While the mega-funded military-industrial-complex churns out threats to humanity for greed without ethics, I feel that I must begin collecting information on how to defend against the robot threat for future reference.
Of course, this is all tounge-in-cheek speculation and by no means represents a serious study.
One would want to read Sun Tsu's The Art of War first, which would be just as effective against robots as it would humans. Paraphrasing The Art of War- misdirection and recon(spies) are very important to victory. Know more about your enemy than he knows about you. Appear weak when you are strong, appear strong when you are weak. Misdirect and confuse your enemy as much as possible.
With that in mind...
Our first subject: the Robotex model AH.
Most likely humanities first ground-based robotic threat, the Robotex AH is being marketed today by Robotex and Blackwater. Here's the link:
Killer robots could replace soldiers
It's main advantages are that it's cheap, simple and deadly. It's main disadvantage seems to be it's limited field of vision and almost total reliance on it.
According to the article, the model AH is 2' tall, has a speed of 10 mph, zero-turn-radius and carries 1 or 2 AA-12 Atchinson Assault Shotguns, which can fire regular 12 gauge rounds, slugs or FRAG-12 rounds, which are small, explosive, 12-gauge grenades. The AH has a 360 Deg. turret independent of travel direction. They can fire fully automatic and carry anywhere from 8 to 32 rounds apiece depending on the magazine with no recoil. According to Jerry Barber, founder of 'Military Police Systems', "It delivers the lead equivalent of 132 M16s," says Baber. "When they start firing from every direction, it's all over." So the first defense would be to limit your bodily exposure to the AH as much as possible.
Baber and MPS has designed a "mini" robotic helicopter to carry and deploy the model AH, and can be assumed it will be used as recon after the drop. So it will be important to take the helicopter first, to give you the best advantage over the land-based AH. The helicopters loadout is not known at this time.
Against the Model AH, Molotov cocktails effectiveness is debatable. Straight-on gunfire would be unwise.
Since there are 6 wheels or rubber track, disabling movement could only be achieved by controlling it's operating surface.
The easiest way to take out a model AH seems to be the oldest trick in the book. A camouflaged or trap-door pit with sheer walls no less than 3 feet deep and at least 3 feet square. Since there is only one camera pointed straight down the barrel for targeting, this seems a cheap, safe and effective defense assuming there is no advanced infra-red involved. At a current price-tag of 30-50k, that seems unlikely. One would have to assume that the Model AH can right itself if inverted, so a pit will only capture one, limit it's movement and field-of-fire and vision. It will still be active and deadly.
So if possible, secondary measures should be added to the pit(s). Filling it with water would be an option. If immersion in water does not disable it completely, water would go a long way to further disabling it's movement, vision and lethality. Furthermore, immersing a simple split wire in the water would be a simple and effective secondary defense. Once a Model AH is pitted, the wire could be plugged into a 120 wall plug to do some serious electrical damage without destroying the shotguns, which could be removed and utilized once the AH is rendered 'safe'.
Spikes in the pit would probably be ineffective, but some measure of limiting the AH's abilities, such as a tangle of rebar, a layer of gasoline that could be ignited, or several inches of mud or grease could be employed to coat the camera and wheels. Humans capacity to think is our greatest advantage, so experimentation and innovation is encouraged.
By looking at the unit, one can see that the AH is equipped with a single camera. If that could be disabled with a scoped rifle, that would go a long way to limiting the AH's lethality while staying out of range. If the camera is disabled, it would be likely for that unit to retreat, making any salvage unlikely.
The camera and shotgun-control wires seem conspicuously exposed with a good possibility of compromise.
With the AH's inability to adjust it's height, another defense could be tightened wires strung across a span. Hallways would be ideal for this but only as a simple way of stopping them and/or controlling their movement. Limiting the visibility of the wires would be advantageous for defense and problematic for the robot. One would want to use as many defenses as possible to defeat the AH. Cheaply stopping them or coralling them into a trap would seem to be effective to limit a humans exposure to the AH's withering field of fire.
One must assume that there will be a GPS unit aboard the AH, so salvage of the entire unit would probably be unwise, but shotguns and batteries could probably be taken without much chance of compromise, and used for future defense.
If the GPS could be disabled, or better yet sent on a goose-chase, then an entire unit would be good for further study and possibly employed against future encounters. A Trojan-horse, if you will, could be added to gather information and possibly attack with deception and misdirection.
So be safe, humans. And be smart. These robots are gonna suck.
Thursday, May 29, 2008
Robot Defense Corps - Lesson 1
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2 comments:
For someone who is so worried about the Big Bro combing over your every word, I'm surprised you're basically posting a how-to manual for people (read: ter-rists) to wage an urban insurgency. I'm sure there's some evil fellow in Sadr City right now taking notes...
"Look here! This Ronin Robot has betrayed his cybernetic brethren and delivered us the means to defeat the infidels! What's this? Bradgelina bought a house?"
If the Terahists listen to me, that's probably stupider than wanting to know what Bradgelina are doing. I lol'd.
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