First man fought with his hands. then he invented the spear and the sword. with the invention of gunpowder by the Chinese and its subsequent spread to the rest of the world, wars were increasingly fought with guns. with the advent of the World Wars, the business of killing became one of the most profitable businesses to be in. Fighter jets, tanks, flamethrowers, bombs - as killing became more innovative, its scale grew as well.
The Manhattan Project redefined the field of play in ways that continue to have an impact even today. The years of the cold War that resulted in stockpiling of chemical, nuclear and biological weapons and the emergence of Terrorism and the increasing rift along both civlizational and economic fault lines has made military innovations highly desirable and prioritized as we entered the 21st Century.
We want to not only identify some strikingly scary and path breaking military innovations of recent years such as fighter drones, non lethal chemical weapons such as bacterial sprays and the controversial "gay spray" but also to study the business models that are employed by companies for the same and the amount of money that is put in R&D and production.
WE also want to raise an ethical question regarding the same and try to determine, if the current political scenario across the world is one that perpetuates innovation in military and defence - thus the cycle is one that no country can afford to stand outside.
the aim of our project is to help identify both the economics and ethics of the issue of miltary innovations.
and to potentially suggest ways of reducing the intensity of the arms race and moving in innovative ways towards ending the same. Perhaps, we could in the process find ways that are being developed across the world to do the same.
We shall keep posting here, as we progress.
Aditya Bhawani Singh and Kshitij Prabhat Bal
The Manhattan Project redefined the field of play in ways that continue to have an impact even today. The years of the cold War that resulted in stockpiling of chemical, nuclear and biological weapons and the emergence of Terrorism and the increasing rift along both civlizational and economic fault lines has made military innovations highly desirable and prioritized as we entered the 21st Century.
We want to not only identify some strikingly scary and path breaking military innovations of recent years such as fighter drones, non lethal chemical weapons such as bacterial sprays and the controversial "gay spray" but also to study the business models that are employed by companies for the same and the amount of money that is put in R&D and production.
WE also want to raise an ethical question regarding the same and try to determine, if the current political scenario across the world is one that perpetuates innovation in military and defence - thus the cycle is one that no country can afford to stand outside.
the aim of our project is to help identify both the economics and ethics of the issue of miltary innovations.
and to potentially suggest ways of reducing the intensity of the arms race and moving in innovative ways towards ending the same. Perhaps, we could in the process find ways that are being developed across the world to do the same.
We shall keep posting here, as we progress.
Aditya Bhawani Singh and Kshitij Prabhat Bal
I guess the 24 TV-show presents a fair amount of "innovative" way of killing each other through various bacteriological strikes...
ReplyDeleteThe R&D cost is extremely high, but the spreading cost is almost zero...
Interesting project idea. You could refer first-person shooter games like Counterstrike and Call of Duty to find some interesting military innovations.
ReplyDeleteRegarding the ethics of this check out Alfred Hitchcock's "Rope" for an interesting viewpoint on the ethics of killing.
ReplyDelete--Jason
A really innovative way to kill/assasinate someone would be to make a genetic killing enzyme/chemical. The idea is to have a chemical or a protein sequence which uniquely identifies a person's DNA sequence. Since the genetic identity of a person is unique (save for twins), it will be a highly effective, unidirectional and lethal weapon customized for each individual. The chemical can just be sprayed in the vicinity of the target.
ReplyDeleteAshish Labroo
L. Sana Macha
their is a new book in the library about warfare in Asia - Ground floor in the shelf next to the entry.
ReplyDeleteits a good project idea, though very morbid. Fictional ideas can be taken from movies, tv series and computer games, very true. However, i think actual accounts would be hard to find given the secrecy governments maintain around this.
ReplyDeleteThe debate finds its ground in the ethical dilemma of countries and corporates making 'business of killing' in the name of defence, which is critical.
Tata making cheap artillery for israel is a huge and never ending debate on the sae and would suggest you should look into that too.
Great idea. Good luck.