Unmanned Vehicles

For a variety of reasons the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) is very sensitive to casualties. This fact has made Israel one of the world’s leaders in the development of unmanned vehicles for warfare including planes, such as this Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) developed by Elbit in Haifa

and Unmanned Land Vehicles (ULV)

And the Protector Unmanned Surface Vehicle (USV) from Rafael (in Acco)

The possibilities and implications for this type of technology in both  military and civilian applications are immense. On the military side a large number of these three types of  devices communicating with each other and attacking an enemy not equipped with this technology would make for a very one-sided battle along the lines of tanks against bows and arrows. In addition, once these types of devices are deployed in large numbers, there will need to be a re-thinking about the role of some of today’s military technology. Just imagine 50 of these little boats, each equipped with a missile, attacking a large warship. Because of their small size and fast speed they would be very difficult to destroy before they could launch their missiles.

On the civilian side all three types of devices could be used in life-saving applications such as search and rescue and replacing human operators in dangerous or unpleasant environments.