back to article 'Phantom Ray' robot stealth jet rolls out

US arms'n'aerospace goliath Boeing yesterday held a public unveiling of its "Phantom Ray" jet-fighter sized robot stealth plane. The firm has no customer for the Phantom Ray, which is intended to fly by the end of the year, but evidently Boeing executives consider that it would be fatal to be left behind in the military robojet …

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  1. Ian Ferguson
    Thumb Up

    My god!!

    "Others, of course, would argue that the US and its Western allies already have far more and far more sophisticated air power than they actually need, and that in fact a long break before the next generation of aerial killware might be in order. Still others might be sceptical about the willingness of senior military officers who mostly came up as pilots to spend big money making their beloved way of life obsolete."

    A reasoned and balanced opinion from Lewis Page! Way to go Pagey :)

  2. Graham Marsden
    Terminator

    "full-sized, stealthy robot warplanes"

    May I be the first to welcome...

    ... why are those dogs barking?

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Do you think Craig Brown is REALLY EXCITED?

    or he just forgot to read his Thesaurus?

    “We’re really excited about this because Phantom Works is back as a rapid prototyping house, operation and organization,” said Craig Brown, Boeing Phantom Ray program manager. “This is the first of what I expect to be many exciting prototypes, and they’re all with exciting technology.”

  4. Chris Girocco
    Grenade

    Rapid Prototyping?

    Perhaps a robotic weapon of mass destruction is not really what we would want to be the subject of rapid prototyping.

  5. snafu

    I like this ship

    …It's exciting

  6. Boris the Cockroach Silver badge
    Terminator

    Is'nt

    DARPA working on some sort of AI system for weapons systems......

    Time to start preparing my weapons bunker

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    If death has to rain from above from an unmanned killing machine

    well then it has to look good doing it. The Ray certainly looks good!

  8. Rattus Rattus

    It's not finished

    They need to take it back and finish painting it. I'm sure I can clearly see primer still on the nose and either side of that central bulge.

    1. TeeCee Gold badge
      Coat

      Re: It's not finished.

      Hmm, I wonder how much isopon there is under that primer. Must be from when they stuck the air scoop on the front.

      Presumably, if and when they get paid they'll spray it red and add some tasteful flames down the side.

      Mine's the one in the Ford Anglia with the pack of Hamlet cigars and receipt for four "Carlos Fandango superwide wheels" in the pocket.

      1. BristolBachelor Gold badge
        Coat

        I think I've seen it...

        It's the one parked in a barn, minus any wheels?

    2. Peter Ford

      It needs painting ...

      ... black of course!

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Imitating Lockheed

    Lockheed has done such development in the past for just the same reasons. However, in this case Boeing benefits from the lessons learned by the early leaders in the field. Good business decision.

  10. amanfromMars 1 Silver badge

    Fluid AIdDynamic Intellligence ...... for Tidal Waves of XSSXXXXStream Surging Power.

    Sadly is the American Way ...... Throw paper money at a project and its heads to lead a successful team, nowhere near enough on its own nowadays, whenever dealing with the Virtually Real and Imaginable and Fundamentally Bad.

    Nowadays to get any Command and Control Project, whether it be Civil or Military, Political or Punitive, to Deliver the Goods in Spades, you need Global Control of Root Message and Memory Store and the Placing of Simply Clear Words in Complex CyberSpace Clouds to Feed the Growing Inquisitive Thinking Mind........ and that is very easily, and most easily done with the Remote Command and Virtual Control of Computers and Communications from Creative Satellite Base Stations......... which is a knack easily acquired with throwaway paper money to Cyber Commanders in Chief who actually know how to do what they are supposed to be doing, rather than Relying on the Sharing of their Needs to Deliver IT for Free with a Plagiarism cobbled together with Threaded Strings Delivering Total Information Awareness and Prime Internet MetaDataMine Programs.

    And to Ignore the NEUKlearer Program Embeds and Enables IT ever Further and Deeper and more Satisfyingly for States and/or Non State Actors to make Beta Use of.

    Or perhaps you would deny that Power and its Crippled Partner, Fiat Currency and Fractional Reserve Lending for Debt Creation and Asset Transfer, is now Internet Controlled by Intellectual Property Forces and Sources beyond Normal Human Ken and Street Savvy, and deliver the Perfect Stealth Cover provided by Being both Ignorant of the Shared Facts and Arrogant in a Disbelief of any Tales which one may have heard and dismissed about such Novel Affairs and Dark Matters? It is a Costly Dalliance to Server Selfish Fools for an IOU for Thirty Pieces of Silver.

  11. John Smith 19 Gold badge
    Happy

    Perhaps rather obvious

    but it looks like a scaled down B2 bomber. Nothing wrong with that but control issues are bit tricky.

    Depends who your opponent is. The Taliban have (I presume) access to heat seeking missiles but no radar.

    As always in the killware biz it's important to play the FUD card as "We don't know what the world will be like in 20 years time. It could be a (God we're hoping) Cold War".

    Just a thought.

  12. John 62

    the British version should be

    Voodoo Ray

    @John Smith 19:

    Indeed, the cold war did have real killing in Korea and Vietnam at least, but it was quiet compared to the 1940s. And the Milt-tech companies got paid loads and generals got to play about with all their fancy kit without trying much of it out for real. Relations with China in the future might not be as frosty as with the USSR, but there will be an arms race.

  13. TeeCee Gold badge
    Happy

    +1 Internets

    To the first person to shoot one down while standing on the back of a clapped out Toyota pickup.

  14. Sillyfellow
    FAIL

    what kind of peace..

    what kind of 'peace' is bombing other people?

    i thought that peace was Not killing other people. oh well. what a sad race of beings we have become.

    1. Secretgeek
      Grenade

      Become a sad race?

      Where have you been?

      We've been knocking each other off since we first picked up rocks. It's only that the means that has become more effective (and cooler too looking at the pic) and the numbers have become higher.

      Peace has only ever been localised and short lived. Try not to be sad about it - maybe one day we'll grow up.

      The icon seemed appropriate.

  15. Secretgeek
    Coat

    Quick question.

    Anyone else read "specter of security". as "sphincter of security"?

    Nope?

    Just me then.

    Still, a secure sphincter is always a good thing too.

    Where's my cloakroom ticket?

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