I, Robot: Man's best friend gets military makeover for the dismounted soldier

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In 2009 the UK MoD released a Capability Vision document to engage industry in its ‘Reducing the Burden on the Dismounted Soldier’ programme, aimed at developing technologies and systems to “reduce the burden on the individual soldier to no more than 25kg to improve their effectiveness and that of their unit.”

The U.S. and other militaries also have a similar scheme to lighten the load for soldiers through lightweight personal protection systems, advanced weapons and ammunition, and efficient electronic and power supply technologies.

Boston Dynamics, a research and development company that specialises in dynamic robots and advanced human simulation, is developing advanced military technology to fulfil this brief.

Talking to Defence IQ, Marc Raibert, co-founder and President of the MIT spun-off Boston Dynamics, explained that the company develops “robots with advanced mobility in rough terrain, and on dynamically controlled robots.”

“There is a growing interest in finding ways to lighten the load for dismounted troops,” Raibert said, with the company’s robots primarily designed for defence logistics such as load carrying.   

“The Legged Squad Support System (LS3) we are developing with funds from DARPA and the US Marine Corps is designed to meet that need,” said Raibert. LS3 is a robot that will help soldiers and Marines carry significant loads off road, in terrain too rough for existing robots and vehicles.”

The LS3 is designed to carry a 400 lbs load and 20 miles worth of fuel with a battery life of 24 hours.

In a press release Raibert said: “If LS3 can offload 50 lbs from the back of each soldier in the squad, it will reduce warfighter injuries and fatigue and increase the combat effectiveness of our troops. The LS3 program shows just how serious DARPA and the Marine Corps are about building practical, legged robots to offload our dismounted troops.”

In addition to lightening the load, the company is also developing robots for other military applications in the field. Raibert wouldn’t be drawn on the likelihood of extending the company’s work to include counter-IED robots but he did allude to machines that would be used for reconnaissance.

“Some of the other robots we are developing will be appropriate for scouting missions, though their completion is further out.”

The company’s Sea Flea is one such robot designed for ISR missions as it can increase a soldiers’ situational awareness by “leaping” up to 24 feet in the air. Sea Flea has a ruggedized camera mounted to it allowing soldiers to “see” over obstacles like walls and into buildings.

U.S. Army Col. Peter Newell, who heads up the Rapid Equipping Force, told Defence News that Boston Dynamics had been engaged by the military to add another capability dimension to its forces on the ground.

"The tactical problem is, how do we sort what compound to look into and what not to?" Newell said in a Defense News interview. "How do we look over a wall before we go over it if I don't have access to a UAS? What can I give the average squadron platoon that they can carry that allows them to repetitively look over walls?" Two Sea Fleas will be tested in Afghanistan during the winter.

In an interview with Defence IQ last week, Dr. Earl William Powers, a Research Fellow at the United States Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory, explained that the role of UAV’s will significantly increase in the future as ground units will be supplied with them to improve ISR capabilities.

“I think you’re going to see a move where you’re going to see more ground units that are going to be equipped with their own small UAVs that they can send out to do the intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance work that they need,” Powers said.

Powers is right, more UAV’s will be deployed to troops on the ground, but that’s not to say it will be done so exclusively and to the detriment of other technologies. Robots such as those designed by Boston Dynamics could offer an alternative to the UAV. Niche yes, but significant nonetheless.

Contributor:   Andrew Elwell

Andrew graduated from The University of Nottingham with an MA in History in 2003. After graduating Andrew started his career with a niche armour systems manufacturer, which provided ballisitic and blast armour products for the international defence market. His first major undertaking was to project manage a UOR up-armour programme for an in-theatre MoD vehicle. After completion of the contract, Andrew headed up the research and development department at the company. This involved designing, developing, testing and presenting new armour solutions to defeat customer specific threats to all major European and International ballistic and blast standards.

Following this Andrew moved behind the desk and became Senior Editor at a news and data provider, offering proprietary analysis, intelligence, market research and data on the global security and defence industry. The role offered the chance to write widely on the industry, exploring new technologies and getting to grips with corporate finance, mergers and acquisitions and debt and equity fundraisings.

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