An illustration from Ubisoft's Ghost Recon Future Soldier.

An illustration from Ubisoft's Ghost Recon Future Soldier. UBISOFT

This Formula Predicts Soldier Firepower in 2050

Drawing trend lines across seven centuries suggests that tomorrow’s troops will rock some seriously heavy gear.

In 2050, exoskeleton-equipped soldiers could carry the sorts of heavy machine guns that are today mounted on vehicles, while tanks could be armed with howitzer-class cannons, according to a mathematical formula derived from seven centuries of weapons development.

To build the formula, Army Research Laboratory scientist Alexander Kott carefully scrutinized the performance attributes of weapons across the years, starting with crossbows and proceeding through muskets and tanks. 

“Building a model of technology evolution based on performance attributes rather than on design attributes allows us to seek regularities across multiple technology families, increase the temporal span of the investigation, and offer superior capability for longer-term forecasting,” Kott writes in a paper that will appear in the Journal of Defense Modeling and Simulation. (Defense One obtained an early copy.)

Kott’s work looks back at centuries of weapons development, starting with crossbows and proceeding through muskets and tanks, in order to come up with a model to predict future developments in weaponry. (Although he is an U.S. Army scientist, the paper does not represent official doctrine.)

Related: Army Goggles Will Feature Facial Recognition Tech ‘Very Soon’

Related: The US Military Is Chopping Up Its Iron Man Suit For Parts

Related: The US Military Must Lighten Warfighters’ Loads

Technological forecasting has been around for decades. The most famous example is Moore’s Law, which forecasts the size and power of computers as a function of the amount of time it takes to double the number of transistors on a chip (roughly 18 months) and the attendant effect on price. Since 1965, it’s been remarkably consistent, allowing hedge fund managers, designers, and entrepreneurs to plan for the future based on the likely availability of computational power at a particular price point. 

Kott’s formula does something similar, but with military projectiles rather than computer chips. He examines such factors as the year of the weapon’s creation, the velocity of the projectile it fires, the mass of the projectile and of the weapon itself, how fast the weapon moves, the rate of fire, crew size, and so on. All these aspects are placed in a formula to show how one innovation sets the stage for another one. 

Based on his work, Kott believes that advancements in soldier-worn exoskeletons will enable dismounted troops to carry a good deal more armor and firepower as, given current trajectories, they should increase soldier carrying capacity by 50 percent by 2050. 

Based on that, and the long-term trends of evolution of firearms in terms of speed of fire and the

kinetic energy they deliver per projectile, he anticipates that future foot soldiers in their battery-

powered armor suits might rock machine gun that are today usually mounted on vehicles or tripods, guns like the Chinese QJZ-89 and the Russian Kord.

Tanks, too, will get heavier and better-armed. Current trends suggest that tank units of 2050 might boast 70-ton tanks crewed by three or four people and armed with a 152mm or even 155mm gun, similar to an M777 howitzer. But Kott also foresees smaller, two-person tanks that can move offroad at 45 kmh, putting up to ten 135mm rounds a minute on targets out to 5,000 meters.

Kott acknowledges that the model can’t anticipate technological advancements, such as in material science or directed energy, that might change the historical trajectory of weapons development. 

“It is also possible, however, that an entirely different technology will emerge capable of delivering comparable levels of energy,” he says.

Amid frequent warnings of the limitations of his own approach, Kott’s paper urges more research into what today’s observable trends might tell us about tomorrow’s weapons. 

“The extent of the generality for a given law, i.e., how many different technologies it might be possible to describe with a single curve, requires a range of empirical investigations and an appropriate theoretical treatment. Perhaps, these would lead to what might be called universal laws of evolution for very broad types of technologies,” he writes. 

In other words, there may exist a universal formula or explanation for the future of weapons development across a variety of sectors, which would allow anyone to predict what sorts of future technologies the militaries of the future might carry in incredible detail. But until researchers can better show how previous innovations in design gave rise to one another, that future will continue to be invisible. 

X
This website uses cookies to enhance user experience and to analyze performance and traffic on our website. We also share information about your use of our site with our social media, advertising and analytics partners. Learn More / Do Not Sell My Personal Information
Accept Cookies
X
Cookie Preferences Cookie List

Do Not Sell My Personal Information

When you visit our website, we store cookies on your browser to collect information. The information collected might relate to you, your preferences or your device, and is mostly used to make the site work as you expect it to and to provide a more personalized web experience. However, you can choose not to allow certain types of cookies, which may impact your experience of the site and the services we are able to offer. Click on the different category headings to find out more and change our default settings according to your preference. You cannot opt-out of our First Party Strictly Necessary Cookies as they are deployed in order to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting the cookie banner and remembering your settings, to log into your account, to redirect you when you log out, etc.). For more information about the First and Third Party Cookies used please follow this link.

Allow All Cookies

Manage Consent Preferences

Strictly Necessary Cookies - Always Active

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Sale of Personal Data, Targeting & Social Media Cookies

Under the California Consumer Privacy Act, you have the right to opt-out of the sale of your personal information to third parties. These cookies collect information for analytics and to personalize your experience with targeted ads. You may exercise your right to opt out of the sale of personal information by using this toggle switch. If you opt out we will not be able to offer you personalised ads and will not hand over your personal information to any third parties. Additionally, you may contact our legal department for further clarification about your rights as a California consumer by using this Exercise My Rights link

If you have enabled privacy controls on your browser (such as a plugin), we have to take that as a valid request to opt-out. Therefore we would not be able to track your activity through the web. This may affect our ability to personalize ads according to your preferences.

Targeting cookies may be set through our site by our advertising partners. They may be used by those companies to build a profile of your interests and show you relevant adverts on other sites. They do not store directly personal information, but are based on uniquely identifying your browser and internet device. If you do not allow these cookies, you will experience less targeted advertising.

Social media cookies are set by a range of social media services that we have added to the site to enable you to share our content with your friends and networks. They are capable of tracking your browser across other sites and building up a profile of your interests. This may impact the content and messages you see on other websites you visit. If you do not allow these cookies you may not be able to use or see these sharing tools.

If you want to opt out of all of our lead reports and lists, please submit a privacy request at our Do Not Sell page.

Save Settings
Cookie Preferences Cookie List

Cookie List

A cookie is a small piece of data (text file) that a website – when visited by a user – asks your browser to store on your device in order to remember information about you, such as your language preference or login information. Those cookies are set by us and called first-party cookies. We also use third-party cookies – which are cookies from a domain different than the domain of the website you are visiting – for our advertising and marketing efforts. More specifically, we use cookies and other tracking technologies for the following purposes:

Strictly Necessary Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Functional Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Performance Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Sale of Personal Data

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.

Social Media Cookies

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.

Targeting Cookies

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.