"They have to wear this dumb heavy block thing here for some reason, idk what it is or what it does, so maybe we could like, just cut out some of that and put our stuff there? It's just wasted space and weight as it is, so we can optimize the space and weight usage that way!"

Like we really are just getting to the point where military gear is graft first, cool toys for engineers and generals to drool over second, and functionality maybe somewhere after that if they get around to it but really it's not important because it's not like infantry has a role in America's strategy of just terrorbombing civilians from the sky and running guns to local fascists who do the reactionary terror from the ground and win or lose the important thing is lots of people die and lots of American businessmen get rich.

Although to be fair, I suppose, it's not like someone wearing the lithium-battery-ballistic-plate special is gonna get shot in it anyways. They're going to get pulped by a quadcopter launched from 20 miles away that costs less than just this thing's battery alone, along with the rest of their squad carrying a million dollars in top-tier-graft slop between them.

[–] tricerotops@hexbear.net 31 points 1 day ago

the important thing is the equipment was destroyed and needs to be replaced

[–] SerialExperimentsGay@hexbear.net 24 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Although to be fair, I suppose, it's not like someone wearing the lithium-battery-ballistic-plate special is gonna get shot in it anyways.

Hey, friendly fire is a thing. And when their buddies hit center mass, this piece of hardware will almost certainly take damage, and it will almost certainly be constructed in some bullshit iPhone anti repair way where almost any failure means you have to buy an entirely new one. Oh and while we're at it, this is a good opportunity to copy Lockheed-Martin's business model and contractually force the army to hire Anduril's inhouse maintainance staff full time.

[–] NPa@hexbear.net 1 points 1 day ago

If that means Anduril engineers might potentially be in the line of fire, I'm all for it.

[–] Belly_Beanis@hexbear.net 11 points 1 day ago

cool toys for engineers and generals to drool over second

I wish they'd make impractical bullshit that's rule of cool to waste imperialist resources and will never actually be deployed. Like make an actual mecha or a bolo or some shit instead of missiles that blow up hospitals with microplastics that travel 99% the speed of light.

[–] BodyBySisyphus@hexbear.net 7 points 1 day ago

Although to be fair, I suppose, it's not like someone wearing the lithium-battery-ballistic-plate special is gonna get shot in it anyways. They're going to get pulped by a quadcopter launched from 20 miles away that costs less than just this thing's battery alone

Or doused in thermite cringe . It definitely seems like they're still trying to win in Iraq rather than preparing for the next war.

[–] SchillMenaker@hexbear.net 15 points 1 day ago

We have reached the pig butchering of the empire stage of capitalism