Keith and The Girl Forums - Robots at an arms fair in the middle east

I heard this on my way to work this morning on NPR... thought it sounded a little scary.

Quote:

In the American section, Jim Hall of AAI Advanced Technology says he's got just the thing for countries looking to protect, say, valuable oil facilities: an unmanned surveillance boat for round-the-clock patrols. Unmanned vessels have been around since the Vietnam War, Hall says, but this one goes faster, can stay out longer, and can launch an unmanned aircraft from its deck.

"This never gets tired, never needs a break, never misses anything," Hall said. "It also has, of course, no risk of human life being lost. We haven't taken the step to arm this yet. People are a little nervous about having a robot with a trigger on it. But of course it can be done."
In fact, unmanned vehicles and robots are a prominent theme at this year's exhibition.

Jamil Ahad, president and CEO of Robotic FX, outside of Chicago, Ill., is showing off what he calls "the world's first low-cost, tactical surveillance robot."

"We just met with the head of Kuwait's EOD (explosive ordinance disposal), he's interested in this type of technology," Ahad said.

And if the robot gets damaged in the field, these buyers could easily afford a new one. These robots cost $50,000 to $90,000 each. In a sobering reminder of the staggering amounts of money involved in the arms trade, that puts them in the category of a disposable product.

Here's a link to the original story where you can listen to it if you're real freakin lazy, bitch.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/s...toryId=7492243