I guess the only real advantage to having super soldier technology then would be the ability to replicate those traits consistently by the millions.
Humans? Consistant?
I know what those words mean, but not together.
What are you, the possible police? 
In all seriousness, given today’s technology, yes, humans and consistency would be something beyond what we can currently do. That doesn’t rule out the possibility in the future, however.
Pointless. Let the Krezblakistanis build all they want. It will take them 20 years and more to do it and then they’ll see their precious weapons get trashed by superior big iron.
Not even needed.
No, this is what the Continentals will do.
Probably impossible.
Why? Its not like you can turn them out that fast? Even if you could, it would cost too much, for too little reward. Your ignoring the money factor. You’d have to engineer them, grow them, raise them for years and years, train them, train them more, equip them, train them even more, feed them to sit on their duffers when not fighting, and then find something useful to do with them after age 40.
Then there is the not-inconsequential problem of what to do with the thousands who simply don’t want to be in your program. And the others who aren’t happy in it. And then theres the thousands who may be psychotic. And the utter immorality of what you propose.
Or, we could take that money, give some other, human troops better guns, ammo, supply, and big iron, and I’ll bet $50 Samuel Colt wins out over your Hercules.
Robots will crush your puny super soldier army. All it takes is one giant flame breathing T-Rex.
It’s a hypothetical scenario. I was debating the ethics of using humans as super-weapons, not whether it is possible to do so in a cost-effective manner.
I propose nothing. I’m only asking questions. Whether it is “utterly immoral” is what I want opinions on.
SINCE the Super-Soldier program will in all likelyhood be ineffective and not cost efficient, THEN it is of course immoral. Any program that would squander millions or billions of dollars on torturing and enslaving innocent babies, all for nothing, is immoral. IF the Super-Soldier program was a cost-effective and practical way to win wars, THEN we might consider if the torturing and enslaving of innocent babies was justified, since it would be the only way to ensure our national survival. If it was, then it might or might not be. Since it isn’t, it isn’t.
This is the exactly the point I was getting at. Would the US engage in a program that many would consider cruelly immoral in order to ensure continued military superiority? Or would the US simply annihalate said potential threat? Or would we not care either way?
It would depend on the threat. There is no need to annihilate the super soldier program if you expect the super soldier program to be an expensive dud. But rather than dropping bombs, perhaps bringing the program to the worlds attention might be better. I imagine that the bad press a country would get for enslaving and tortuing children might make continuing the program impossible. At the very least, a total boycott ala South Africa would be in order.
But there is no need to get all worried about the other guy’s super soldiers. There are currently no super soldier programs anywhere in the world, the linked article is simply a hysterical fact-free rant by an america-hating liar.
And even if there were super soldiers, it wouldn’t matter. Super soldiers will still be soldiers, they won’t be invincible, you can’t genetically engineer bullet resistance. A few super soldiers aren’t going to save a third world hell hole from getting bombed to hell, super soldiers can’t stop tanks and artillery. And if you want to go for unconventional warfare, how exactly would a super soldier make a better terrorist?
I think to an extent we’re already creating super soldiers. We feed them high carb, high protein diets. We have them do lots of physical exercise. We equip them with high tech equipment. We train the heck out of them. We give them all sorts of vaccinations. You can even have your vision improved with Laser surgery.
Imagine a modern American soldier going up against your typical Iraqi soldier. Our guy’s got night vision glasses, more powerful & accurate weapons. Better boots, flak jacket, infrared defeating uniform. Uniforms that protect you from biological & chemical weapons. Carefully designed Meals, Ready to Eat (MREs). He’s healthier, more physically fit. Better trained.
You do not want to go up against a modern day highly trained & equipped American soldier. In effect, they already are super soldiers.
It’s only going to get cooler. Exoskeletons that make you stronger & faster. Wearable computers & sensors that make you lethal from a much greater range.
Should we make super soldiers? I say yes, as long as there is evil in the world.
What we won’t do is genetically modify soldiers or dope 'em to any significant degree. Why? Because we live in a free society and employ an all volunteer military. Soldiers eventually return to the civilian world and our society wouldn’t tolerate a bunch of homocidal genetically modified killing machines being reintegrated back into society. We wouldn’t tolerate them being created in the first place.
Despite some of our faults & failings, we’re still the “good guys.” We still try to play by the rules & do the right thing. And I agree with the other posters in this thread. Our superior tech will always out perform any genetic or drug induced improvments another country makes in their soldiers.
Nice to see you back oldscratch. I will vouch for those who said that the idea of using genetic engineering is totally not within reach for another at least 20 years. Even if it was within reach, without radically different science than what we know right now, you would have to raise them from the level of the zygote to the adolescent. I’m not saying it can’t happen, but the payoff would have to be really, really good. And I just don’t see the technology to make it really, really good within another 50 years on top of that 20 at the top of my post. Right now with crack training and all the best the military gives, we can get good soldiers. Perhaps we will start using drugs, especially recombinant human factors such as growth factors and epoietin in the future. This may raise us to really good, and it isn’t such a large moral leap to go from there directly to gene therapy and then genetic engineering. I just don’t see the payoff being all that much better, at least using technology now on the horizon, with a huge investment needed.
Probablky Not. Oh, don’t give me that look. Its entirely possibel to build them, its just not really that useful on the battlfefield. Soldiers do not want to:
- Raise their target profile
- Move slower and heavier (and exoskeletons would make people slower and less agile)
- Make more noise.
We already have mobile armored mechanized infantry. Exoskellies are not going to help that. I could see them used in specialty roles, such as for quartermasters, transports, and field engineers. I don’t doubt that in a pinch one could mount some big guns on such a suit. Overall, howver, they are a lot less efiicient that traditional trucks and tanks and APC’s.
This is where its at.
Ultimately, though, your most cost-effective route is to improve your entire population through eliminating certain childhood diseases, better education, encouraging exercise and youth sports etc. Then, when it comes time to pick the top one percent of one percent to form your elite force, you’ll get a slightly better selection. No laboratory is likely to give you better results than all the random mixing that goes on in a population of three hundred million.
I’ve always been sort of wary about how much faith the military is putting on its high tech sensors and computers. It obviously gives a tremendous advantage on the modern battlefield, but wouldn’t all of those gadgets be redered useless if a couple of e-bombs were set off? Soldiers would then be handicapped by their reliance on sensors and computer equipment that no longer work.
I am aware that EMP shielding technology does exist, but how feasible is it to have all (including the wearable stuff) military computers and sensors shielded?
Well e-bombs may knock out electronics, but good ol’ inexpensive Napalm can burn super-soldiers.
It’ll always be possible to create some situation where the opponent’s advantage is lost. Overall, though, I think highly-trained, highly-motivated, well-equipped soldiers will still beat out super-soldiers anyday, especially the zombified indoctrinated super-soldiers that are being implied in this thread.
That’s true. Zombie soldiers would suck.
First of all anyone would actually have to be utterly mad to do this (create super whatever) Come to think of it the US Gov. kind of IS utterly mad, so you never know.
Secondly, it would cost far too much to create one unit. (One single super-soldier) It would probably cost more than training a company of regulars. And since it only takes one bullet to disable one unit of “super-soldier”, it would only take one regular to do it. So, a regiment of “normal soldiers would be far more valuable than a platoon of “super soldiers”.
Now I can’t imagine that if they are really serious about this that they would actually use them on a battlefield. (Far too costly) What comes to mind is domestic militarized law enforcement. Which is off course totally illegal, but that has never stopped the Bush admin. Why? Because who better to control and put down domestic uprisings and riots than emotionally blank maniacs in totally controlled by your government. Think about it.
Thirdly, they could be used as special forces. But that’s doubtful since Special Forces soldiers have to be sympathetic. They do not just have to kill you know. They have to carry out hearts and mind and that kind of stuff.
Oh yes,
Bryan wrote
Feh, you forgot:
- Bomb the hell out them from 15,000 feet.
It works rather well, actually.
Bryan, bombing from 15,000 feet does NOT work well actually. You kill to many civilians, (not to mention Friendlies ) it’s inaccurate and you usually do not get the results you want. The grunts will get the job done. And also: The US does not have endless heaps of smart-weapons, though that’s all you see on the telly.
And Bryan wrote again:
Ultimately, though, your most cost-effective route is to improve your entire population through eliminating certain childhood diseases, better education, encouraging exercise and youth sports etc. Then, when it comes time to pick the top one percent of one percent to form your elite force, you’ll get a slightly better selection. No laboratory is likely to give you better results than all the random mixing that goes on in a population of three hundred million.
Uh oh, sounds familiar. Third Reich?
And levdrakon, your American soldiers are not the best in the world. They have the best equipment, yes. I’ll bet some guys were sitting and having the same discussion 30 years ago, at the beginning of the Viet Nam war. Best trained, best guns, best this and that. Yet lost the war to farmers who had very little training.
Now here in an interesting survey:
http://www.time.com/time/europe/gdml/peace2003.html
Check it out.
And why are they spending billions of dollars in bullshit research? Poverty is rising in the US, you have HUGE deficit. Use the money to improve your quality of life, not quality of death.
Regards, hlujarn
What’s wrong with improving the quality of death?
Your newness to this board may explain your blatant contradictions:
and
but
So, the American government (particularly the Bush administration) is ruthless, yet still concerned about bombing civilians and Friendlies?
Hmm, eliminating childhood disease, improving education and promoting physical fitness makes me a Nazi, now?
You’re new. I’ll make allowances.
Given the enormous cost of producing one so-called super soldier, I’m sure we can make the trade-off.
In any event, a single daisy cutter inside of 15 meters will cream these uber-mensch. And we can do that with an unguided bomb easily.
I have several things to say about this.
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We “could” militarily have easily destroyed them. We chose not to for politicl reasons. In fact, looking at the conflict now, one can see that, in essence, the US refused to win and was too strong to lose. Ultimately, Vietnam was a political failure, not a military one.
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Our soldiers were still far superior. Simply because the Russians beat the Germans in WWII, does not make the Russians better soldiers. They sucked. They were horrible at it. They had poor gear and almost no training. Sometimes wars hinge on other factors than the quality of soldiers. And our troops are far, far better now.
Frankly, I think you need to think about what you are saying. Don’t reduce complicated issues down to caricatures.