Robot Warfare in Iraq

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Gun-Toting Ground Robots See Action in Iraqi Streets

The U.S. Army quietly entered a new era earlier this summer when it sent the first armed ground robots into action in Iraq.

Sofar, the robot army抯 entry into the war has been a trickle rather thanan invasion. Only three of the special weapons observation remotereconnaissance direct action system (SWORDS) have been deployed so far.

TheArmy has authorized the purchase of 80 more robots

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Seventy-one of the 80 unfunded robots are allocated to Stryker brigades, he added.

Saitta,who also served in the Marines as an armor officer, said armed robotsand their operators need to become organically part of a unit to beeffective. Just as a TOW missile crew supports tanks, the robots andtheir operators should be fully integrated into Stryker brigades.

Therobots could prove their worth in urban areas with blind corners orcurves and little intelligence of what lies beyond, he said.

One skeptic knowledgeable about military robots questioned whether this new weapon would make a long-term impact.

Insurgentswill attempt to defeat them just as they have with the military抯 newcounter-roadside bomb technology. The three robots could last weeksrather than months in the field, said the source, who declined to benamed because he is still involved in the military robot community.

JamesCanton, chief executive officer of the Institute for Global Futures andan expert on military technologies, said SWORDS is a relatively simplemachine and just the cusp of where the military is going with robots.The coming robot army will change the military world both tacticallyand strategically, he predicted.

SWORDS, unmanned aerialvehicles, and other such systems are 搕ele-robotics,