"Normal bullets can be stopped by armor, and we are very close to being able to deploy laser weapons that can detonate explosive rounds while still in flight. Test weapons have knocked out incoming artillery shells. Whether this would work on an RPG given the very short flight time is unknown."

Yeah, I'm not concerned about the threat from normal bullets, but I am concerned about getting whoever is shooting at us (yes, tom, regardless about whether I agree with the war or not). The anti-artillery laser system is cool, but I seriously doubt that it could ever be shrunk down to fit in any sort of practical urban combat vehicle, nor smart enough to nail an RPG thats in flight for microseconds. But I wouldn't really know.

I do know that the grave and unavoidable side-effects of trying to use laser weapons around non-combatants is not something we can over-come. Supposing an Anti-RPG laser, anyone glancing in the general direction... or even glancing at a reflective surface thats IN the general direction of that laser is going to be blinded or harmed.

would really hesitate to automate the return fire option. [.......] Would a kid throwing a rock set it off? How do you tell a rock from a grenade if you are a radar system?

Regular grenades, I think, are not too much of a problem- LAVs should be able to handle them. Its the shaped charges on RPGs that I understand is the problem. Assuming adequate radar tech (which, like you, I suspect should be up around and up to the task), it would be a software and computing issue to discern an RPG from a rock. The trakectory on an RPG would be flat, the speed much higher- and accelerating on its path. No way would it be failsafe, it would undoubtedly cause some tragedies, but I don't think it would be confused by rocks.

There are weapons (satchel charges, rocks, grenades, mines, etc) that would not be classified as a threat. Thats for sure

I sympathize with your man-in-the-loop sentiment. Its an interesting practical, moral and philosophical question if lethal force should be turned over to a program or not (even though, in effect, its been done since the late 70's with the first generation of AEGIS-like turn-key systems).

Doing something like Projecting a BigRedX on a soldiers sights, however, is probably going to get just as many innocents killed, though, as letting the computer target the response. If I was a 19-year-old kid on a Baghdad street and heard an RPG round go off and saw a BigRedX in my sights, I doubt I wouldn't fire. MAybe the Army could get all the way down to my lizard brain with their conditioning, but I doubt it.

Davin L.