Pentagon May Send Robotic 'Mule' to War

(Sept. 3) -- In the 1980s, the CIA sent mules to Afghanistan to help ferry weapons to anti-Soviet fighters. Now, the U.S. military is looking to send robotic pack mules that can carry supplies around the battlefield and lighten the load of overburdened soldiers.

US soldiers patrol jointly with Canadian soldiers and the Afghan National Army in Kandahar's province Arghandab Valley on August 10.

Yuri Cortez, AFP / Getty Images

The Pentagon thinks overburdened U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan would benefit from the help of robotic "pack mules" designed to transport supplies.

The Rapid Equipping Force, a part of the Army designed to provide urgently needed equipment to commanders in military operations, says it wants a cargo robot that can transport supplies to troops. The robot should be "about the size of a compact car, capable of carrying up to twelve hundred (1,200) pounds of payload, and designed primarily to serve as a utility and cargo transport for dismounted small unit operations," the Pentagon announced today.

One possible candidate to fill this requirement is an unmanned ground system developed by Lockheed Martin Corp. Known as Multifunction Utility/Logistics and Equipment, or MULE for short, it was designed to follow humans on the battlefield, bringing forward supplies when necessary. But the MULE, which was part of a larger $200 billion Army modernization program, was canceled earlier this year as part of broader budget cuts.

The Army's plans to possibly revive this -- or at least a similar -- project is ironic. Earlier this year, one Army official involved in the modernization program was quoted by Army Times as saying MULE robots were canceled because there was "no longer a requirement based on lessons learned from theater."

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The Army's new request for just such an unmanned system seems to contradict that statement.

There are, however, other military robots in various states of development that could help carry supplies. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the research and development arm of the Pentagon, has for a number of years sponsored work on Big Dog, a four-legged robot that looks more like a headless mule than a canine. The Marines also have worked on their own version of an unmanned supply vehicle.

The Army announcement doesn't specifically say when or where the robotic supply vehicle would be deployed.