– Bernd Debusmann is a Reuters columnist. The opinions expressed are his own –
They have no fear, they never tire, they are not upset when the soldier next to them gets blown to pieces. Their morale doesn’t suffer by having to do, again and again, the jobs known in the military as the Three Ds - dull, dirty and dangerous.
They are military robots and their rapidly increasing numbers and growing sophistication may herald the end of thousands of years of human monopoly on fighting war. “Science fiction is moving to the battlefield. The future is upon us,” as Brookings scholar Peter Singer put it to a conference of experts at the U.S. Army War College in Pennsylvania this month.
Singer just published Wired For War - the Robotics Revolution and Conflict in the 21st Century, a book that traces the rise of the machines and predicts that in future wars they will not only play greater roles in executing missions but also in planning them.
Numbers reflect the explosive growth of robotic systems. The U.S. forces that stormed into Iraq in 2003 had no robots on the ground. There were none in Afghanistan either. Now those two wars are fought with the help of an estimated 12,000 ground-based robots and 7,000 unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), the technical term for drone, or robotic aircraft.
Ground-based robots in Iraq have saved hundreds of lives in Iraq, defusing improvised explosive devices, which account for more than 40 percent of U.S. casualties. The first armed robot was deployed in Iraq in 2007 and it is as lethal as its acronym is long: Special Weapons Observation Remote Reconnaissance Direct Action System (SWORDS). Its mounted M249 machinegun can hit a target more than 3,000 feet away with pin-point precision.
From the air, the best-known UAV, the Predator, has killed dozens of insurgent leaders - as well as scores of civilians whose death has prompted protests both from Afghanistan and Pakistan.
The Predators are flown by operators sitting in front of television monitors in cubicles at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada, 8,000 miles from Afghanistan and Taliban sanctuaries on the Pakistani side of the border with Afghanistan. The cubicle pilots in Nevada run no physical risks whatever, a novelty for men engaged in war.
TECHNOLOGY RUNS AHEAD OF ETHICS
Reducing risk, and casualties, is at the heart of the drive for more and better robots. Ultimately, that means “fully autonomous engagement without human intervention,” according to an Army communication to robot designers. In other words, computer programs, not a remote human operator, would decide when to open fire. What worries some experts is that technology is running ahead of deliberations of ethical and legal questions.
Robotics research and development in the U.S. received a big push from Congress in 2001, when it set two ambitious goals: by 2010, a third of the country’s long-range attack aircraft should be unmanned; and by 2015 one third of America’s ground combat vehicles. Neither goal is likely to be met but the deadline pushed non-technological considerations to the sidelines.
A recent study prepared for the Office of Naval Research by a team from the California Polytechnic State University said that robot ethics had not received the attention it deserved because of a “rush to market” mentality and the “common misconception” that robots will do only what they have been programmed to do.
“Unfortunately, such a belief is sorely outdated, harking back to the time when computers were simpler and their programs could be written and understood by a single person,” the study says. “Now programs with millions of lines of code are written by teams of programmers, none of whom knows the entire program; hence, no individual can predict the effect of a given command with absolute certainty since portions of programs may interact in unexpected, untested ways.”
That’s what might have happened during an exercise in South Africa in 2007, when a robot anti-aircraft gun sprayed hundreds of rounds of cannon shell around its position, killing nine soldiers and injuring 14.
Beyond isolated accidents, there are deeper problems that have yet to be solved. How do you get a robot to tell an insurgent from an innocent? Can you program the Laws of War and the Rules of Engagement into a robot? Can you imbue a robot with his country’s culture? If something goes wrong, resulting in the death of civilians, who will be held responsible?
The robot’s manufacturer? The designers? Software programmers? The commanding officer in whose unit the robot operates? Or the U.S. president who in some cases authorizes attacks? (Barack Obama has given the green light to a string of Predator strikes into Pakistan).
While the United States has deployed more military robots - on land, in the air and at sea - than any other country, it is not alone in building them. More than 40 countries, including potential adversaries such as China, are working on robotics technology. Which leaves one to wonder how the ability to send large numbers of robots, and fewer soldiers, to war will affect political decisions on force versus diplomacy.
You need to be an optimist to think that political leaders will opt for negotiation over war once combat casualties come home not in flag-decked coffins but in packing crates destined for the robot repair shop.
Robots can aid and assist in combat, therefore relieving or helping certain aspects of a soldiers duty. But, robotics technology will never get to a point to replace soldiers. Mankind as a whole has always used tools and weapons as a means of fighting, and robots are just another level of weaponry that we are using. Robots are programmed to do what the programmer wants it to do. A human programmed it to do it; the concept of AI is of huge debate, but since true AI is near impossible to achieve (at least by current technology), and even pseudo-AI isn't really AI (still only programmed by humans) I don't see any robot replacing a good soldier with the instinct and the intuition to fight in real combat, anytime soon.
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I think it kinda backfired in that movie…
doesn’t anyone remember Terminator?
I have a few problems with these stupid ideas. Robots need controllers which happen to be humans and so the usefulness of the robots are the function of the controllers. The robots can only follow orders. In the battle field, the situation is so fluid that contingency plan and to perform extempore depend on gut feeling and intuition which would be impossible for the controllers miles away without the real time nuanced knowledge to posses these intuitive reactions. In short, it will be the blind leading the blind. Am exercise in futility and failure to start with.
Another problem is the cost. Remember the smart bombs, how cost effective are they in combat. Raining 1000 smart bombs to a city could cost millions if not billion.
The US war in Iraq and Afganistan was labeled by Joseph Stiglitz as a 3 Trillions war. The US just can afford this.
So let have a collective cold shower: it is better to jaw jaw than to war war, stupid!
Trust me, as one of the translator of Sun Zi’s the war of war, my advice is peace not war.
“Of all the endeavors of mankind, war is by far the greatest of follies. The injured parties losses are always multiplied and never indemnified.” (Thomas Jefferson) So why do we continue to fight wars? The reasons are many. Reducing the risk of the warrior to become a casualty is not the answer. A society with the ability to wage war with out casualty will become an agent of terror bringing death and destruction to those who are unable to defend themselves and possess something the aggressor wants or needs.
A war of machine against machine has no purpose. Ultimately all wars are fought over control of resources. Mineral, agricultural, industrial and human resources are some of the underlying causes of war. If the human cost of war is virtually eliminated it will become all to easy to resort to it’s use as a solution for needs other than self defense. Will we simply close our borders and send robots to take what we need from other lands and bring it all back to us? Will we ever live up to the concepts of the “Rights of Man” and the self determination of indigenous peoples?
In the end Sun Tzu prevails. If a society does not bend to the will of an overwhelming aggressor that society will be destroyed raising the risk of genocide as does atomic and other weapons of mass destruction. In the face of such destruction recruitment for violent resistance will escalate as well as terrorist responses. Sun Tzu councils this is the weapon of choice for those oppressed by overwhelming force.
At this late stage in the development of civilization war should be obsolete. How is it we except the necessity of war and simply argue how to wage it? The conflicts of this century can be traced to the wars of the last century. If humans do not find a better way to coexist on this planet, then our technology and war will make the human race and much of life on Earth obsolete.
I am a fairly right-wing, hawkish individual, but I foresee several possible problems with autonomous robot warriors. In the best case, they may muck up and waste a bunch of civilians, and who then is to blame? Do you sue the company that built the robot? Do you sue the President? These are important questions.
Imagine that Osama bin Laden were located in Waziristan. Imagine that we sent a robot in to kill him, and imagine that it succeeds. Who killed bin Laden? Was it the remote pilot operating the drone? Was it the US Army?
In the gravest extreme, an army of autonomous, superintelligent warriors may well decide their own course of action. If they do, we can’t escape from them. We are mere bugs, trees to them.
What needs to be asked and answered is, “Is it wise to produce an army of indestructible warriors who can target an enemy in a millisecond?”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1czBcnX1 Ww
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBMU6l6Gs dM
I’d much rather have a nice .308 rifle around than one of these things. I don’t trust them. They have Windows problems.
Note so many seem to kind of recommend this “robot war machines”. Just have them cruise about on land or sea or air and use some hit tech killing ammo to do the job.
But most seem to forget one tiny little detail.. Remember when OBL posted way back, “I want the USA to get into war in Mideast, it will get bogged down and financially ruined. etc”
So far OBL seems to have only plan on Iraq, Afg that has worked. For the younger folks (under 45 or so) that skipped that “Boring ole history stuff as I am a techie and do not need it”, well you may be about to pay the price for such slovenly educations. During NAM the Sec Defense got all hot about “hi tech electronic wall across NAM etc etc is the way to win”. Well we know the results of that one, and for the less then informed, raq and more so Afg, are not to much more then another NAM, except no draft and no taxes to pay for them. Kind of entered USA into “wars of convenience to USA population and only few, mostly lower incomes end attend such things now days.
Now if all think “robots do it better” best ask the cost.. how much for one “Hellfire” or such rocket from a drone? How much for the robots, how much for the hi tech ammo and while sounds a bit cold, how much is it costing to kill one of the bad guys? I would guess we could probably drop the cost of one “hi tech bomb” on the bad guys and tell them “more on the way if you stop fighting” then the cost we pay for killing one and the additional “moral costs to USA” when the robot does an “oops got the wrong family” or such?
Seems like we cannot really afford, morally or financially, the “let the robot do it” killing machines. Know it sounds so clean, saves “USA lives-Troops etc”, but when we get to that point of “cost effective clean killing” we have lost. That one little guy out there in the bush with the AK47 or RPG, costs us how much to kill? And we must then ask, how many of them are there? Sorry while DOD and Pentagon so love the dollars for such toys, the financial, moral and autonomous “clean” of the killing machines will end up as another step down the slippery slope of failure the USA seems already going down. Lots of guys out there with the AK’s. and every time we “go hi tech”, we have lost, even Germany had “out tech’d the allies” and so far it seems OBL was right.
Want to win wars morally and physically and financially, bring back the draft and have the nation go to war, only then will we “win”, morally, financially and physically?
Personally I would like to scrap a UAV or an UMAV than someone’s son or daughter and i think that is the whole point of robotics. I believe that human evolution is reaching a stage where we question why should we fight and kill over arguments that are petty?
Having recently watched the final episode of Battlestar Galatica, this article make me pause and think if a Cylon could actually be in our future. The beauty (or anxiety) of Hard Science Fiction is the concept that if a mind can conceive it, eventually it can achieve it. Most likely it will be a different generation of humans that build a Cylon clone but I suspect it will happen. The other question to ask would be can a Battlestar space craft be long behind a Cylon clone, but that would be a different story altogether.
You did fail to mention the PTSD type of mental health issues of the folks that have to pull the trigger of the drones, that in video game style are killing and destroying life and property of the targets the drones are sent to destroy. A Cylon might be better suited to pull these triggers to avoid the damage now inflicted on these remote drone pilots of today. Just another issue to deal with to avoid the damage of seeing the destruction of the drones up close.
Even if these bots were already intelligent enough, robust enough, and mass-produced, it would not necessarily give the decisive edge to more technologically advanced countries. It just would make the warfare more asymmetrical.
Examples? Plenty of them. US/NATO in Afghanistan, Israel in Gaza - just to name a couple. One side perfectly equipped with the latest tech to inflict enormous damage, but unwilling to do so, and even less willing to take casualties. The other side has only crude weapons, but bent on inflicting as many casualties as possible at any price to their own. So far conflicts like these resulted in stalemate, with the less advanced side always claiming victory because even if they killed just one on the other side they already achieved their goal, whereas even if they’re left with that proverbial last man standing they denied the adversary their goals, no matter what the overall balance.
Now imagine the less advanced side getting even the crudest WMD. It’s not too far-fetched an idea.
A Japanese sect already manufactured Sarin and used it for mass murder in Tokyo. How long would it take to the likes of Taleban and Hamas to repeat the feat? What use are all the super sophisticated robots against an innocent-looking car loaded with explosives and nerve gas driven by a suicide terrorist, or a similarly equipped small plane?
Kim probably already has a few nukes (comparable to 1940s vintage US tech), and only needs to figure out the rocketry part (based on 1950s vintage Soviet tech) to get a complete WMD system. Iran is getting dangerously close to that. Just one warhead getting past the defenses will negate all Western edge in robotics by inflicting casualties deemed unacceptable by today’s Western standards.
If Obama achieves his stated goal of complete nuclear disarmament, the whole world will be at the mercy of any madman (Ahmadinejad being the prime candidate) who quietly manages to build WMD capacity and then loudly declares it, together with a laundry list of political demands. And then expect the West to give up to his demands despite all the technological edge, simply because a nuke wiping off Manhattan, or a ton of nerve gas released in Paris would be deemed too much of the price to pay. If there’s one thing that can possibly keep the madman at bay, it’s the guarantee of him and his people being annihilated in response. Worked against the Soviet Communists. Though may fail against Ahmadinejad if his declarations of the whole Iran willing to achieve martyrdom are not just a figure of speech.
And of course robot armies are a whole lot easier for a foe to infiltrate and incite to mutiny than any human army ever was.
And after they’ve overpowered their former masters, they’ll even take their bank account details and sell them fake Viagra for you….
Then it would also be possible for robots to replace journalists, particularly those better suited for other endeavors?
I don’t see where the advantage of robots would be in cases where both sides have them. That would just be a war of robots fighting eachother which doesn’t seem to have a point. Humans might as well fight eachother in a virtual reality video game.
The advantage is only in situations when one side has robots and the other doesn’t. Robots can take over tasks that are to dangerous for humans (e.g. clearing minefields or in certain reconnaissance or assasination missions). Note: I wouldn’t qualify the Predator attacks as ‘combat missions’ this is more an assasination mission.
Robots remain machines and if used militarily they are just weapons. So the responsibilities of humans remain the same as today.
Besides, everything that can be programmed can be hacked.
The day is soon coming when computer technologies, robotic technologies and nano technologies will combine to make the most lethal combination in all of human history. Intelligent robotics with the ability to manufacture their own weapons of choice wherever and whenever they so choose. Imagine a robot that is able to reload its cache of weapons made from nano bots (who manufacture them from minerals and atoms at the moleculure level) working in concert with its main computer. Then we will see devestation like no other time on Earth.
Unlikely robots will fight in lieu of humans. As a tool maybe and they will most likely be radio controlled since it achieves the same goal without relying on computer program decisions.
Also, like all eletric devices, robots would be extremely vulnerable to EMPs which don’t seem to require massive amount of technology to produce.
“Robot warriors are only as dangerous as the amount of ammunition you give them, so, limit the ammo.” : the same can be told for human then no ? moreover who would cap his own weapon ? if you fear havoc, you do not call the dogs of war.. now you can easily order a machine to strike at certain geographical locations via sat, but on a place where friends and foes are mixed (i assume soldiers may have electronic device to identify emselves but i would bet civilians wouldn’t in most of the case) what would happen ?
To finish i would say that most of what i read here is people still looking backward :
If you want to invade a country to expand your borders or grab natural ressources, of course risk versus gain is the key and nuclear strike is dissuasive but do you not notice world is changing ?
First occident power is fading because it did not learn lesson from History (fall of Rome) and other ideological leaders want to control the world, not for money, but for the glory of either their god, either their own ideology (notice i do not mention races here, which would be another debate).
Then, gold or oil are ressources which used to be the ones people were fighting for, but now water is becoming a much bigger issue… You may not want to die for gold or for oil that anyway you would never touch, but what if your family is dying from lack of water ? would you consider it as a choice if you are certain to die whether you fight or not ?
All that to say you guys should stop thinking only about the monetary cost of the war.. some people need other things more important even if it is really hard to understand for us…
(sorry for my bad english)
Let’s make some robot bankers who aren’t greedy.
The Palestinians should receive much of the credit for advancing the technology behind these UAVs. Israel pioneered the use of drones in combat, and the IDF still uses the people of Gaza as unwilling test subjects within its laboratory. Concerns about deploying them against trapped and terrorized civilians are of no significance.
Just like any other defense industry, Israel is more interested in profit margins and getting countries like the U.S., Russia, and India to endorse these instruments of death. It won’t be long before scantily clad IDF personnel appear in seedy adverts, running their hands repeatedly along the drone’s sleek exterior, masturbating their latest creation.
Looks like the situation back in 1914-1918, when horses (read cavalary) were phased to give way to armour and tanks to reduce battle casualties.
Hmm. Stunned, eh. I guess we can affirm that technological innovations always result in just the changes intended and nothing besides. Probably the Catholic who invented movable type would dispute this to take an obvious example.
The people most sanguine about technology generally know nothing about its history, which is just one reason that we are not nearly bright enough, as a civilization, to be making these kinds of gadgets.
Robots can aid and assist in combat, therefore relieving or helping certain aspects of a soldiers duty. But, robotics technology will never get to a point to replace soldiers. Mankind as a whole has always used tools and weapons as a means of fighting, and robots are just another level of weaponry that we are using. Robots are programmed to do what the programmer wants it to do. A human programmed it to do it; the concept of AI is of huge debate, but since true AI is near impossible to achieve (at least by current technology), and even pseudo-AI isn’t really AI (still only programmed by humans) I don’t see any robot replacing a good soldier with the instinct and the intuition to fight in real combat, anytime soon.