Flying Belts, Swimming Tanks, Giant Muscles & Fast Foils

Modern technology treats harshly those who do not anticipate its rapid progress, and this is nowhere truer than for the military. The U.S. is not only working on next year's weapons, but also on those for many years and even decades ahead. This year the U.S. will raise its research budget to a record $6.3 billion out of a total defense budget of $60 billion. More than 2,000 new weapons are on drawing boards or taking shape both in the military's 83 labs and arsenals and in the countless defense projects of private industry. Among the more interesting:

>-A Buck Rogers-style Army "jet-flying belt" that is expected to transport a soldier over the treetops at 60 m.p.h. for as far as ten miles. Weighing a total of only some 150 Ibs., propelled by a Lilliputian fanjet engine and fed by a back-riding fuel depot of seven to ten gallons of kerosene, the new jet is aimed at superseding a current experimental backpack that is operated by rocket thrust and has a range of only 860 ft. Though it will be a year before the new system can be proved feasible, scientists at Bell Aerosystems Co., which developed both the old and new jet belts, are optimistic. The Pentagon has invested $2,000,000 in the project, believes that it can drastically alter infantry warfare through such means as mass landings behind enemy lines.

>Two new versatile tanks that take naturally to water, which are being assembled at General Motors' Cleveland plant. The Sheridan, the most revolutionary tank since World War II, is the U.S.'s first with a cannon capable of firing both conventional shells and guided missiles. It can be air-dropped from C-130 or C-141 cargo planes (by eight 100-ft.-wide parachutes) without damage, swim like a turtle across water obstacles. After testing, it will go into operation within a year. An even more versatile vehicle, the MBT-70 (for Main Battle Tank of the '70s), is being developed jointly by the U.S. and West Germany in history's first two-nation collaboration on a major military weapon. It will be too heavy to swim, but will nonetheless be able to crawl under wa ter, like a crawdad, on river, lake or ocean beds, traverse steeply slanting terrain and raise its turret to peer over hills and walls. It is air-conditioned and insulated against atomic radiation. The first experimental model is scheduled for completion next summer.

> A Navy "surface effect ship" that is actually a giant high-speed hydrofoil capable of a speed of 120 knots and able to cross the Atlantic from New York in 35 hours, reach Viet Nam from San Francisco in 72 hours. Powered by gas and turbine engines and traveling on cushions of air, the ship could quickly transport troops to trouble spots, be adapted as a high-speed aircraft carrier or as a moving platform for deploying anti-missile missiles and ICBM batteries at sea. Though the program is still in the model stage, the Navy believes that it can have a seagoing version within a decade, feels that the ship will completely change naval warfare.

> A highly classified new Army gun, the SPIW (for Special Purpose Individual Weapon), which is being developed as a replacement for both the current M-14 rifle and the M-79 grenade launcher. An under/over rifle, the SPIW fires fast bursts of small lethal, high-velocity darts called flechettes from its top barrel and 40-mm. antipersonnel grenades from its bottom barrel. The Army has already spent $15 million on the gun, will pick a final version next year.

> A set of mechanical muscles that would give its user the strength of a giant, enabling him to lift 1,500-lb. loads with a minimum of effort. Nick named HardiMan, the machine is being developed by General Electric under a joint Army-Navy contract. Attached to the operator at his feet, forearms and waist, the steel-framed, pincer-armed skeleton mimics and amplifies its user's movements, could be used for bomb loading, underwater salvage and a variety of other functions, both military and civilian.

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