UK military cuts, fear not ..

[Grenville Fortescue]

.. the British Super Soldier is here!

Superstrong, telepathic - the bionic soldiers of the future: How radical technology could transform British troops within 30 years

High-tech implants in brains could turn square-bashing squaddies into super-intelligent man-machines

Ministry of Defence report says 'augmented’ soldiers could even have bodies that self-repair wounds

Superstrong, telepathic - the bionic soldiers of the future | Mail Online (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2316892/Superstrong-telepathic--bionic-soldiers-future.html)

[Sandy Parts]

Someone must have found some back issues of 2000AD - Rogue Trooper!

[Heathrow Harry]

I doubt the Mail Online staff can read such challenging literature

[dervish]

Apart from some of the wilder interpretations by the journo, this is all VERY old hat. It is pretty much based on the US's presentation to the ISSC of 2001. Then they discovered they were years behind the UK and cut their work back.... What is really worrying is if this is MoD's current thinking.

[Finningley Boy]

Some citizen Army that would be, imagine the Army Careers Officer visiting the upcoming School Leavers explaining that once accepted there will be some Brain surgery to look forward to first of all together with various other surgical implants and removal of bits and pieces of you which the Army will need replaced. You'll never be the same again!:ok:

FB:)

[Sandy Parts]

Can you imagine the storeman when you leave? "Sorry mate, but your book clearly says you've got an implant, I can't sign your clearance chit until I get it back."

[tucumseh]

http://www.pprune.org/military-aircrew/513271-procurement-privatisation.html


Threads need combining. 95% commonality! :oh:

[Always Up]

As usual some of it will never materialise but then who would have suggested that we would have had mobile phones, personal computers, stealth, drones etc 20 years ago.

[salad-dodger]

Threads need combining. 95% commonality!

You are joking aren't you Tuc?

If only we could replace civil servants with some sort of bionic, non-workshy, non- clock watching, level shouldered, non-whinging humanoid device :E

S-D

[dragartist]

Salad Dodger,
I find it so sad that you think like that.
Not all us simple servants were like that. I must admit I did come across a few that matched your stereo type. I was certaily not one of them.

I came accross all of the comparisons in my 30+ years. An SA 80 because they won't work and you can't fire them.

Those at the DRA - pre Q2 "Dont Rush Around"

Not allowed to look out of the windows in the morning- to give us something to do in the afternoon.

I kind of share your sentiments. the pitty is that those who fit your bill remain in post because they could not make it on the outside. I do wonder how many actually get found out and dismissed. How many get put on "Restoring efficiency" When I tried to get rid of some of mine the HR dept, particularly when it was PPPA advised against because they could not cope with the admin burden.

One thing that really troubled me was having to accept a new staff member on redeployment because it took more effort to declare them as unsuitable, particularly during the recruitment ban. It really is a shame that there were no forced redundancies. I figure most, but not all, in the redeployment pool are dead wood. Any good ones would have been snapped up.

Having read the stuff on Pprune and spoken to ex colleagues I am as well out of it.

[Courtney Mil]

Yeah. The vast majority of the CS guys working within the MoD, HQs, etc., are bang on side. They represent us in the way they are required to do and mostly save us from our selves. When the Mil guys need to understand what the central Government issues are, the CS people are ones we turn to for advice. Does anyone think they're all spies for Sir Humphrey? They bring their own specialist knowledge to the party.

And what about the PAs, and secretaries? Not highly paid people, but massive supporters of what our senior people are doing.

No, I think there is a lot of unnecessary judgement going on by people that don't see what the CSs do for us. Why do I know that? Because I used to make the same generalizations myself.

Are the old Handbrake House military personnel so much better. Jobsworth?

That is all.

[salad-dodger]

You're probably both right. The majority of the civil servants aren't bad, but unfortunately I have seen far too many that are. Perhaps not all of those criteria at the same time, but usually at least one.

I wonder what the split would be between the good and bad, about 80:20 ?

S-D

[Courtney Mil]

Aren't bad. I know CS guys that saved us from so many disasters. I would say there are CS guys that are outstanding. As for the "bad" ones, maybe there are, I don't know, but it's like me noticing that every Harrier pilot it totally up himself. Maybe I only noticed the few that were.

Or maybe... :cool:

[dragartist]

Yep, about 80 good to 20 bad. I consider myself to have been in the best 5% as evidenced by my accelerated promotions, commendations, performance pay and special bonus payments, particularly in my first 25 years. I became too much the rebel and feather ruffler in my last 5. Brought about by poor Mil and CS leadership.

Worst influence was the Mil guys (Army and RAF) who came in to make a name for themselves and leave me to clear up the mess for the next year or more. The sad thing was they finished up in Handbrake House and given greater influnce to mess up. Many of the good ones saw the writting on the wall and banged out.

My exit interview with D AS would have been entertaining had I been afforded the opotunity!

Courtney - I don't mind if you put the spelin rite. It's past my bed time!

[Courtney Mil]

Past mine too!

[dervish]

And yet it was a CS who spotted the link between the two threads.

[Pontius Navigator]

Back to the OP, are these implants from the brains we have been storing from SOs since the 60s?

[chopper2004]

Something out of a Dale Brown book starting with Tin Man (sort of sequel to STORMING HEAVEN ) then a couple of other books where all personnel of the High Advanced Weapons Centre -HAWC and Dreamland were surgically installed with a little biochip that acted as a communicator as in even if they were without mobile phones or communciations, trapped, imprisoned in the middle of nowhere they could shout literally into the air for help or be communicated to from hq.

This also reminded me of the concluding chapter of Airland Battle 2000 by Christy Campbell written in the mid to late 80s. Whereby it was said that a UK company was researching a Soldier 2000 equipped with a lightweight kevlar all in one suit with added NBC protection, armoured helmet and visor with eyes up display and lightweight bergen / backpack with twin vertical launch anti armour missiles and an advanced automated rifle with laser and night vision.

[dallas]

High-tech implants in brains could turn square-bashing squaddies into super-intelligent man-machines
I doubt human technology is ever going to be that advanced :ok:

[Finningley Boy]

As usual some of it will never materialise but then who would have suggested that we would have had mobile phones, personal computers, stealth, drones etc 20 years ago.


Always Up,

All these things existed 20 years ago Sir, Mobile phones were a rich man's gimmic as were Laptops, stealth existed - F117, had been in action in the first Gulf War, the B2 was flying and drones have existed since the Second World War.:ok:

FB:)

[GreenKnight121]

To elaborate on FB's answer, all of those were available 30+ years ago:


Personal computers (the desktop model) were being sold fairly inexpensively in the US by 1979... my high school bought some 30 Commodore PETs (Personal Electronic Terminal) that fall.
That's 34 years ago.

I bought my (so far only) laptop computer (Toshiba T1000) in early 1988.
That's 25 years ago.



The first hand-held mobile phone was demonstrated by John F. Mitchell and Dr Martin Cooper of Motorola in 1973, using a handset weighing around 2.2 pounds (1 kg). In 1983, the DynaTac 8000x was the first to be commercially available.
That's 40 years ago for the prototype and 30 years ago for production models.



The USN was flying the Gyrodyne QH-50 DASH (Drone Anti-Submarine Helicopter) from modernized WW2 destroyers starting in 1959 (first flight, service entry 1963). And yes, I'd say that it was a UCAV... it carried 2 Mk44 ASW torpedoes or 1 Mk17 nuclear depth charge with a W44 warhead.
That's 50 years ago.

The DASH program was canceled in 1969. Although low reliability was the official reason, the manufacturer pointed to the expenses of the Vietnam War, and the lack of need for antisubmarine capability in that war.

Modified DASH vehicles continued to operate for several more years in the Vietnam War. With attached television cameras, they were used as remote artillery spotters and organic reconnaissance by their ships.

As of 2006, a small number of DASH drones were still in operation at White Sands test range, where they are used to tow targets and calibrate radars and electronic systems.

The Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force operated a fleet of 20 QH-50 drones, for use on their Takatsuki and Minegumo class destroyers. With the difficulty of maintaining DASH operations after the termination of the U.S. program, the drones and associated equipment were removed from JMSDF service in 1977.



The F-117 first flight was June 1981, and IOC was October 1983. The Nighthawk saw its first combat operation in Panama in December 1989.
That's 29 1/2 years ago for IOC and over 23 years ago for combat debut.

[langleybaston]

I assume the bionic soldier of the future would have his tackle modified so it did not supercede brain?

A fair few civilians could do with that mod. of course.

[dervish]

This also reminded me of the concluding chapter of Airland Battle 2000 by Christy Campbell written in the mid to late 80s. Whereby it was said that a UK company was researching a Soldier 2000 equipped with a lightweight kevlar all in one suit with added NBC protection, armoured helmet and visor with eyes up display and lightweight bergen / backpack with twin vertical launch anti armour missiles and an advanced automated rifle with l@ser and night vision.


Spot on. 3 phase programme endorsed and ISD was meant to be about 2006 IIRC. I can't remember the missile but politics decreed SA80 would not be replaced because it was the best thing since sliced bread, so it was officially in Phase 3 which IIRC was ISD 2015. The clothing part of it was set aside by the clothing people at Biscester, transferred to AbbeyWood and then back again. It has an acronym, something like PECOC. Originally it was Crusader 2000 or something like that. Helmet was upgraded, but I think the head up display was cancelled. I remember this all being trialled in Cyprus in the 90s. The difficulty was that Bowman was to provide a lot of the C4I stuff but didn't so the programme had to pay for basic kit and forsake the advances.