We often think that bigger is what the military wants. After all, the military often holds the records for the biggest aircraft, fastest plane, highest flying plane, etc. While some of these, like the C-5 Galaxy is a transport plane, it is used by the US Military and allies.
Sometimes a specialized civilian aircraft such as the Guppy and the Beluga are created, which are larger than other craft, but they often have very limited uses.
Weapons are no different. The use of the Atomic Bombs created an immense blast. Little Boy, the first bomb dropped, had the equivalence of 15,000 tons of TNT, or 30,000,000 lbs if you prefer. The largest bomber the US had in WW2, was the B-29. It carried an 20,000 pounds of bombs. So you’d need 1,500 planes to make the equivalent drop… instead of one. Atomic weapons have gone both up and down in size, from the smallest the Davy Crockett (20 tonnes of TNT) to the largest Tsar Bomba (50 megatonnes of TNT – it is estimated it could have been 100 MT in final form). — source
Minimizing Collateral Damage
However, sometimes you want to minimize collateral damage. This is now possible with the ability to more accurately place weapons through the use of GPS, laser designaters, and other forms guidance. Before these types of designaters, we relied on large scale carpet bombing to try to take out a large area, as well as dive bombing to hit more precise targets. Unfortunately, this requires both a lot of people and equipment, and it is dangerous.
Additional challenges is the hitting of non-military individuals who are near by. As we found out during our war on terror, taking out a legitimate target might inflict several other civilian casualties, which could often cause people who had previously been neutral or for us, to gather up arms against us. We we started looking at how to create smaller, more precise munitions.
Most bombs, despite what Hollywood likes to portray, actually do most of their damage due to the concussive force of the explosion, not heat, or shrapnel, etc. So smaller bombs with less explosive power becomes powerful. Enter the concrete bombs, small diameter bombs, and even the ninja missile (warning language – a cleaner version is below). Yes, with the “Flying Ginsu” the rummer is that is so accurate, if hitting a car, you have to specify which seat the bad guy is in.
Additionally, we often get better ranges because the payload is lighter, which means we can fire farther way, to keep our troops safer. This leads us to the next topic – better optics.
Better Optics
For years, the best optics a military rifle had was iron sights. If you don’t know that that is, on top of the rifle is a series of metal posts, or a ring with a front post. By aligning them, you can determine where your rifle will shoot. You are limited to about 300 to 400 yards with this time of sighting system, and you are not necessarily going to be real accurate at that range.
In the early 2000’s, the military started to give out ACOGs which is a simple 4x scope, to their troops. Legend has is that the Marines scored so many shots to the head, the Marines had to do a legal review thinking that enemy troops were being executed instead of dying in combat. (Some swear this is truth, others swear it’s just propaganda.) Turns out, having a good optic allows you to see farther, and keep yourself safer, especially if the enemy doesn’t have an equivalent tool.
For perspective, the “Advanced Combat Optical Gunsight” as the program was known, allows US troops to accurate hit a target at 600 yards or so, instead of 300 yards like our enemy could hit. This keeps our troops safer for longer. However, we’re going to massively improve that.
Introducing the XM-157 (warning language). (If you want a cleaner version: https://youtu.be/uDrGj5TbXqY?si=6pos9uv5jn0v0hE0&t=56 ) This has a normal 1-6x scope on it, plus what is called a ballistic calculator. You see, after 600 yards or so, there is a lot of external factors that have to be managed, such as the temperature, elevation (air density), spin drift, wind, time in the air, etc. (Go out far enough and the spin of the earth is something that must be calculated as it will adjust the trajectory of the bullet.) It used to be that snipers, and to some extent what was known as the squad designated marksman, would learn how to do these calculations, so they could take longer range shots.
Now with this tool, those calculations will be done for you. (Yes, the government is basically handing all their troops aimbots.) And it will adjust the cross hairs to show you where to actually aim. Automatically … OK, with the press of a button. Not only that, it is supposed to link up with your night vision goggles, and allow you to link up with other squad members, so they can see targets you designate. That way if you don’t have an angle on the bad guy, you can point him out, and have a teammate do it.
Not only that, it is supposed to be accurate up to approximately 900yards. That is about 1/2 a mile. The enemy may not even know you are there, that is until the people he’s with start to fall.
Civilian Uses
You may not think that there is much civilian use for tools like this, and you’d be both right, and wrong. While a civilian doesn’t need to run an aimbot, in a game or otherwise, we do get to enjoy the technological advances that come with running smaller electronics for things like our phones, watches, and laptops. Everything getting smaller and stronger helps us all, everywhere.
Additional, the glass that is used in those scopes have to be both accurate, and strong to handle being dropped, concussive forces of explosions, etc. We use this to learn how to make stronger glass for everything from cooking tops, eye wear, smart phone screens, etc.
Then we look at GPS. It was designed by the US Air Force, who then gave it away to the world. (Russian, China, and Europe have all started working on their own versions in case the US ever changes it’s mind…but that’s a different story.) We utilize these in things like phones, car navigation, tracking devices for animals in the wild, etc. We even use it to track cars in NASCAR.
Ethical Concerns
On one hand, having more accurate weapons which can reduce collateral damage can probably be seen as nothing but a win, unless those weapons are being used on you. However, is it fair to fire at someone who can’t even see that you are there?
John Steinbeck once said, “If you find yourself in a fair fight, your tactics suck”. This quote is often used to convey the idea that if you are in a fair fight, you should have done something to tip the scales in your favor. It is a humorous way of saying that you should always try to gain an advantage over your opponent, rather than relying on a fair fight.
In the movies you might see someone throw down their weapon to “fight like a man” but that isn’t going to happen in real life. People are there to win, and as long as you don’t do it illegally, then you are encouraged to see any advantage.
A Case of an Illegal Weapon
However, there are cases where certain weapons can be illegal. Even if, or maybe because, they provide an unfair advantage. The XM-29 was an idea to have “smart grenades” which could define when to explode. And while exploding munitions is allowed, Geneva doesn’t like…I mean allow… them below a certain size. This weapon was literally too small to be legal. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvV6u3dchkc – yes, language warning again.
Once someone “remembered” this, the project was cancelled, but not before spending a tone of money on it first… what’s the ethics of the government wasting money?
Weapon Size vs Accuracy was originally found on Access 2 Learn
