Mines

1) I have heard of expedient minefield clearance using artillery. It
doesn't
give a very reliable sensation for the infantry that have to advance
into
the "beaten zone". 

2) They have stupidly large numbers of mine varieties now. Including
anti-helicopter mines and many off-route mines that are hard to clear
because they don't sit in the path you're advancing through but they
engage
your tank from the side or rear with a GMS or IAVR type attack. 

3) Spider mines are a neat concept. They can arrange themselves to avoid
sweeping and also use their mobility to get in the way of their target. 

4) Embedding electronics into mines would be interesting. Some of the
good
mines now have no metallic parts. I suppose a chip might be okay, but
start
putting metallic sensor transducers in the mine along with antennae or
whatever and you have a more detectable mine. 

5) If the device accepts incoming comms, wide-area EMP or targetted EM
jamming might render such a field inert (probably the default if no
outside
comms work) and then sweepable by conventional means. 

6) Once you have grav vehicles, you have new challenges. If the vehicle
is
up a few meters and exerts no ground pressure, only mines with sensors
will
work. 

7) Engineers with custom mine clearing equipment are your best option,
or
just bypassing the mines with VTOLs or some such technology. Infantry or
Artillery minesweeping is risky. 

8) Being even more imaginative, if your mine works off radar, spray the
minefield with a metallic flake suspension.... oops, no signal.

9) If the mine can move, so can small robots or even smaller nanomites
to
hunt and disable them. Point and counterpoint. You lay a high-tech
moving
minefield, I sent out high tech HK anti-mine bots to kill your mines.
Mine
come with a small laser and bake your mines without exposing humans to
risk.

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Thomas R. S. Barclay
Voice: (613) 722-3232 ext 349
e-mail: tomb@bitheads.com

Do not go where the path may lead, 
go instead where there is no path 
and leave a trail.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)  
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