Musings

Today is my wife’s birthday, and so I took her golfing as a birthday present. Of course, I have convinced her that all neophyte golfers must go through the learning stage of being a caddy before wielding potentially dangerous drivers and irons. It seems to work well for both of us, and I’ve assured her that she will graduate from my one-on-one instructional program soon.

On our return from a very pleasant round, I sat down to read the news on-line. One article caught my attention; a new product announcement from Robotic Technology, Inc. It announced the EATR (Energetically Autonomous Tactical Robot), a new Warbot that incorporates some interesting new technology.

To quote from their website, “The purpose of the Energetically Autonomous Tactical Robot (EATR) ™ project is to develop and demonstrate an autonomous robotic platform able to perform long-range, long-endurance missions without the need for manual or conventional re-fueling, which would otherwise preclude the ability of the robot to perform such missions. The system obtains its energy by foraging – engaging in biologically-inspired, organism-like, energy-harvesting behavior which is the equivalent of eating. It can find, ingest, and extract energy from biomass in the environment (and other organically-based energy sources), as well as use conventional and alternative fuels (such as gasoline, heavy fuel, kerosene, diesel, propane, coal, cooking oil, and solar) when suitable. For example, about 150 lbs of vegetation could provide sufficient energy for 100 miles of driving, depending on circumstances.”

One of the biomass articles touted which it can utilize for fuel is dead bodies. Here is a drawing of the prototype:


Of course this is just one of the possible configurations. It could be equipped with rocket launchers or heavy machine guns.

It occurred to me that in a certain configuration, it could be the ideal weapon for use on the Taliban in Afganistan. In use, the video camera image processing system would select for certain image patterns in its memory. The software would eliminate from consideration as a potential target any human in a military uniform or business suit, and focus instead on those with turbans, robes and so forth.

Because the Taliban delights in beheadings and amputations, the armament system would consist of a half-dozen hydraulic arms that wield samurai swords. These whirling blades, under computer control, would have reflexes much faster than any human, and would cut them down in a heart beat. The system would also include a loudspeaker that loudly plays an audio loop of James Earl Jones shouting ‘Allah Akbar!’ as it roamed around the battle field at high speed, stuffing limbs and other body parts into its fuel tank.

It would be the ultimate terror weapon, free to roam at will without any operator at the controls. And, it would never need to ‘gas up’, so to speak. And after the conflict is over, we simply redeploy them along the U.S./Mexican border, with new patterns in the software that look for sombreros, or perhaps gang member colors. I hope members of Congress earmark funds for this project as soon as possible.

It beats the hell out of giving the money to their banking cronies.