[RecycledEle]

LOL.

I remember looking into research on Network Centric Warfare when I was doing my MS thesis around 2000. I had a ton of ideas for cheap counters to traditional weapons systems, but the funders only wanted multi-billion-dollar solutions. They said our next wars would be asymmetric, and that they wanted expensive solutions so our enemies could not copy them.

I said we would eventually fight a symmetric war against an enemy that could out produce our industry and who designed cheaper systems.

I also said (prophetically) that the next symmetric war would be won by whoever designed and modified the best autonomous systems on the front lines and who produced the most of them. This seems to be partly happening in Ukraine.

[wjnc]

I ‘pitched’ autonomous drone swarms in ‘06 to a NATO official who had a good laugh at my expense. He had the good grace to compliment my idea about a decade later. Nearly another decade later and it’s a regular part of low cost warfare. Not saying my idea was particularly novel (or smart). Just a random reader of sci-fi getting enthusiastic. But I think our feeling at the time must have been alike. It’s like military procurement is by definition stuck in last years war.