IP: Air Force new ideas (note stared item)

[Dave Farber <farber () central cis upenn edu>]

WASHINGTON (Reuter) - The Air Force Wednesday projected a
dazzling array of new U.S. arms and space sensors for the 21st
century, from pilotless hypersonic attack jets to microwaves
that cripple enemy electronics.
         The possible high-tech weapons listed in a year-long study
released by the service are so advanced that special training
would be essential to make sure humans are not overwhelmed by
science. ``The keyboard and the mouse are simply not adequate
for the 21st Century,'' said Gene McCall of Los Alamos National
Laboratory, chief of the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board.
         Air Force Secretary Sheila Widnall and McCall presented the
2,000-page study, telling a Pentagon press conference these and
other systems could be built in 10 to 50 years:
         -- Warplanes that fly at speeds as high as 7,000 miles an
hour without pilots, guided by brain waves and using lasers or
microwaves to attack the enemy.
         -- Low-flying families of satellites that help aircraft and
missile-launchers send their weapons to targets
instantly and assure delivery of relief supplies accurately in
any kind of weather at any time.
***************************************
         -- Stables of disruptive ``information warfare'' weapons
that confuse and disable enemy electronics and communications
systems such as commercial computers.
***************************************
         -- Satellite-based global positioning systems that tell
aircraft and ground troops where they and their targets are
located within a half-inch).
         ``Let me assure you that this study is not going to sit on
the shelf and gather dust. We have already set aside funding for
some of these promising new areas of research,'' Widnall said.
         McCall said some space and communications systems could be
ready within a decade but hypersonic aircraft and missiles that
could maneuver sharply would be a major challenge. He also said
machines must not outpace human ability to use them.
         ``What we have to make sure of is that people are the
primary actors at the major points,'' he said, showing a video
of a blinking pilot, concentrating to use brain waves to control
maneuvers in a flight simulator.
         McCall said the Air Force could advance ``stealth''
technology, allowing an aircraft to better avoid ground radar by
making the underbelly completely smooth and putting the wheels
on top -- landing the plane in a flip maneuver.
         ``The pilots don't like that,'' he smiled.
         Laser-guided bombs used to defeat Iraq in the 1991 Gulf War
were only the beginning, the report suggested. But it stressed
that speed was the hallmark of the future.
         Aircraft and satellite sensors, cooperating in the future,
will tell U.S. forces within one second when an anti-aircraft
missile site anywhere in the world is activated, sending a
hypersonic missile to attack the site from 200 miles away within
a minute.
         The board also suggested that high-tech research will
produce non-lethal or ``sub-lethal'' microwaves that attack the
enemy's information systems. ``You could produce impulses that,
if you are attacked by an airplane, you could simply turn off
all the warning lights in that airplane and send it home. Or,
force the pilot to bail out,'' McCall told reporters.

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