. They probably developed there own EMP weapons there as well but I have no evidence for that.
      Knowles2
      Reply Vote

    • Too broke because congress keeps allowing to

      give corporate welfare to entities offshoring jobs, which in return helps create that pesky income problem... there are other factors, but 'corporate welfare' (especially to companies that are hardly poor) is hardly discussed (by comparison).
      HypnoToad72
      Reply Vote

      • If by corporate welfare you mean gov't subsidies

        to green energy sinkholes, you are 100% correct. But for some reason, I think you are actually talking about profitable companies, like the oil industry, being allowed tax deductions. Why? Because for decades, now, Americans have been systematically indoctrinated by their government to think that all money belongs to Washington and so allowing anyone, especially an "evil corporation" to actually keep more of the money it earns is somehow welfare.
        baggins_z
        Reply Vote

      • Keynes was right

        @baggins_z
        Corporate welfare means giving tax breaks to big companies that are not available to smaller ones, or to the public at large.
        So here we have more of the usual load of misinformed political rubbish. Green energy sinkholes? Other than Solyndra, care to make citations? In fact, it is not hard to make the case that government investment in technologies has done more for the private sector than all private sector R&D, combined. Take military (and non-military) investment in Bell Labs' research into transistors, NASA research for the moon launches that lead to everything from mylar to the microwave oven, and yes, Energy Dep't, funded alternative energy research and compare it to private R&D and the difference is stark.
        But one could be even more specific to your objections. As a result of U.S. government research, as well as gov't funded research in other countries, solar panel efficiency has more than tripled in the past fifteen years. Sink hole? Hardly. A little bit more efficient, and a bit cheaper to manufacture, and alternative energy like solar will be market competitive with fossil fuels, that are only as cheap as they are now because of entirely ARTIFICIAL market dynamics. Because consumers, especially U.S. consumers, are almost universally short-sighted, and look only at the short term, the market does NOT factor into the cost for these fuels many of the associated health and environmental costs. In addition, it does NOT properly price itself on the open market, because this same psychology leads it to be priced as if it were an unlimited resource instead of a decidedly limited one. If it were priced based on its real supply and demand metrics taken over a much more realistic time period, the costs of fossil fuels would be exorbitant.
        But first, how about you name specific green energy sink holes.
        More importantly, seeing corporations and private citizens able to skirt around having to pay their fair share, for things like the infrastructure without which they could not operate, the educational system without which they could find no employees, the military that protects their vital interests abroad, simply because they have the money to afford the lobbying power that makes this possible, in NO way, shape, or form implies that people think that all money belongs to Washington. Considering that some corporations, such as GE, have gone decades without paying ANY significant taxes, and seeing this as abhorrent is not indoctrination.
        Nor is it sound fiscal policy to assume that allowing corporations to maximize profit at the expense of the well-being of the nation is the only way to "lift all boats", as the nineties clearly demonstrate.
        Keynes was correct, and despite your Reaganesque musings to the contrary, I doubt you can point to a single example where he wasn't. Now go ahead and bring up the stimulus.
        .DeusExMachina.
        Reply Vote

  • Human Universal Load Carrier

    The HULC ? ... hmmm, sounds like it should be paired with a green uniform! Now, where the heck was that when I was taking Army PT tests?!
    friedsonjm@...
    Reply Vote

  • How about an invention that assures that

    no humans are injured or killed when these toys are used in practice ? Wouldn't that be a giant leap for mankind, to coin an oft-rehearsed phrase ?...

    Henri
    mhenriday
    Reply Vote

  • oops: someone tell the webmaster

    The title and description under photo 9 should go with photo 8, and vice versa.
    paul613
    Reply Vote

  • Why military all the time?

    I've gone through these military inventions and so far no one has ever commented on the dangers of using these weapons in any enviroment. So far we all are giving the military inventions appluses. Have we, for one minute, thought how wonderful we can invent peaceful inventions for the progress and good living standards of humans? Have we thought, how humanity will
    benefit if these war inventions were channelled to producing products that will help us?

    Why are we gifted to wars all the time? One thing that everyone should know is that if one country possesses one invention, before too long other countries will have the same or similar inventions. Now, countries are developing drones that was exclusively US right. When AK-47 came out it was for one country, but now every country and gang of drugs and crooks have AK-47.

    We will destroy this planet one day. Let us jubilate whenever one dangerous military invention is developed and get sad when a machine that can change the way heart operations are done because it is not military.
    uwanscj@...
    Reply Vote

    • You have no clue, do you?

      Do you know how many medical advances came out of the military? For instance, ever hear of robotic and remote surgery? Not the best way to get them, sure, but pious platitudes are evil weapons, too.
      Vesicant
      Reply Vote

      • Isn't it funny..

        when you spend so much research on how to kill people, sometimes you accidentally discover how to save them. Do you believe in your heart that spending money on weapons is the best, and most efficient way, to advance medicine?
        alawishis
        Reply Vote

    • For one simple reason

      It takes two sides to create peace, and only one side to create war.
      baggins_z
      Reply Vote

  • As a retired military NCO

    I have reservations about a system which causes an individual to start out in a position where his/her physical capability will be totally overtaxed if the event of system failure. When the assistance system fails. AND IT WILL there appears to be no capability to correct in the field short of abandonment . one golden bb puts several million dollars worth of equipment in the hands of the opposition. In SEA the Vietnamese )and advisers( learned how to take down an F-111 in less than two weeks giving all our hard earned R&D away
    rhslocum@...
    Reply Vote

    • Totally overtaxed?

      We've had such systems for decades; we call them "trucks." There's no way the driver can carry everything loaded.
      ka5s@...
      Reply Vote

  • There are no more armies to fight...

    these weapons will be used on civilians. Why is there a need to keep spending outrageous money (that we cannot afford) to build superior weapons when the ones we have already cannot be answered.

    From the article:
    "The highly configurable F-35 aircraft is the next-gen ???affordable??? fighter for the Navy, Air Force, Marines, and US allies."

    Who else finds this above statement sickeningly ironic.
    alawishis
    Reply Vote

    • Wasteful spending

      I do. By the way, are these weapons made for whom? One thing those of us in the sciences should bear in mind is that history is a very important subject. History repeats itself, so it is said and this is true. Millions of Americans are dying in poverty, student loans are skyrocketing, unemployment is spiraling out of control, crime is everywhere, and we are happy to develop F-35 for the Navy, Airforce, Marines and for some of our allies. Who is the enemy? From outer space (Battleship, Alien, Transformer, etc) or from underneath the earth that we have to spend billions and billions for weapons? This is tax payers' money that ends up in the pockets of very few individuals in the military, government, private sectors and corporations.
      uwanscj@...
      Reply Vote

  • Really?

    "for a lot cheaper"
    Really people?
    Does no one take pride in anything these days? Like LANGUAGE and GRAMMAR?
    guiri
    Reply Vote
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