In-Helmet Social Networking: Influential Ex-General’s Vision of Future War

[Jan Klimkowski]

In the near future, infantrymen will be selected by psychologists, train like football teams and tap online social networks of military experts as they enter a war-zone village. The soldiers will rely on overseas translators to talk to the locals, drive all-electric vehicles and have their vital signs constantly monitored by their superiors. And thanks to new “weapons and sensing technologies and the creation of hyper-performing small units,” a small handful of troops will be able to control vast swaths of territory and influence large populations.
That’s the future, at least, as sketched out for Gen. James Mattis, the nominee to take over U.S. Central Command, by retired Maj. Gen.Robert Scales, a well-known military futurist. Earlier this year, Scales and Mattis were sharing ideas about the next generation of small units — something the two iconoclastic senior officers have done repeatedly over the last six years.

A neo-fascist wet dream, refracted through the banal prism of American football and cyberpropaganda.

An iconoclastic vision?

Nah. Just plain embarrassing.