Skynet reveals itself with a test run

[LurkerNoMore]

https://www.businessinsider.com/killer-drone-hunted-down-human-target-without-being-told-un-2021-5

This is the dangers of working from home when you turn your back and your cat walks across your keyboard.

Boss - "What happened"?

worker - "I don't know, I turned around and it did it on it's own....  I swear I didn't do anything...."   *stares at cat licking it's ass hole"

[Tapeworm]

Sensationalized headlines, like always. Makes it sound like the drone turned itself on, wrote its own homicidal to-do list, and went postal. It just did what it's programmed to do.

Also an awfully expensive kill if the thing has thermal. How about a spotter drone which commands way less expensive kamikaze drones. Or maybe put a gun on it. Then you don't have to crash your drone every time you want to kill someone.

[IroNat]

Sensationalized headlines, like always. Makes it sound like the drone turned itself on, wrote its own homicidal to-do list, and went postal. It just did what it's programmed to do.

Also an awfully expensive kill if the thing has thermal. How about a spotter drone which commands way less expensive kamikaze drones. Or maybe put a gun on it. Then you don't have to crash your drone every time you want to kill someone.

It cost $2.1 million to fund one U.S. soldier per year.

Artillery rounds are expensive.  Missiles more expensive.  Fighter jets even more expensive.


https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidhambling/2020/06/17/turkish-military-to-receive-500-swarming-kamikaze-drones/

[Never1AShow]

What if, at then end of Terminator 15, SkyNet is activated, but instead of launching Judgment Day, it turns all guns to the sky and launches all the missiles at the alien spaceship from Independence Day that is just entering Earth orbit.  So SkyNet saves humanity rather than destroying it.

Then you realize that both movie lines were narratives engineered by adversary AIs (one that came from the scout ships that crashed back in the 40s and laid dormant until we developed computers and the other reverse engineered by Earth scientists from that same crash tech) to soften up the Earth population and retard research into tech threatening to the aliens soon to be arriving.   

[LurkerNoMore]

What if, at then end of Terminator 15, SkyNet is activated, but instead of launching Judgment Day, it turns all guns to the sky and launches all the missiles at the alien spaceship from Independence Day that is just entering Earth orbit.  So SkyNet saves humanity rather than destroying it.

Then you realize that both movie lines were narratives engineered by adversary AIs (one that came from the scout ships that crashed back in the 40s and laid dormant until we developed computers and the other reverse engineered by Earth scientists from that same crash tech) to soften up the Earth population and retard research into tech threatening to the aliens soon to be arriving.

HA!  Much better scenario.

[Jizmonkey]

It cost $2.1 million to fund one U.S. soldier per year.

Artillery rounds are expensive.  Missiles more expensive.  Fighter jets even more expensive.


https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidhambling/2020/06/17/turkish-military-to-receive-500-swarming-kamikaze-drones/

The cost is high because they have have bathrooms for all the genders.

[Irongrip400]

Sensationalized headlines, like always. Makes it sound like the drone turned itself on, wrote its own homicidal to-do list, and went postal. It just did what it's programmed to do.

Also an awfully expensive kill if the thing has thermal. How about a spotter drone which commands way less expensive kamikaze drones. Or maybe put a gun on it. Then you don't have to crash your drone every time you want to kill someone.

No doubt. First thing o thought when I actually read the article.

[Tapeworm]

Not that I was ever in the military but I doubt an infantryman or coffee pogue costs 2 million. Accountancy fuckery could make it so. If you say helicopters, APCs, etc, cost zero because it's included in the associated cost per man then yeah, but drones need transport too, so saying you can make a drone for $1000 vs $2 million for a human is apples and oranges.

They're nifty but it's just another tool. Besides, conventional engagements are the exception. We've spent nearly 20 years as a counterinsurgency occupier. The Korean War was the last time you could point to the enemy and say he's right over there. How much use would 500,000 non-information gathering, kamikaze attack drones have been to us in the ME? Some, yes, but it wouldn't have been a totally different conflict.

It's more useful to Turkey than to us. We already have overwhelming force. More force is nice, and it would save lives when fighting time comes, but nobody squares off against us on a battlefield as it is, even without drones. They sneak around. I don't see how an attack drone is the tool for the job. It might even be counterproductive in a Hearts & Minds campaign.


Being cheap and anonymously deployed, it's of way more benefit to our enemies. We'd do better to concentrate on counter-drone tech.

[IroNat]

Not that I was ever in the military but I doubt an infantryman or coffee pogue costs 2 million. Accountancy fuckery could make it so. If you say helicopters, APCs, etc, cost zero because it's included in the associated cost per man then yeah, but drones need transport too, so saying you can make a drone for $1000 vs $2 million for a human is apples and oranges.

They're nifty but it's just another tool. Besides, conventional engagements are the exception. We've spent nearly 20 years as a counterinsurgency occupier. The Korean War was the last time you could point to the enemy and say he's right over there. How much use would 500,000 non-information gathering, kamikaze attack drones have been to us in the ME? Some, yes, but it wouldn't have been a totally different conflict.

It's more useful to Turkey than to us. We already have overwhelming force. More force is nice, and it would save lives when fighting time comes, but nobody squares off against us on a battlefield as it is, even without drones. They sneak around. I don't see how an attack drone is the tool for the job. It might even be counterproductive in a Hearts & Minds campaign.


Being cheap and anonymously deployed, it's of way more benefit to our enemies. We'd do better to concentrate on counter-drone tech.

Good for select kills and assassination.

[bhank]

Not that I was ever in the military but I doubt an infantryman or coffee pogue costs 2 million. Accountancy fuckery could make it so. If you say helicopters, APCs, etc, cost zero because it's included in the associated cost per man then yeah, but drones need transport too, so saying you can make a drone for $1000 vs $2 million for a human is apples and oranges.

They're nifty but it's just another tool. Besides, conventional engagements are the exception. We've spent nearly 20 years as a counterinsurgency occupier. The Korean War was the last time you could point to the enemy and say he's right over there. How much use would 500,000 non-information gathering, kamikaze attack drones have been to us in the ME? Some, yes, but it wouldn't have been a totally different conflict.

It's more useful to Turkey than to us. We already have overwhelming force. More force is nice, and it would save lives when fighting time comes, but nobody squares off against us on a battlefield as it is, even without drones. They sneak around. I don't see how an attack drone is the tool for the job. It might even be counterproductive in a Hearts & Minds campaign.


Being cheap and anonymously deployed, it's of way more benefit to our enemies. We'd do better to concentrate on counter-drone tech.

Exactly 2m is some bullshit fancy accounting allocating the cost of a fighter jet and a few million in Lockhead Martin kickbacks out to infantry soldiers who are eating MRIS and sharing a HUM V with no up armor because its too expensive to protect soldiers