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AnonTechie writes:
First Stop: Skyshield ... Next Stop: Skynet"
Israel is finally ready to combat shoulder-launched missiles and they're going to do it with lasers. Israel's Ministry of Defense announced Wednesday that SkyShield, developed by Israeli defense contractor Elbit Systems, had successfully completed testing and is certified for commercial use to combat the threat of man-portable surface-to-air missile systems (MANPADS) by combining advanced laser detection and disruption technologies.
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Commercial Jets Will Soon Be Firing Lasers
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I'm not a robot like you. I don't like having disks crammed into me... unless they're Oreos, and then only in the mouth.
-- Fry
(Score: 3, Insightful) by bucc5062 on Wednesday March 05 2014, @02:56PM
Who the hell are box lovers? That alone diminishes your statements since you resort to name calling to identify a group of people.
What costs more, a hand held missile launcher or this laser device? What's more replaceable, hand held missile launchers and missiles or a plane with a laser device. The reason I ask pertains to your question why every plane needs one.
Why does every single person in the USA have to go through a security screening before getting on an airplane? Because in the minds of the TSA, if just one person gets past, and that was the one with a exploding device, weapon, and or ability to capture a plane, the whole purpose fails. This is why the TSA shuts down whole airports when some dim-bulb walks past a security station or the TSA discovers that a person got past without being checked.
If you put a laser defense on just a few airplanes, then you just make it easier to identify the ones that are not protected and boom, security system fails. If you don't enforce an all or nothing approach for this type of security then it does little to stop bad guys. It is not a strawman at all. It is a reflection of how the USA implements security these days in dealing with air transport. To your other point, yes, it would be the US government mandating all airlines to implement this level of security for it would be the FAA having to establish how, when, and who does the work.
Are you serious about automatic? How is it turned on? Turned off? What happens when something goes wrong and an indicator light comes on saying it don't work no more. Airliners and the FAA do not like to put black boxes on civilian airplanes without knowing everything it does, how it effects a civilian air frame, and what impact it can have on a flight.
So, back to the cost comparison. I'm a bad guy and I want to do harm to airplanes (note NSA, this is just theorizing like you do all day). Some airplanes will have cool laser device, most wont. Once Evil Capitalist country starts to implement such a device it makes civilian planes more target worthy thus I will,
1 - Identify the haves from the have nots
2 - Set up a location where I can attack with the biggest impact (no pun)
3 - Attack. If I miss no harm for the Capitalistic Country will bend over backwards trying to get even safer and destroy its economy (at least aviation). If I hit, I get the satisfaction of success and I still get the first part.
Even if all planes are protected, I just adjust by attacking with overwhelming odds using multiple conventions of attack.
Cost to me, a bunch of missiles and possibly a martyr or two. Cost to an airline and a country, billions of dollars wasted. and unless I have dedicated airplanes to those countries you listed (and US carriers go to some, EU carriers certainly do) then what happens with a protected plane is out of service and the only plane to fly in is one without a laser beam? Make it mandatory to fly into Mali? Smart Airlines will drop that country in a heart beat.
Here's a thought, maybe if we just figured out a way to stop bad guys from shooting missiles at civilian airplanes it might just cost a lot less. But then some defense business would lose out on making billions on a worthless project.
The more things change, the more they look the same
(Score: 0, Troll) by Yog-Yogguth on Wednesday March 05 2014, @10:29PM
It says it's automatic in TFA. When it doesn't work you explode. That's probably why it's quite expensive: fault tolerant engineering.
Not every airplane travels every route.
You obviously instantly knew what a box lover is. I could have called them "hate tourists" and you would instantly know. I could have called them "pink unicorns" or "green trolleys" and you would still likely know exactly who it was or quickly figure it out. If I called them "yummy peaches" you would probably be slightly confused, maybe confused enough to stop writing but it wouldn't be because you didn't identify them but only because your stale thought patterns started throwing all your assumptions back in your face --you might start contemplating and reevaluating your own thoughts :D
A hand held missile launcher doesn't do the airplane any good so your comparison is nonsense, or are you suggesting the co-pilot hang out of the cockpit window with a Stinger trying to shoot down the rocket with his rocket? :)
Flares would be cheaper but "lawyers" (i.e. international civil regulation of the use of civilian airspace for civilian purposes making the obvious solution illegal), so one isn't allowed to do that.
Would it be cheaper to kill all the lawyers and then use flares? Please feel free to do it.
Fuck the TSA, fuck the US federal government, fuck your straw-men, and fuck islam :)
"Evil capitalist country"? What are you, stuck in the 20ieth century? This is the 21st century dominated by two large fascist powers hell-bent on the destruction of everything and anything remotely decent about humanity: the federal US "elite" with their EU pawns and islam murdering their way through Africa and Asia and raping and fucking their way through Europe, neither of which are capitalist in any meaningful sense of the word except if by capitalist you simply mean "have or use money".
No system is perfect but it is made to avert at least one missile. Maybe it will have to be improved, maybe it already can deal with multiple missiles (I would not be surprised if it did) but yeah you would then argue it's shit because it couldn't handle fifty or a hundred simultaneous missile launches. Why would you give a shit about a hundred bullets in your neck if you didn't avoid bullet number one anyway? This is a perfect example of bureaucratic mentality where you don't do anything at all because you can think of a thousand reasons it might fail: you don't take any baby steps towards finding possible solutions and don't want anyone else trying either because they might eventually end up with something that at least partially works and you hate that. You good Sir, is an anti-hacker.
Best of luck making it mandatory to fly into Mali —you're pure gold!— maybe you don't know it but they already have you thinking like a pure fascist would; you believe anyone planning on blowing up planes gives a shit about laws :D
Cue everybody telling me I've been trolled in 3, 2, 1...
Buck Feta? Duck Fice! And Guck Foogle too!
(Score: 2) by bucc5062 on Wednesday March 05 2014, @10:50PM
I just...[slow claps]
The more things change, the more they look the same