Since the Batman comics were first published, many new technologies have appeared that significantly expanded the capabilities of the Batmobile, allowing it to be improved both from physical (a wardrobe for transporting spare clothes in the 40s) and cybernetic (a password to protect against hacking in the 60s) points of view.
Perhaps the Batmobile's biggest technological leap forward has come with the integration of unmanned and autonomous capabilities. Since the 90s, Batman could already drive on autopilot and remotely control the Batmobile in the narrow and dark streets of Gotham. By the 2000s, he was able to operate on his own, transferring data back to Batcave headquarters for quick processing and subsequent use.
If Batman and his high-tech supercar are associated with dynamic progress and technological innovation, then Gotham is a reflection of a political, social and ecological decline: an unmanageable and untestable urban space, immersed in a gray, semi-criminal atmosphere. Corruption and the growing threat of violence, a crowded and dissatisfied population, a vulnerable critical national infrastructure are characteristic of Gotham City, and in this complex urban space, Batman must be stronger, smarter and more cunning than his opponents in every episode.
Unmanned ground vehicles in the future metropolis
Against the backdrop of massive global migration to cities and the increased fragility of urban spaces due to environmental and geopolitical crises, the likelihood of future conflicts in cities increases. With this awareness, the armies of the world are updating their capabilities to fight and win in urban environments, and automatic ground vehicles (AHAs) are expected to play an important role in these future operations.
This article examines the development of doctrine, tactics and methods of warfare in relation to the AHA in the future urban space, plus the development of deserted technologies. The analysis of the problems of AHA deployment at the present stage is given with specific examples of Israel and Syria, as well as the unique operational challenges that commanders and combat units will face in future cities. It also provides a brief overview of testing and evaluating models for the American and British armies as they pursue their own AHA programs, hoping to eventually accept them for supply.
Robots in urban conflicts and metropolitan areas
Urban conflicts are becoming more frequent. These conflicts have global potential, ranging from traditional fighting in metropolitan areas and metropolitan areas to urban unrest and unrest, as seen in the democratic protests in Hong Kong or the Yellow Vests movement in France, to gangsterism and criminal riots in large cities. and slums. They pose an extreme threat to civilians, challenge the military, police and intelligence agencies, and seriously impede the work of humanitarian organizations.
Conflict and technological merger
Urban conflict is also the scene of a technological fusion, as the military and security forces, as well as their opponents, use new technologies ranging from drones and artificial intelligence - "applications and algorithms" - to cyber warfare and robotization. Assassin robots and lethal autonomous systems pose new operational and ethical challenges. While science fiction is filled with robot wars, modern technological advances are consistently expanding the presence of deserted weapons systems on the battlefield.
Drones are seen today as an evolving tactical challenge. Their swarms can be used to penetrate air defenses or deliver explosives and weapons of mass destruction. Non-state armed groups also use drones to advance their targets, using them as surveillance, reconnaissance and intelligence gathering tools, strike weapons or vehicles such as unmanned drug submarines. In the not too distant future, we can expect the integration of AI into strike drones in an urbanized operational space.
Due to the increase in the share of urban combat in the variety of future conflicts, ground vehicles are being rapidly integrated into power structures. For example, the United States Marine Corps is testing ground-based robotic sensor platforms to enhance its surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities and remotely operated vehicles for underground missions. His war laboratory is also experimenting with deserted weapon platforms, including an Expeditionary Modular Autonomous Vehicle (EMAV) armed with rockets or a 12.7mm machine gun for use in tight urban environments.
Robots in urban space
Robots and autonomous systems are changing combat tactics and police patrolling methods. Robots and AI are the two engines that are reshaping and blurring the boundaries between the physical and virtual worlds, changing the way the military approaches recruiting, manning, training and retention of operators. All functions will be affected, from transportation and logistics with automated and timely resupply, maintenance and rearmament based on AI, to reconnaissance and information gathering and warfare. The robots will also increase operational flexibility when operating underground, something that the armies of some countries, such as Israel, are looking forward to.
As the proportion of inhabited and uninhabited platforms on the battlefield changes, the planning, decision-making, observation, reconnaissance and intelligence gathering processes will change. New approaches to visualization and formation of the image of the terrain are becoming mandatory, since AI machines must navigate the operational space without any problems. This applies equally to military, public safety and humanitarian aspects of urban operations. The complexity and density of metropolitan areas (in physical and virtual space) only increase the level of complexity. Robots are also adapting to perform other urgent tasks, for example, mine sweeping operations or humanitarian demining operations.
Robots can move in such places and perform such tasks in which, due to objective reasons, it is difficult for people to be and work, but at the same time they also face a number of restrictions, especially when it comes to cognitive and adaptive abilities. Autonomous systems can easily fall prey to electronic warfare because they are vulnerable to electronic jamming. In the current Hong Kong confrontation between state structures (including the police, security services and to some extent gangsters from the triads) and pro-democracy groups, digital mapping tools, for example, became a participant in the battle,since the authorities have demanded that telecommunications companies remove those applications (tracking applications) that give demonstrators an advantage in situational awareness.
Robots in the city: ethical standards, international humanitarian law and future urban combat
Modern robotic weapons systems are in the overwhelming majority of cases remotely controlled. In the future, they may be semi-autonomous with AI-based navigation and / or autonomous under AI control. Collectively, drones and droids have already demonstrated the ability to enhance a variety of work functions, ranging from reconnaissance and surveillance, terrain navigation, and the ability to operate in high-risk areas. Precise targeting and high-precision fire potentially increase combat effectiveness while reducing combat losses. Strike robots and AI kamikaze robots have become almost a reality. Robotic weapons systems, providing lethal capabilities, call into question humanitarian norms and require the development of new restrictions and norms of international law and military ethics.
Robotic warfare with extensive use of artificial intelligence may be the forerunner of a new arms race. Some opponents of the West, including Russia and China, are very serious about robotic warfare. And some groups, such as Boko Haram, have already understood the capabilities of drones and will potentially be able to integrate some AI capabilities in the near future as they appear on the commercial market. Intelligent power systems of cities and robotization will become an integral part of military operations, and robots, most likely, will expand the framework of human-machine interaction in the megacities of the future. Now is the time to prepare for robotic urban warfare through war games, opponent analysis, experimentation, and doctrine development.
Robots in the Israeli Armed Forces
The Israel Defense Ministry and the Israel Defense Forces see the enormous potential of ground-based assault vehicles for urban combat. Their efforts to develop and deploy these systems are focused on two areas that will eventually merge in the future. The first is the development of advanced automated combat vehicles and the second is the use of uninhabited and fully autonomous systems.
Carmel program
Most recently, the Ministry of Defense presented three prototypes proposed for the promising Carmel combat vehicle, which the Israeli army should eventually adopt.
Launched three years ago and spanning several years, the Carmel project is one initiative aimed at addressing the maneuverability challenges faced by Israeli forces in urban environments. In essence, the program is a breakthrough in the doctrine of the future urban combat, integrating advanced autonomous capabilities and advanced AI in order to improve the efficiency of the execution of tasks by the mobile forces of the Israeli army.
The automation of the Israeli army's combat forces is based on a solid industrial foundation. For many years, Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) has been a leading UAV designer and manufacturer and is currently developing a family of ground-based robotic systems.
IAI Automatic Ground Vehicles Family
IAI's AHA platform line includes RoBattle, a highly maneuverable robotic combat system for heavy-duty operating conditions. The system is designed to work with tactical forces in mobile, dismounted operations in support of a wide range of tasks, including information gathering, surveillance and armed reconnaissance and protection of transport convoys. The platform is equipped with a modular “robotic kit” consisting of vehicle control, navigation, sensors and functional target loads. The system can operate in several modes of autonomy and be equipped with wheels and tracks in order to meet operational needs.
According to IAI's Ground Systems Project Manager, “With 'modular robotic kit' technology designed to meet specific customer requirements, RoBattle is one of the most advanced ground combat robots on the market. It implements modern technologies and capabilities that will help to cope with the challenges of the future battlefield."
The family also includes the Panda robotic combat engineering platform, the Sahar IED detection and route clearance system, and the fully autonomous REX vehicle designed to reduce the burden on infantry and act as a combat porter in dismounted units.
Tests and experiments
With the aim of increasing the safety of working with them and better understanding their operation in the field, the Israeli army received funding to test and evaluate the AHA in a number of different scenarios in physical and virtual space.
While physical testing offers obvious benefits to developers, current Israeli law prohibits the use of AHAs in cities, which can take too much time and resources to improve their effectiveness. As such, virtual or simulated testing has proven to be an excellent alternative.
Israeli company Cognata has developed a platform that is based on the digital representation of the real world "Digital Twin" ("Digital Twin"). It is built on the basis of aerial photography and other information, which adds "reality" to the modeling process.
According to a company spokesman, it will take about 11 billion hours of work for the AHA to fully test all the possible "complexities" that it may encounter over its entire life cycle. "It is clear that this is unrealistic and therefore we are creating our own modeling platform."
The synthetic product "Digital Twin" describes real-world conditions in great detail. “We give the client almost 100 percent of all possible scenarios, so he can be confident that his machine will handle all of them.”
The future Israeli industry of autonomous ground systems
As the case of Cognata shows, Israel's robot hardware and software industry is becoming increasingly diversified, and the nature of this technology means that small and medium-sized businesses, start-ups and commercial companies are increasingly able to compete for military contracts.
One Israeli start-up, Roboteam, was very successful last year with its ultralight mini-ANA, winning two contracts from the Italian police and the New Zealand army.
Testing and evaluating robots in an urban environment
In 2017, it was reported that Russia plans to supply its Uran-9 robotic complex to the troops for further testing and evaluation. The platform was intended for remote operation (as opposed to IED disposal platforms, for example) and use in complex urban operations. However, a year later, reports from the war zone ceased to please with good news.
In June 2018, at a conference at the V. I. N. G. Kuznetsov in St. Petersburg, it was said that
“Russian ground combat robots are incapable of performing assigned tasks in classic combat operations. It will take another 10-15 years before AHAs are ready to operate in a complex urban space.”
Samuel Bendett's Mad Scientist blog lists some of the main problems the Russians had with the Uranus 9 robot in Syria:
1. The average platform control distance was only 300-500 meters, there were several reliable cases of loss of control over the platform.
2. Low reliability of the chassis elements, for long periods of time the machine could not take part in close combat, constant repairs in the field were required.
3. Optoelectronic stations made it possible to conduct reconnaissance and identification of targets at a distance of no more than 2 km, and the platform systems interfered with each other.
4. Cases of unstable operation of the automatic cannon were recorded.
A year later, the Russian Ministry of Defense argued that all the shortcomings had been eliminated, and the Uran-9 robot and a number of other autonomous platforms were presented at the Army 2019 exhibition. Later in an interview, Samuel Bendett noted that while
"Many were there to study the Russian military experience in Syria, the only way to check if such problems have been resolved is to demonstrate the Ural-9 in real combat, so the future will show."
Testing and evaluating a portfolio of promising robots
Studying Syrian practice can give NATO countries and their allies some insight into the likely challenges they may face when testing and assessing AHA capabilities and their role in urban operations. Short range, inadequate autonomy, poor target identification, electromagnetic interference and unreliable service all need to be addressed jointly by the testing authority and industry as countries move towards more practical AHA applications.
The approaches of the American and British armies clearly demonstrate their serious involvement in innovative testing and evaluation, as well as their commitment to working closely with industry to balance risks and rapidly deploy robotic vehicles.
The US Army's robotics needs are driving the accelerated development of AHA technologies, as well as technical and procedural issues. Teams competing, for example, to make Light Robotic Combat Vehicle light combat vehicles for the army, have presented impressive prototypes and it will be interesting to follow the progress of this process.
Textron and Flir's M5 Ripsaw platform includes guided missiles, an optoelectronic / infrared station, and two drones to expand the field of view. Most importantly, according to some reports, the platform does not require constant remote monitoring.
Meanwhile, HDT's Global Hunter WOLF is another contender for the Light Robotic Combat Vehicle project - in recent trials of a multipurpose cargo platform for the SMET (Squad, Multipurpose Equipment Transport) squad, it showed better performance, including a longer operating time, compared to their competitors. The platform is equipped with a 130 hp engine. and a 20 kW on-board generator, meaning it does not need to stop to recharge its batteries.
Meanwhile, the British army already in 2018 decided on the priorities for testing and evaluating AHA platforms, which allowed its combat units to better understand their feasibility. The Army Warfighting Experiment 2018 (AWE 18) included three weeks of intensive testing involving four vehicles. The results were positive, so in the AWE 2019 experiment, the program was expanded and the emphasis was placed on the interaction of inhabited and uninhabited platforms (General Dynamics demonstrated its MUTT platform). In the AWE 2020 experiment, the British Army will test how inhabited and uninhabited platforms fit into its command and communications networks.
A new accelerated prototyping, testing and evaluation model, such as in the US Army, needs to be more effective, giving mobile forces new capabilities and greater preparedness for future urban combat. As the Chief of the General Staff of the British Army noted at a conference on autonomous systems: “Rapid adaptation is essential to success on the battlefield, and the deployment of next-generation armored vehicles and innovative robotic and autonomous systems will keep the British Army at the forefront of military technology, increasing lethality, combat sustainability and competitiveness”.
Given Russia's concerns in Syria in the context of new US and UK robotic platform programs, industry and procurement process managers should continue to collaborate on defining AHA requirements, especially for urban operations. This may require additional investment in more realistic test and evaluation processes - physical, augmented, or virtual - so that scenarios can be played back from a b Othe highest level of immersion.
Potential rivals of the West are taking concerted action to develop their own robotic and autonomous systems through the development of high-precision, intelligent and stealthy uninhabited long-range weapons platforms. New autonomous ground platform programs are also under way in NATO and Partner countries. Due to the development of breakthrough technologies in the field of artificial intelligence and robotization, the nature of combat maneuver has changed. It is becoming more and more obvious that any conversation about deserted technologies can no longer be conducted without taking into account the interaction of inhabited and uninhabited systems.
