Getting one step closer to Skynet, aren’t we?
Israel is announcing its plans to use autonomous technology in order to secure the border with Gaza.
The UGVs (Unmanned Ground Vehicles) are based on militarized Ford F-350 pick-up trucks, featuring four driving cameras along a 360-degree one. For now, the vehicles are not featuring assault equipment.
”Sending unmanned vehicles to do these patrols means that troops lives’ are not at risk.” an Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) official stated for Fox News.
The UGVs began testing in July 2015 and were declared operational in February this year. The Israeli Army is ready to make even more use of autonomous technology for its military vehicles: "In the future, we will have the capability of fully autonomous driving," the IDF official added.
At this moment, the vehicles are remotely controlled by operators using a steering wheel, joystick, and pedals – just like in a very neat, military-themed simulation rig we guess. Although in the future, the UGVs will know how to move to a preset destination, operators will still be needed to guide them around obstacles.
As for the plans of adding weapons on the vehicles, the IDF official stated: "We think at the beginning of next year, we will get a machine gun a machine gun on the vehicle that will be operated from a control room – the machine gun will not be autonomous."