Here we go. Precision is reaching the infantry:
The system works by tracking potential ground and aerial drone targets using a day or night mode with a traditional red dot sight picture. Once found, it works out a firing solution even as a soldier’s natural breathing and fatigue draws his aim off target. All a soldier has to do is hold the trigger down.
When the solution is calibrated, the round is let loose, hitting the target and nothing else, Smart Shooter officials told Army Times at the Association of the United States Army’s annual conference in Washington, D.C., this week.
The problem is when this technology (which I have dubbed Dumb But Controlled, or DBC) reaches even enemy insurgents, our training edge that emphasizes accurate shooting will be nullified. As I recently wrote on the Naval Institute blog:
The May 1972 “Battle of the Bridges” in which U.S. aircraft destroyed targets that had long resisted dumb munitions announced the arrival of a new precision method of waging war that promised “If you can see it, you can hit it. If you can hit it, you can destroy it.” That was described as the first phase of a revolutionary change in the nature of warfare.[22] That battle won with expensive but effective “remotely piloted munitions” fired from expensive planes by expensively and extensively trained air crews has filtered down to the level of rifles carried by even ill-trained individual fighters. Will U.S. Marines be prepared to win on such a battlefield of tomorrow?
This applies to the Army, too, of course. And to any Navy or Air Force people who carry rifles for a living.
I argued that marksmanship training time in basic training will have to give way to tactical training pushed down to basic training; and that leadership, tactics, and non-weapon technology must be improved to overcome enemies with marksman created by putting a rifle in their hands.
UPDATE: Enlisted leadership has to be chosen carefully to make the most of our infantry.
