US to launch world's fastest ever plane.

#26
#26
DC Vol said:
I would be very surprised if there is a single foreign national in DARPA (which has developed a bulk of advanced technology for the DoD).
Click to expand...

What do you mean by "in DARPA" by the way? As I understand it, they are a fairly flat organization, with not that many employees, really. They are primarily program managers and some administrative folks. They are most likely not foreign nationals. By "in DARPA", do you mean all of those doing research on DARPA-funded programs?

Of the folks that they go out and give money to as part of their program management, I'm not sure how many are foreign nationals. I know a quite a few folks working on DARPA projects that weren't born here..I'm just not sure how many gained US citizenship....

...if your lab is doing something that DARPA is very interested in but you are not a US citizen...would they give you money? I think most likely so, but I'm not positive.
 
#27
#27
Looks like this is going towards the prompt global strike effort. To be able to strike anywhere in the world within an hour with a conventional weapon would be extremely valuable to the military. The problem though is that it could trigger fear of a nuclear weapon.
 
#29
#29
TennTradition said:
I agree that in defense-related research, the use of foreign nationals is growing small. At one time, it was more common, but relative to other areas of research, less frequent. With that said, the US has long-relied on taking the world's best and brightest (or giving those bright enough the freedom to do their thing) and made technological gains as a result. It isn't like reliance on foreign nationals is a new thing. Usually, the ones who make the biggest contributions go on to gain citizenship (as they then qualify as aliens of exceptional ability)...that may be less common now, not sure....some do want to go back "home" at some point.

If the person who originally posted the comment about falling behind was talking about defense technology, then my post is less accurate. However, I took it to imply falling behind in technology in general. I certainly didn't take the post to be about DARPA research.
Click to expand...


Well, the poster said "we're falling behind because we need foreign nationals to help develop these things" pertaining to a DARPA project. Also, as a general scope, foreign nationals only comprise about 20% of all high-end tech research (i.e. non-defense driven like Intel, AMD, Apple, Microsoft, etc) which isn't what I would qualify as "relying on" either. Large defense firms like Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, etc have to play by DoD rules and therefore are mostly if not entirely comprised of US citizens. And a good number (I work with quite a few Boeing employees) are from US Top 10 engineering/science schools.


Either way it should be seen as a good thing that the world's best and brightest choose to come here to be educated and a good number of them choose to stay here and work (and go through the arduous process of citizenship which many don't ever get... PhD or not).
 
Last edited:
#30
#30
While I know nothing about this specific platform, I have worked some advanced R&D projects under contract from DARPA. I can guarantee only a small number of people know everything about its full capabilities. There are some unacknowledged programs that have come out of DARPA that, because it was so compartmentalized, had a few hundred people working on it, but only a select few knew what the final product was.

I wouldn't be surprised if this is only a small part, or technology demonstration, for a completely different platform. Just my guess.
 
#31
#31
TennTradition said:
What do you mean by "in DARPA" by the way? As I understand it, they are a fairly flat organization, with not that many employees, really. They are primarily program managers and some administrative folks. They are most likely not foreign nationals. By "in DARPA", do you mean all of those doing research on DARPA-funded programs?
Click to expand...

DAPRA can fund a large facet of things, obviously. I was specifically commenting on DoD projects which would have a very strict clearance requirement.

Since this is releated to a weapons platform I would assume that it's SCI. This, if you're not familiar, is an extremely hard clearance level to attain. It took me almost 2 full years from kick-off to read-in to get mine.


Basically, if you're a citizen of China you're not getting anything as there is no clearance level that approves the release of information to China.

If you're a citizen of Great Britain, since there are caveats that pertain to releaseable information to Britain you can only attain the ceiling of information disclosure to the country of which you're a citizen. Lets say (I'm not disclosing anything factual or specific outside of what's outlined in Exec. Order 12968) that would be SEC/REL UK AUS NZ. UK, Australian or New Zealand citizens could be read in but still very strictly regulated to ONLY that project and the information the require.

I.E. you are hired on to work on the communication sensors. You're only getting information on the communication sensors and would have no idea about the payload, speed, ceiling, etc of the project you're working on. Literally only the project manager and select security required personnel would have full read-in access to all the compartments a project would be under.


And, as an aside, probably only the director of DAPRA (it is an agency like the NSA or CIA) knows how it's actually divvied up and how many cookie jars it has it's hands in. Maybe not even the director. There is a lot of smoke-and-mirrors that takes place with the DoD.
 
Last edited:
#34
#34
"Downrange assets did not reacquire tracking or telemetry." This according to DARPAS twitter.
 
#36
#36
rjd970 said:
JMO, they proved the technology works, all they needed. The real use behind this technology is probably a black project we may or may not ever know about.
Click to expand...

Either that or "Oops, our tech failed... nothing to worry about." Given you're loc, you might know about what I'm talking about.


Though, to be honest, I think it's very likely this will be handed over, similar to GPS, for use in the civilian sector for human flight. Imagine, if you will, a cheaper and far faster method of delivering humans or goods across the world. I know an offshoot was released that the USN was looking into this for delivering spec ops troops. Obviously, there are a myriad of problems they'll have to conquer but mankind must constantly push the edge of science.
 
Last edited:
#40
#40
DC Vol said:
Well, the poster said "we're falling behind because we need foreign nationals to help develop these things" pertaining to a DARPA project. Also, as a general scope, foreign nationals only comprise about 20% of all high-end tech research (i.e. non-defense driven like Intel, AMD, Apple, Microsoft, etc) which isn't what I would qualify as "relying on" either. Large defense firms like Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, etc have to play by DoD rules and therefore are mostly if not entirely comprised of US citizens. And a good number (I work with quite a few Boeing employees) are from US Top 10 engineering/science schools.


Either way it should be seen as a good thing that the world's best and brightest choose to come here to be educated and a good number of them choose to stay here and work (and go through the arduous process of citizenship which many don't ever get... PhD or not).
Click to expand...

The 20% number is a good stat to have - thanks for posting it. By relied upon, I meant that foreign nationals have been a key part of our technology development throughout the modern era. I did not mean to imply that we would have to close shop tomorrow if they decided to leave. Most of the high-end companies doing good tech development sponsor their foreign nationals toward citizenship. If they aren't productive enough tech wise with patents, disclosures, etc. then they probably end up having to leave. You can draw that process out for years though. I have to imagine that they probably hire a higher fraction of foreign nationals than is present in their overall research organization due to naturalization. I know that's the case in my company.
Posted via VolNation Mobile
 
#41
#41
Exactly. You want to become a citizen of the US? Play a crucial role in inventing solid state memory or aiding a Cisco team in developing a more efficient and secure means of communication across multiple clients. Then, we'll talk.

It's actually an extremely good system as we squeeze the most juice out of the best oranges in the crop. It takes years for people to go through the process of becoming citizens in the US but generally speaking is definitely worth it for them. Even if they don't gain citizenship they will have 10-15 years of education and work experience in the US and will probably enjoy a higher QoL in their native country where a $125k/year salary here would buy them a penthouse unit instead of a standard 1,100sq foot apartment in San Jose. It's a win-win for everyone and is a definite key part, but not a crucial part, in our technological dominance which is in no way, shape or form of slowing.


The only problem I have is the fact that education in primary schools is far too broad and mathematics isn't nearly as emphasized in the US as it is the Pacific Rim (where a good portion of our FN engineers come from). That's another discussion though, as the current system, while deficient in math/tech pays dividends in overall human development and intellectual well-roundedness.
 
Last edited:
#42
#42
The problem with extreme high speed weapons/unmanned aircraft is for proper targeting, it will have to slow down as it approaches the target. The way a GPS guided bomb works is it is continually self correcting and updating its trajectory as it approaches the target. Even if it is correcting/updating every tenth of a second, at hypersonic speeds it could be miles off between updates. In order to maintain a high Pk, it would have to have an extremely large warhead (translates to more collateral damage), update at ridiculously fast intervals, or slow as it approaches the targeted impact point.

It is a problem that sounds easy in theory, but extremely difficult in practice. Hell, just designing an on board targeting system with the needed control surfaces that could survive the forces exerted on it at those speeds would be just as big of an accomplishment as achieving the speed itself, IMO.
 
New posts
You must log in or register to reply here.

VN Store



Back
Top