SurvivalBlog presents another edition of The Survivalist’s Odds ‘n Sods. This column is a collection of news bits and pieces that are relevant to the modern survivalist and prepper from JWR. Our goal is to educate our readers, to help them to recognize emerging threats, and to be better prepared for both disasters and negative societal trends. You can’t mitigate a risk if you haven’t first identified a risk. In today’s column, we look at robotic warfare.
All-Robot Force in Ukraine
SurvivalBlog staff writer Tom Christianson spotted this article (with accompanying video): Ukraine deploys all-robot battleforce for the first time as deadly tech is launched at Putin’s troops in Kharkiv assault.
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Ukraine Kamizaze Drones
Ukraine releases footage of North Korean troops being wiped out by kamikaze drones in latest disaster for Kim Jong Un’s forces sent to help Putin. The article opens with this:
“Graphic footage shows the moment a Ukrainian special operations crew targeted a North Korean position in Kursk with kamikaze drones in the latest disaster for Kim Jong Un‘s forces sent to help Putin.
Dramatic video showed the drones circling troops as they scrambled to get away in an open field in Kurshchina, shared by the Special Operations Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine on Telegram today.
Twelve vehicles were also destroyed during skirmishes in the open field, including three buggies, the military claimed.
The crew said it had killed 77 and wounded as many as 40 North Korean soldiers over a three day period of fighting in the region.
More than 1,000 North Korean soldiers have already been killed or wounded in Russia‘s war with Ukraine, South Korea‘s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) assessed today.”
JWR Adds: Other recent news reports suggest that as many as 3,000 North Koreans might have already been killed or wounded in Ukraine.
One-Third of US Military Could Be Robotic by 2039
Back in July, Defense News reported: One Third of US Military Could Be Robotic by 2039: Milley.
Some Chinese Appliances Storing Your Data
Chinese Appliances Under Fire: Smart Air Fryers Found to Be Storing Your Data.
Army Awards Two Contracts for Cargo Robot Prototypes
From Defense News: Army awards two contracts to build cargo robot prototypes.
AI-Driven Weapons
A Harvard Medical School study: The Risks of Artificial Intelligence in Weapons Design. An excerpt:
“For decades, the military has used autonomous weapons such as mines, torpedoes, and heat-guided missiles that operate based on simple reactive feedback without human control. However, artificial intelligence (AI) has now entered the arena of weapons design.
According to Kanaka Rajan, associate professor of neurobiology in the Blavatnik Institute at Harvard Medical School, and her team, AI-powered autonomous weapons represent a new era in warfare and pose a concrete threat to scientific progress and basic research.
AI-powered weapons, which often involve drones or robots, are actively being developed and deployed, Rajan said. She expects that they will only become more capable, sophisticated, and widely used over time due to how easily such technology proliferates.
As that happens, she worries about how AI-powered weapons may lead to geopolitical instability and how their development could affect nonmilitary AI research in academia and industry.“
10 Smallest Mini Drones Used in Spying
Video from Mostop: 10 Smallest Mini Drones Used in Spying. (Pardon the computer-generated voiceover. The script was probably written by A.I.!)
Poland Makes Weapons Training Mandatory For Schoolkids
Poland Makes Weapons Training Mandatory For Schoolkids As Threat Of Russian Invasion Escalates.
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