Pint-sized soldier with a big wallop

January 17, 2007 | Source: Star-Ledger

The U.S. Army is developing a robot that fires a machine gun with half-mile accuracy. Troops operate the machine remotely from a suitcase-size computer that lets them peer through the robot’s five cameras and drive it by tilting a joystick.

The $250,000 robot — known as Special Weapons Observation Remote Reconnaissance Direct-Action System, or SWORDS — is intended as a way to keep troops out of harm’s way.

The Department of Defense is investing $130 billion over the next 20 years in the Future Combat System, a network of computerized weapons and robotic vehicles.