Military Applications of Zombies

[WNxHasoroth]

Assuming we're using the Max Brook'z zombie (of World War Z fame) what do you think of using Zombies as shock troops? Its three AM and I just had a massive brain wave.

Take your average zombie. It's essentially a psychotic shambling human that feels no pain and wants to eat other less psychotic shambling humans. So assuming that the events of World War Z are long finished and that some morally bankrupt government has kept some zombies 'alive' chained up in a bunker what do you think of using these zombies as shock troops? Cover them up in armor (I'd use plate/kevlar seeing as zombies don't tire) and unleash a couple thousand at a city and watch people flee. The important thing here is zombie control, its no use turning the undead loose when you can't round them back up again. Solution? Remote detonators attached to the heads of every zombie GI.

As you've gathered already this isn't really a serious thread but how would you use zombies in a military capacity?

[Prime32]

Project Cherry Blossom was a failure, as was Project Sturgeon. Any follow-up projects which remain unknown are likely to have had similar success rates.

One of the biggest problems is delivery - your best bet is probably sending infected humans rather than already-transformed zombies. Especially if you position them in hospitals. Or maybe they could contaminate some IVs with Solanum, though this would be harder to pull off.



The important thing here is zombie control, its no use turning the undead loose when you can't round them back up again. Solution? Remote detonators attached to the heads of every zombie GI.You seem to be overlooking zombies without such detonators being created.

If you want them to non-infectious, well, that's kind of defeating the point, but I suppose you could replace their lower jaw with a chainsaw or something. They'll keep trying to "eat" even if they're physically incapable of it.

[The_JJ]

Military? No, not if we're proceeding from a post World War Z perspective. Brooks zombies are shamblers. Giving them big helmets might help but the military has the hardware to crack anything and presumable will have the know how to get out of the way while they wait. One guy in a bunker surrounded by a moat can trap your whole army. Give him a flamethrower and he's just wasted a huge investment on your part.

Against civilian targets however, that might cause a good bit of panic. You'd be running into the people who were badass enough to survive the war, but most have picked up some psycological scars. [/understatment]

So you might inspire some terror that way. More effective but much harder to control would be to use the virus as a straight bioweapon. Give some guys pricks on their pinkies and send them into the city.

[TRM]

Project Cherry Blossom was a failure, as was Project Sturgeon. Any follow-up projects which remain unknown are likely to have had similar success rates.

One of the biggest problems is delivery.

What about air-dropping zombies? Buzz over a city with a jet full of undead, and push them out as you pass. If you're low enough, they might be in good enough condition to still move (or would you have to be impractically low?)

If you dropped multiple shipments of zombies simultaneously in different parts of the city, I think it could easily cause a panic.

[Prime32]

What about air-dropping zombies? Buzz over a city with a jet full of undead, and push them out as you pass. If you're low enough, they might be in good enough condition to still move (or would you have to be impractically low?)

If you dropped multiple shipments of zombies simultaneously in different parts of the city, I think it could easily cause a panic.That is exactly what those projects did (after trying and failing to train the zombies). The zombie paratroopers were headshotted on the way down. If you didn't give them parachutes they'd break their legs and wouldn't be able to infect anyone.

What about a Solanum dart gun?

[TRM]

That is exactly what those projects did (after trying and failing to train the zombies). The zombie paratroopers were headshotted on the way down. If you didn't give them parachutes they'd break their legs and wouldn't be able to infect anyone.

What about a Solanum dart gun?
What canon are those projects from?

Who says zombies can't infect without legs? "Grabbers," "Crawlers," Brooks calls those some of the most dangerous. The key would be to drop lots and lots of zombies.

[Tyrant]

I know it's a different series with somewhat different rules, but in the Resident Evil games some memos that you find indicate that this was one of the considered uses of the T Virus. Infecting enemy POWs then releasing them was the main idea. They go back behind enemy lines and start causing chaos. I assume the follow up was some type of heavy bombing. Then again, this was before the Raccoon City indicident so the idea might have been considered possible before seeing what the virus would do if it were released like that.

[Prime32]

What canon are those projects from?They're mentioned in The Zombie Survival Guide, so I assume its the same canon.

[WNxHasoroth]

Well the application of the Zombie Shock Trooper (henceforth renamed as the Zombie Terror Trooper) isn't to infect but to scare inhabitants away from their homes. The remote detonators are there for after the operation is over. Destroy any excess zombies and bundle the rest back up. If you keep them sheathed in armor it renders them pretty much impervious to melee weapons and gives them a decent resistance to civilian owned firearms but also has the plus side that they won't be able to bite your own human soldiers when you're trying to pack them back up.

Another terror weapon, zombie suicide bombers. Take an early stage zombie wrap him up in a hoody with shades drive him out into a densely populated area, drop him out of a van and watch the fireworks.

Using zombies as meat shields is an ever better idea. Toss some zombies at a defended emplacement soaking up ammunition and attention before striking with living soldiers.

[Revlid]

Jesus, guys, even a complete moron could see that this was a bad idea. (http://www.hlcomic.com/index.php?date=2006-02-06)

[warty goblin]

What about air-dropping zombies? Buzz over a city with a jet full of undead, and push them out as you pass. If you're low enough, they might be in good enough condition to still move (or would you have to be impractically low?)

If you dropped multiple shipments of zombies simultaneously in different parts of the city, I think it could easily cause a panic.

The problem with this is that I suspect the destruction wrecked by your average broken legged airdropped zombie is much, much less than you could get for an equivilent weight of conventional explosives. It's also much harder to do, since you would have be flying relatively slowly at low altitude, making any Z-bomber easy pickings for fairly cheap and simple AA weapons.

Using them as shock troops might work, but only to test defenses. I'd be quite surprised if zombies could really break through a prepared position with echeloned fire support, barbed wire, and prepared fallback positions. Plus zombies are manifestly not humans, which means that there's absolutely no compulsion to follow anything resembling the Geneva Convention. This means that any military faced with zombies is free to let loose with explosive ammunition, flamethrowers and whatever else crosses the demented minds of their weapons designers.

The best use of zombies in an army? Clearing minefields. They'd be totally ace for that job.

[kpenguin]

The best use of zombies in an army? Clearing minefields. They'd be totally ace for that job.

Wouldn't it be easier to use animals for that or something?

[chiasaur11]

Wouldn't it be easier to use animals for that or something?

Maybe. But zeds would be funnier.

[Quincunx]

Wouldn't it be easier to use animals for that or something?

We don't use animals now. All the positive confirmation you can get (i.e. exploding mines trod upon by animals and/or zombies) doesn't equal the negative confirmation that the zone is free of them.

Running with the zombies-in-hazardous-situations though, I have yet to meet the zombie which would be deterred by dirty bombs or other contamination.

[Moff Chumley]

Well, if you have a city adjacent to a large military base, say, Colorado Springs and Cheyenne Mountain, would it would be practical to begin turning Colorado Springs into zombies, in hopes that infected soldiers enter Cheyenne Mountain? All this talk of destroying Colorado Springs is COMPLETELY HYPOTHETICAL (tm).

[warty goblin]

Wouldn't it be easier to use animals for that or something?

Maybe, but it's not particularly easy. Anti-personel mines are designed to explode when stepped on by a person, which means that they require some amount of pressure to trigger. It would take a fairly large animal to reliably trigger a mine, and something that size is probably more valuable alive than riddled with shrapnal. Not to mention herding a bunch of animals across a minefield is probably not going to do your army's morale a whole lot of good.

A zombie however being human, pretty likely to set off an AP mine. Plus zombies tend to occur in fairly large concentrations, and are more or less worthless. I also see far fewer objections to zombies getting blown to smithereens*.

*At least until the inevitable People for the Ethical Treatment of Undead forms...

[13_CBS]

A zombie however being human, pretty likely to set off an AP mine. Plus zombies tend to occur in fairly large concentrations, and are more or less worthless. I also see far fewer objections to zombies getting blown to smithereens*.

But the new question is, how do you herd a bunch of zombies into a minefield? Zombies don't really go away from things, they go towards things, so to lead them across a minefield you'd have to drive something through the minefield as well. There's also the issue of where you get all those zombies, and how you're going to clean up all the de-limbed but still "alive" ones...

[warty goblin]

But the new question is, how do you herd a bunch of zombies into a minefield? Zombies don't really go away from things, they go towards things, so to lead them across a minefield you'd have to drive something through the minefield as well. There's also the issue of where you get all those zombies, and how you're going to clean up all the de-limbed but still "alive" ones...

Herding zombies in twelve easy steps.
1) Get a lot of cow and/or pig brains.
2) Put brains in net
3) Attach net to helicopter via a reasonably long rope.
4) Make sure the rope is easily detached from helicopter.
6) Seriously. Like, really easily detached.
7) And keep something sharp near the rope just in case.
8) But sheathed, because we don't wany anybody to get hurt.
9) Fly the helicopter, dangling the brainbag through a zombie horde. The zombies will naturally follow the brains*.
10) Lead the zombies over the minefield.
11) ???
12) Profit.
13) Bonus step. Have designated marksmen on helicopter shoot any still moving zombies in head with 7.62mm marskmen's rifle from safe altitude. Return to fortified military compound/Bill Murrey's house for hamburgers and ribs, taken from all the pigs and cows you had to debrain.


*Important safety note: Make sure that you keep the brainbag high enough the zombies cannot grab it. If a zombie does manage to grab it, detach the bag immediately. Otherwise the Laws of Zombie Physics dictate that they will drag the helicopter down.

If the detaching mechanism fails, employ the rope cutting impliment, being careful not to accidentally severe the limbs of any other people on the helicopter. Loudly announce that you are swinging a sharp impliment, otherwise the Laws of Zombie Physics dictate that somebody will accidentally get their arm cleaved off. Such an event will of course cause contention and shouting among any survivors aboard the helicopter.

The Laws of Zombie Physics clearly state that any contention and shouting in a motorized vehicle with zombies in the vicinity will lead to a specatular crash of said vehicle. Naturally that leads to the dazed survivors making a desperate last stand totally cribbed from Black Hawk Down. Although awesome, this has severe negative repercussions for your survival probability.

[13_CBS]

Herding zombies in twelve easy steps:

Practical 13_CBS: If we're using Max Brook's style of zombies, then AFAIK dead animal flesh won't work. Also, what's preventing the zombies from heading straight towards the tasty, tasty soldiers who drove them to the minefield instead of going for the actual bait? What about in weather and/or terrain conditions where a helicopter is impractical? Also, anti-personnel mines seem rather a poor choice to kill zombies (they only damage primarily the legs, IIRC, and for Max Brooks zombies you gotta kill the brain), so I'd guess that you'd be left with a hell of a lot of broken-legged zombies, more than you could finish off with some dude with a rifle in a helicopter in a practical amount of time. And as a nitpick, Max Brooks zombies lack the dexterity to climb ropes, so easily detachable ropes are unnecessary.

Wacky 13_CBS: Sigged lol
Edit: Sigh, it's too long to be used as a sig.

[warty goblin]

Practical 13_CBS: If we're using Max Brook's style of zombies, then AFAIK dead animal flesh won't work.

Use a live cow. Makes the celebratory hamburgers a bit more difficult to pull off, but cows are plentiful.

Also, what's preventing the zombies from heading straight towards the tasty, tasty soldiers who drove them to the minefield instead of going for the actual bait?
What actual soldiers, the ones in the helicopter 50 feet over their heads? If they wanna chase them, then great, I save a cow.


What about in weather and/or terrain conditions where a helicopter is impractical? Clear the minefield tomorrow. Not like it's going anywhere.

Also, anti-personnel mines seem rather a poor choice to kill zombies (they only damage primarily the legs, IIRC, and for Max Brooks zombies you gotta kill the brain), so I'd guess that you'd be left with a hell of a lot of broken-legged zombies, more than you could finish off with some dude with a rifle in a helicopter in a practical amount of time.
That depends on the landmine. The nastier sort tend to bounce and blow up closer to chest level, so the odds of some fragment totalling the brain is much better. Even if it doesn't do that, a zombie blown open at the ribcage, and with most arm muscles seriously chopped up is pretty low on the worry list.

Plus, the point of the exercise was to dispose of the mines. Getting rid of zombies is purely a bonus.


And as a nitpick, Max Brooks zombies lack the dexterity to climb ropes, so easily detachable ropes are unnecessary.
Zombie Movie Physics. They don't need to climb it, all they need to do is to grab on to it, at which point it is inevitable that their combined weight will, somehow, drag the helicopter down. We're already talking about a virus that somehow makes a human capable of surviving being blown in half. Way I see it, once that's on something's deeply borked with physics anyway. Better safe than killed in a slow motion pullback shot to dramatic music.


Wacky 13_CBS: Sigged lol

Nice to see you got it.

[13_CBS]

Use a live cow. Makes the celebratory hamburgers a bit more difficult to pull off, but cows are plentiful.


But cows are adorable! :smallfrown:



What actual soldiers, the ones in the helicopter 50 feet over their heads? If they wanna chase them, then great, I save a cow.

I'm assuming the ones that drove them there in big troop transports or whatever.



Clear the minefield tomorrow. Not like it's going anywhere.


Ah, but what if you need to move troops through the area very soon, and the weather doesn't let up for a few days?



That depends on the landmine. The nastier sort tend to bounce and blow up closer to chest level, so the odds of some fragment totalling the brain is much better. Even if it doesn't do that, a zombie blown open at the ribcage, and with most arm muscles seriously chopped up is pretty low on the worry list.


Unless some poor fools have to walk through the area. They'll have to either get bitten (mutilated zombies still bite!) or fail to move through the area quietly.



Plus, the point of the exercise was to dispose of the mines. Getting rid of zombies is purely a bonus.


I thought the point of the exercise was to dispose of the mines so that your own dudes can safely and easily get past the area?



Zombie Movie Physics. They don't need to climb it, all they need to do is to grab on to it, at which point it is inevitable that their combined weight will, somehow, drag the helicopter down. We're already talking about a virus that somehow makes a human capable of surviving being blown in half. Way I see it, once that's on something's deeply borked with physics anyway. Better safe than killed in a slow motion pullback shot to dramatic music.


That's true.



Nice to see you got it.

Sadly, the sig part won't work. :smallfrown:

[Kiren]

Military Applications for Infected Soldiers (Not infected by said military)

Step One: Send slow burn infected individuals out on "one way" missions.
Step Two: Wait, should they fail to complete the mission, the enemy will be off their guard, the zombie soldiers will rise and the enemies will become more soldiers, which I hear are great for minefields.

[averagejoe]

I like the idea of the zombie suicide bomber. (Insomuch as I can like an idea that I find to be reprehensible both strategically and morally.) It seems like using individual/small groups of zombies for hazardous missions in place of humans would be more effective/controllable than unleashing a bunch on a populace.

It isn't as if all the applications have to be destructive. For example, if you need to get medical supplies into a quarantined area, or some other area basically reachable by humans but undesirable. Get some zeds, cut their arms off and muzzle em, load them down with supplies, and they will go and seek out any humans in the area. This would also work in remote search/rescue situations, tracking zombies from the air and using them as essentially bloodhounds that don't necessarily need to catch scent. I imagine similar uses could be found for underwater operations, what with their ability to walk along the ocean floor unhindered.

Similarly, one could use a muzzled zombie with no legs as a sort of grappling line for airlifting people out of hazardous situations. This might be tricky, though, so extensive testing would have to occur to investigate whether it would work. True of all my suggestions, though, really.

Of course, any zombie used for military purposes would need punctured/removed lungs in order to stop them from moaning all the time, unless this would be somehow desirable, in which case one would create a unit of zeds separate from the other ones.

Zombies are also potentially good for manual labor. Just harness up a bunch to whatever you want to drag and have them follow some guy. This would probably be used for transporting materials through terrain unsuitable for vehicles.

Hell, zombies could even make good lookout/warning systems. Just get a bunch of torso zombies, set them up at the perimeter, and the moans will let you know when someone's coming. More sensitive than using humans, and more accurate than automated electronics, if perhaps less sensitive. Zombies don't generate heat like humans do, though, so such sentries at least wouldn't interfere with thermal scans.

That's just off the top of my head. Zombies are mostly unsuitable for combat, but I imagine they have tons of other potentially military applications, as well as some potential civilian ones.

[Ashen Lilies]

I don't think a zombie grappling line is such a good idea. Sure, they might be muzzled, but there's still enough strength in those arms to do some damage.

Also, your zombie perimeter is flawed. They'll be too busy moaning at the people inside the perimeter.

[averagejoe]

I don't think a zombie grappling line is such a good idea. Sure, they might be muzzled, but there's still enough strength in those arms to do some damage.

Also, your zombie perimeter is flawed. They'll be too busy moaning at the people inside the perimeter.

I imagine the former would be for emergency situations, when the grapelee would probably die otherwise anyways, and it would be dangerous enough that they wouldn't want to risk another human going out and grabbing him. I'll admit that the greatest potential would be of limited effectiveness, but I see that as the baseline for zombies in military applications anyways. It would be, at least, worth investigation with dummies or something.

Maybe not a perimeter, then, but simply setting them up as early warning systems in places where the enemy is likely to pass, or in critical locations. The point is you have a sentry that has unique advantages and potential applications compared to what we have now.

Either case, at least, has more potential than sending zombies into combat in my opinion.

[Finn Solomon]

The helicopter idea reminds me strongly of that Simpsons Treehouse of Horror episode, where the military airlifted giant donuts to lure an army of clone Homers to their doom.

[Solaris]

Well, if you have a city adjacent to a large military base, say, Colorado Springs and Cheyenne Mountain, would it would be practical to begin turning Colorado Springs into zombies, in hopes that infected soldiers enter Cheyenne Mountain? All this talk of destroying Colorado Springs is COMPLETELY HYPOTHETICAL (tm).

You didn't have this idea, you will not further disseminate this idea, and when the men in suits come by you will leave with them for... questioning.

Mo' seriously, infecting the civilians/soldiers in and around a military base would be a great way of seriously hampering the military's efforts. Just make sure you'd be able to put down what you've called up. I think the heavy depopulation of the planet post-WWZ would help with that.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Hmm...I wonder if you can catch the zombie virus from eating zombies....

...just sayin'.

[Tavar]

Max Brook Zombies? Yes, you can. In fact, I believe that it's explicitly stated that you can.

[Solaris]

Hmm...I wonder if you can catch the zombie virus from eating zombies....

...just sayin'.

It was stated to be fatal for animals, but I don't recall if it would result in humans turning or just dying.

[Tavar]

Animals die because the virus always just kills them, and the flesh contains the virus. So, humans would turn, as they would contract the virus.

[Solaris]

Animals die because the virus always just kills them, and the flesh contains the virus. So, humans would turn, as they would contract the virus.

Unless the toxicity gets them before the virus's five-hour cutoff. I'd assume it wouldn't - but he does reference a toxin making the flesh unpalatable to bacteria and likely toxic to animals, one that's likely a byproduct of the virally-altered metabolic process.

[Erts]

Maybe it's a fault on Max Brook's fault, but I recently read a graphic novel written by him, in the same canon (Solanum and everything) depicting zombie encounters throughout history, and some Russians exploring Siberia who eat a zombie (not knowing what it was,) just die, not contracting the virus.

[chiasaur11]

Maybe it's a fault on Max Brook's fault, but I recently read a graphic novel written by him, in the same canon (Solanum and everything) depicting zombie encounters throughout history, and some Russian exploring Siberia who eat a zombie (not knowing what it was,) just die, not contracting the virus.

Yeah, that's from the survival guide.

Bad blood can work, but eating zeds is "just" lethal.

[Erts]

Bad blood can work, but eating zeds is "just" lethal.

Well, yeah, "just" lethal, as most deaths you do not become reanimated as a ravenous corpse which has no concept or memory of it's former self. :smallwink:

[Mr. Scaly]

Ammunition. If firing human corpses and rotten meat and stuff like that over the walls of enemy castles would spread disease, imagine what using these suckers for ammo would do. The splatter when they land would spread infected flesh, and crawlers are still legitimate threats. They'd have to be tied up pre launch though.

[FoE]

Oddly enough, I watched a movie about this topic (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0960890/) the other night. It ... didn't go so well.

[chiasaur11]

Oddly enough, I watched a movie about this topic (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0960890/) the other night. It ... didn't go so well.

I should say so. Never has a modern update of "Rhinoceros" been of such poor quality.

[Mr. Scaly]

Oddly enough, I watched a movie about this topic (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0960890/) the other night. It ... didn't go so well.

Did it end better than the attempts to increase the size of sharks' brains?

Wait, the U.S.A. is in a war with Alaska...?

[chiasaur11]

Did it end better than the attempts to increase the size of sharks' brains?

Wait, the U.S.A. is in a war with Alaska...?

Well, we settled that with an uneasy truce by 2040.

Of course, electing Nathan Fillion god emperor was unconventional, but you can't argue with the results.

[Soras Teva Gee]

There are no military applications for zombies.

Feeling no pain doesn't matter to high caliber weapons that will simply shred muscles and bones. Armor is money better spent on intelligent humans to keep them alive to fight another day, oh yeah and use those high caliber weapons. Then there's how the zombies never taking cover and generally having no tactics. Cover determines gunfights, you take an automatic weapon directly to a fleshy target it goes down. Take a look at WWI, only this time only one side gets machine guns and the other knows nothing but reenact charge of the light brigade.

Oh yeah and one tank can kill an indefinite number of zombies without even using its weapons. And any sizable amount of zombies is just air-power/artillery bait.

I can see no military scenario where replacing an intelligent soldier with an idiot makes sense.

[Oslecamo]

I can see no military scenario where replacing an intelligent soldier with an idiot makes sense.

1-Diversion. If zombies are cheap enough (for example if you can turn deceased into zombies), dress them like soldiers and send them to a strategic point. They will make great cannon fodder to atract the enemy atention and make them spend ammo while your real troops sneack from somewhere else. Cannon fodder is always usefull, even nowadays, and must be stupid enough to let itself be killed. Zombies have the extra advatages of trying to keep moving unless head shotted, making the enemy spend more ammo!

2-Raid operations. Again, assuming that zombie serum is cheap, it can make for a powerfull terror weapon. Attack enemy facility, then when you retreat reanimate the enemy fallen to give you a meat wall while you escape! If you can zombify animals, you can wreck chaos in the enemy cities by using spies to zombify herds and vulnerable crowded places like hospitals.

Sure, they won't win the war for you, but cheap cannon fodder would surely find a home at war.

Clearing mine fields, dealing with annoying rebel populations wich have nothing but small caliber guns, they would make a great support tool!

[Soras Teva Gee]

1-Diversion. If zombies are cheap enough (for example if you can turn deceased into zombies), dress them like soldiers and send them to a strategic point. They will make great cannon fodder to atract the enemy atention and make them spend ammo while your real troops sneack from somewhere else. Cannon fodder is always usefull, even nowadays, and must be stupid enough to let itself be killed. Zombies have the extra advatages of trying to keep moving unless head shotted, making the enemy spend more ammo!

Given that the most ammo is expended to suppress opposing forces so they don't shoot you in turn... I'd consider it at best dubious that a zombie diversion would be any more diverting then a conventional attack by soldiers. One sniper for example can tie down an entire squad of men.

That aside animating the already dead is about the only way it would make might make any sense from just conscripts. Even then you still have all the specialized equipment and personnel to control/confine the zombies, not to mention a massive body gathering effort. So I still think it would be easier for a government to forcibly gather the living then the dead. And of course any government willing to employ zombie would be willing to employ conscripts.


2-Raid operations. Again, assuming that zombie serum is cheap, it can make for a powerfull terror weapon. Attack enemy facility, then when you retreat reanimate the enemy fallen to give you a meat wall while you escape! If you can zombify animals, you can wreck chaos in the enemy cities by using spies to zombify herds and vulnerable crowded places like hospitals.

I don't consider terrorism strictly a military application. You can drop daisy cutters on hospitals killing people and causing chaos when vital infrastructure is disrupted. And that leaves less collateral clean up duties afterward should you win. Much like dirty bombs this only makes sense as an attack for causes that can't muster enough power to actually menace governments. Terrorists basically. Who by the same coin would have much the classic terrorist problem of acquiring the necessary materials.

As for rear guard. Depending on exactly how different your zombies are they may not 'rise' in any meaningful time. Max Brooks ones if I recall take something like 24 hours to incubate from a living host. And a meat wall that will fight you is not a meat wall, its a liability. Especially as you by definition are closer to it.

Something like basic motion sensor tied to a grenade would achieve much the same results of slowing the opposing forces down.


Clearing mine fields, dealing with annoying rebel populations wich have nothing but small caliber guns, they would make a great support tool!

Mine fields is work better done by robots since they aren't a risk themselves.

And rebel populations without access to automatic weapons don't much exist, or are disorganized enough to not be a threat in the first place.

So I don't see any great support tool, only an ineffective fighter that's as likely to cause problems for you as for any enemy. The military mind does not like things that are unreliable.

[Oslecamo]

Given that the most ammo is expended to suppress opposing forces so they don't shoot you in turn... I'd consider it at best dubious that a zombie diversion would be any more diverting then a conventional attack by soldiers. One sniper for example can tie down an entire squad of men.

Why risk good breathing soldiers when you can send the dead to get your oponent's atention?



That aside animating the already dead is about the only way it would make might make any sense from just conscripts. Even then you still have all the specialized equipment and personnel to control/confine the zombies, not to mention a massive body gathering effort.

We already gather the bodies. Leaving flesh rotting in open air is an invitation to disease and all kind of nasty problems.

As for specialized equipment, I was thinking about the quite simple Umbrella coporation tactics:
1-Put bodies dressed as soldiers inside locked giant boxes.
2-Zombify them with dart guns/very long seringes.
3-Take giant boxes to the frontline.
4-Open boxes trough remote means, making sure the entrance is turned to the enemy.
5-Zombies should advance towards the enemy position, as they always advance forward.
6-?
7-Profit!

Here, no need for sophisticated tech besides the zombie serum itself! And most of the pieces can be reused. As long as you keep the zombies locked inside the giant boxes untill the big moment and nobody is idiotic enough to try to put an hand inside, containment/control is no problem at all. The only issue would be making sure the zombies advance in the right direction, but from my impression zombies always move forward if no fresh flesh is nearby.



So I still think it would be easier for a government to forcibly gather the living then the dead. And of course any government willing to employ zombie would be willing to employ conscripts.

You'll still gather the living off course. You're just make them twice as usefull. They fight for you untill their last breath, and then fight again as zombies! Plus, conspricts need to be fed and stuff, while you can cram a lot more zombies inside tight spaces for big amounts of time whitout crippling their performace, making for much better transportation.

Finally, zombies will NEVER surrender to the enemy, a common problem with consprits. Sure, they may turn on you, but consprits may backstab you just as easily, if just by telling intel to the enemy when captured.



I don't consider terrorism strictly a military application. You can drop daisy cutters on hospitals killing people and causing chaos when vital infrastructure is disrupted. And that leaves less collateral clean up duties afterward should you win. Much like dirty bombs this only makes sense as an attack for causes that can't muster enough power to actually menace governments. Terrorists basically. Who by the same coin would have much the classic terrorist problem of acquiring the necessary materials.

Fair enough, altough in theory you could easily get an infinite amount of zombie serum if you got your hands on a zombie.



As for rear guard. Depending on exactly how different your zombies are they may not 'rise' in any meaningful time. Max Brooks ones if I recall take something like 24 hours to incubate from a living host. And a meat wall that will fight you is not a meat wall, its a liability. Especially as you by definition are closer to it.

Good point. It could still be used by semi-suicide missions, wich would zombify themselves if cornered.



Something like basic motion sensor tied to a grenade would achieve much the same results of slowing the opposing forces down.

But zombie serum would take a lot less space and weight than explosives, as normaly a single scratch is enough to zombify someone.



Mine fields is work better done by robots since they aren't a risk themselves.
Robots are pretty damn expensive however.



And rebel populations without access to automatic weapons don't much exist, or are disorganized enough to not be a threat in the first place.

Meh, guess you're right on that point. Altough I really like the idea of zombie guards with leashes instead of rabid dogs to keep the population in check.



So I don't see any great support tool, only an ineffective fighter that's as likely to cause problems for you as for any enemy.

An ineffective fighter that consumes almost no resources, at least resources that are needed for something else like food, ammo, salaries. Dead bodies always clog up the battlefield. Why not give them an use? Also, quantity has a quality of it's own. If a zombie needs more bullets/blasts to be taken down than it costed to reanimate, then it makes for one damn good atriction weapon!




The military mind does not like things that are unreliable.

But they use them anyway. We have countless stories of soldiers dying because they were using new flawed technology. Gunpowder stuff in particular, could as easily kill the shooter than the shooter for some centuries. But hey, that's called field testing, and we normally end up managing to make the weapons safer for the user by trial and error.

[WNxHasoroth]

Well at the Battle of Yonkers the vaunted might of the American military failed to stem the zombie horde. I'm fairly certain that there is more than a few military applications of our favorite zed-heads for anyone willing to think about it:

1: Ammo Waster
2: Psychological Terror
3: Landmine Locator/Clearance
4: Bio Weapon
5: Diversion
6: Trackers

Thats just getting the ball started

[Rutskarn]

Double doy! (http://www.hlcomic.com/index.php?date=2006-02-06)

Which is easier to kill--a human, or a zombie? Because in most military situations where killing anyone and everyone in the area is acceptable, you're going to want to send people through the area at some point that you don't want getting taken apart by zombies.

[Mr. Scaly]

Well, we settled that with an uneasy truce by 2040.

Of course, electing Nathan Fillion god emperor was unconventional, but you can't argue with the results.

That movie certainly sounds weird...

[Soras Teva Gee]

Why risk good breathing soldiers when you can send the dead to get your oponent's atention?

Why have dead ones in the first place when the living can create the diversion better then retreat in good order to fight another day.

Zombies you'd either need a massive recovery crew (I dare say you would want multiple persons a zombie to capture and confine them) or their very expandability multiplies their costs because they are single use weapons.


We already gather the bodies. Leaving flesh rotting in open air is an invitation to disease and all kind of nasty problems.

Exactly the problem. Bodies come from people, so chances are you are drawing them from the civilian populace that dies naturally. Of course you'd need a fairly repressive regime to confiscate the dead, and go after people that simply stop reporting their elderly/infirm are dead which punishing them after the fact will still deny you that nice freshness. Not to mention old grandma with her osteoporosis and depleted muscle mass isn't exactly prime matieral depending on how dead your zombies specifically are.

Now you could make them yourself out of healthy living people, but replacing intelligent beings with idiots is exactly what I'm disputing. Even criminals would be better as living suicide troops, offer them a pardon if they survive long enough. Fitting them with say explosive tracking collars isn't going to be incomparable to the clean up after every zombie deployment.


As for specialized equipment, I was thinking about the quite simple Umbrella coporation tactics:
1-Put bodies dressed as soldiers inside locked giant boxes.
2-Zombify them with dart guns/very long seringes.
3-Take giant boxes to the frontline.
4-Open boxes trough remote means, making sure the entrance is turned to the enemy.
5-Zombies should advance towards the enemy position, as they always advance forward.
6-?
7-Profit!

One see above. Three depends on how dead your zombies are and how they behave when confined with their other kind. Four and five make some positively massive assumptions on your ability to deploy these things exactly where you want them. Would really ruin the day to have your nice cargo helo shot down by a Stinger missile while still closer to your own lines. Five of course is simply wrong, zombies advance towards food and given the way war simply works your own personnel would likely be the closer source of food.

Oh and dropping and leaving a box close to enemy positions is begging for it to be artillery shelled. So again you are likely the closer source of food.

So that must be some step six to get a profit out of this.



Here, no need for sophisticated tech besides the zombie serum itself! And most of the pieces can be reused. As long as you keep the zombies locked inside the giant boxes untill the big moment and nobody is idiotic enough to try to put an hand inside, containment/control is no problem at all. The only issue would be making sure the zombies advance in the right direction, but from my impression zombies always move forward if no fresh flesh is nearby.

Which leaves you with big heavy boxes to transport. While not entirely non-existant delivering cargo into combat isn't precisely easy. You really can't just drive a truck up to a battlefront. And dropping this thing would leave who ever was dropping it vulnerable to aforementioned artillery or air warfare depending on exact method.

Never mind the boxes themselves aren't as simple as they sound. A standard cargo container is not going to hold hungry zombies surrounded by food. This thing would need to be built solid, probably all metal and therefore pretty heavy. Contrast standard shipping of light boxes or strapped to scrap wood. And safety would demand you couldn't even have people close to it when you needed to move it.

A cargo plane full of humans by contrast you tell to get out and they on their own accord. Sure they need food but they also don't need stringent monitoring and can pack a lot of food with them. And whatever infrastructure you have will need food in the first place so you will always be establishing supply lines.


You'll still gather the living off course. You're just make them twice as usefull. They fight for you untill their last breath, and then fight again as zombies! Plus, conspricts need to be fed and stuff, while you can cram a lot more zombies inside tight spaces for big amounts of time whitout crippling their performace, making for much better transportation.


Gathering your fallen implies you win, if you win why are you gambling on zombies?


Finally, zombies will NEVER surrender to the enemy, a common problem with consprits. Sure, they may turn on you, but consprits may backstab you just as easily, if just by telling intel to the enemy when captured.

Given that war has been predominantly fought with conscripts before the modern era this doesn't seem to be a large problem. Enemies don't exactly have good records of treating enemies well. If your forces surrender its because they are loosing, which fighting to the death does not turn around as much as claimed. Because if the enemy was having trouble killing you, you wouldn't be loosing.


Fair enough, altough in theory you could easily get an infinite amount of zombie serum if you got your hands on a zombie.

The risk of which would be a major impetus to never use the bio-weapon to begin with, or even keep in manufacturing. I dare say we'd be talking smallpox level confinement.



But zombie serum would take a lot less space and weight than explosives, as normaly a single scratch is enough to zombify someone.

Given that lugging around modern weapons and armor is comparable to medieval knights in full plate its hard to see how the difference will be made. Especially since you'd be carrying grenades anyways and the zombie juice would need something at least comparable to a thermos for safety.


Robots are pretty damn expensive however.

But reusable, or alternately done extremely cheaply (think RC toy cars) but with the added bonus of standard manufacturing and delivery.



Meh, guess you're right on that point. Altough I really like the idea of zombie guards with leashes instead of rabid dogs to keep the population in check.

Ya just need to think more elaborately about this. Like leashes, wouldn't work because a zombie will try and eat its handler thus be going inward not outward. You'd need something like a reinforced collar with two (or more) handlers at the end of long poles to leash zombies. And their constant struggle to hold the thing still won't reflect well on your authority.



But they use them anyway. We have countless stories of soldiers dying because they were using new flawed technology. Gunpowder stuff in particular, could as easily kill the shooter than the shooter for some centuries. But hey, that's called field testing, and we normally end up managing to make the weapons safer for the user by trial and error.

At best a matter of degrees. Gunpowder isn't exactly safe, but doesn't need constant watching sitting in a box simply to ensure it doesn't spontaneously kill you. And given the use of it since its invention gunpowder mishaps are a low percentile risk factor. What danger there is comes more from poor standards of manufacture and misuse, both controllable factors. A zombie ultimately remains inherently uncontrollable.

And field testing by being field testing is small scale therefore would illustrate all the unreliability of zombies thus seeing them never come into use.

For that matter what unreliable tech. Most military tech in history with problems has generally been in a new area and shortly cleared up. The infamous M-16 jamming problem was because soldiers that they had super space rifles that didn't need cleaning, something solved rapidly via education resulting in almost complete reliability. The zombie reliability problem is more innate, if its controllable then we are stretching our definition of zombie to the breaking point.

[Closak]

Shoot a human in the heart and he's dead.

Shoot a zombie in the heart and it keeps walking.


Blow off a humans lower body with a bomb and he's dead.

Blow off a zombies lower body with a bomb and it will keep crawling at you with it's intestines trailing on the floor behind it.


Seems to me like a zombie is more difficult to kill.

Though the human has the advantage of being able to easily outrun the zombie.

[Prime32]

Oslecamo, Soras, the WWZ zombies can't reanimate the dead, and if you die before the virus "kills" you then you won't rise.

[averagejoe]

There are no military applications for zombies.

Feeling no pain doesn't matter to high caliber weapons that will simply shred muscles and bones. Armor is money better spent on intelligent humans to keep them alive to fight another day, oh yeah and use those high caliber weapons. Then there's how the zombies never taking cover and generally having no tactics. Cover determines gunfights, you take an automatic weapon directly to a fleshy target it goes down. Take a look at WWI, only this time only one side gets machine guns and the other knows nothing but reenact charge of the light brigade.

Oh yeah and one tank can kill an indefinite number of zombies without even using its weapons. And any sizable amount of zombies is just air-power/artillery bait.

I can see no military scenario where replacing an intelligent soldier with an idiot makes sense.

As I've already pointed out, military application =/= stuff to kill people, and zombies can be potential assets in noncombat roles in military operations.

[Soras Teva Gee]

Blow off a zombies lower body with a bomb and it will keep crawling at you with it's intestines trailing on the floor behind it.

Given that modern weapons fire at you from down the street (when not further) then that disabled zombie ceases to be a threat since by the time it reaches you they'll all be that way at best and finishing the job is simpler then stepping on a cockroach.

You don't even have to blow it in half, decent assault rifle or loading slugs in the shotgun can leave a leg "attached" only in the loosest sense.

[Oslecamo]

Oslecamo, Soras, the WWZ zombies can't reanimate the dead, and if you die before the virus "kills" you then you won't rise.

Oh, well, then they're pretty much useless. A breathing soldier is always better than an uncontrolled biting machine, wich in turn is better than an useless lump of flesh in the ground.

[Prime32]

Oh, well, then they're pretty much useless. A breathing soldier is always better than an uncontrolled biting machine, wich in turn is better than an useless lump of flesh in the ground.So you're best either using the virus as a biological weapon or "repurposing" zombies you find.

[Oslecamo]

So you're best either using the virus as a biological weapon or "repurposing" zombies you find.

We have a lot of just as deadly biological weaponry available, and they don't spawn monsters that will make capturing the enemy resources much harder.

[SlyGuyMcFly]

The only application I can think of would be in a scorched earth type scenario. Viral bomb your own city as you leave and make it a major pain in the ass to capture for the enemy. Maybe. I'm not sure that kind of tactic actually sees any use in modern warfare.

[JeminiZero]

Or you could take a page from Umbrella and do research on the virus. Learn to control them and you get Tyrants (http://residentevil.wikia.com/Tyrant_T-0400TP). Boost their reaction speed and intelligent thought and you get Nemesis (http://residentevil.wikia.com/Nemesis_T-Type). Add Armor and heavy Weaponry on top of that and you get Talos (http://residentevil.wikia.com/Tyrant-Armoured_Lethal_Organic_System).

[Soras Teva Gee]

Or you could take a page from Umbrella and do research on the virus. Learn to control them and you get Tyrants (http://residentevil.wikia.com/Tyrant_T-0400TP). Boost their reaction speed and intelligent thought and you get Nemesis (http://residentevil.wikia.com/Nemesis_T-Type). Add Armor and heavy Weaponry on top of that and you get Talos (http://residentevil.wikia.com/Tyrant-Armoured_Lethal_Organic_System).

If you have to add anything goes mutation to the equation doesn't that merely highlight how ineffective they are militarily?

[JeminiZero]

Imagine that millenia ago, a bunch of primitive warchiefs were sitting around a campfire discussing... well, war. And at some point one of them brings up the practical use of animals in war. Various esoteric points come up. Perhaps, they may be dressed as men and used to distract the enemy. But most chiefs agree that is rather impractical.

And then one warchief suddenly has an epiphany. "Wait, wait, what if we could RIDE animals into battle".

At which point another warchief points out. "If you add anything goes to the equation, doesn't that merely highlight how ineffective they are militarily?"

I'm not suggesting that converting zombies into remote controlled super powered bio-organic weapons is necessarily the same epiphany as riding animals into war. (And its not even my own original idea to boot). But just because something isn't usable 'as-is', doesn't mean its entirely unusable.

[Zeful]

As you've gathered already this isn't really a serious thread but how would you use zombies in a military capacity?

Rural use: A four man seal team walks into a village in the war zone, and set up a series of aerosol cans containing a short lived airborne version of the virus. Then after they have vacated up-wind they deploy the virus turning the entire village into monsters.

Urban use: A single man walks aboard the city mass transit system with a series of aerosol containers disguised as water bottles and set to activate 30 minutes after activation. Throw them in the trash, leave them on buses and/or trains. Virus is released into the population en-mass, and hysteria ensues.

[chiasaur11]

Rural use: A four man seal team walks into a village in the war zone, and set up a series of aerosol cans containing a short lived airborne version of the virus. Then after they have vacated up-wind they deploy the virus turning the entire village into monsters.

Urban use: A single man walks aboard the city mass transit system with a series of aerosol containers disguised as water bottles and set to activate 30 minutes after activation. Throw them in the trash, leave them on buses and/or trains. Virus is released into the population en-mass, and hysteria ensues.

Not airborne. Thus?

Air canisters no-worky.

[Tavar]

JeminiZero, you're missing his point.

I mean, say you're having a DnD debate, specifically about the power of monks. If someone says that Monks are good as long as they have several full casters buffing them, does that say more about the full casters or the Monks?

For this discussion, substitute zombies for monks, and the "anything goes mutation" for the "several full casters buffing them".

[JeminiZero]

JeminiZero, you're missing his point.

I mean, say you're having a DnD debate, specifically about the power of monks. If someone says that Monks are good as long as they have several full casters buffing them, does that say more about the full casters or the Monks?

For this discussion, substitute zombies for monks, and the "anything goes mutation" for the "several full casters buffing them".

I would counter that although the monk is good, so would a commoner. The monk being strong from full caster buffing is not a particular triat of the monk itself. But the full caster.

Zombies are different. They have exceptional strength and endurance, but they lack control and coordination. Putting in remote control microchips into their brains compensates for control/coordination. Putting them in heavy armor and giving them tank busting guns is ONLY possible because they are strong enough to carry that much steel without slowing down. If you put a normal human in the same situation, the chips would perform LESS optimally than his fully functional brain, and the weight of the armor alone would cause him to collapse. Ergo, zombies being strong in this case IS a particular trait of the zombie.

Edit: to further illustrate this, consider the usual reasons why humanoid mechs are not cost effective. Zombies turn this on its head, because it is very cheap to produce a tough strong zombie. The usual of expenses of advanced highpower/fine motor control servos and long lasting fuel are entirely absent. Add on a few microchips, some shaped steel armor, and guns, and you have a mass-producable supersoldier.

[Solaris]

I can see no military scenario where replacing an intelligent soldier with an idiot makes sense.

Obviously you are unfamiliar with the United States Marine Corps.


Well at the Battle of Yonkers the vaunted might of the American military failed to stem the zombie horde. I'm fairly certain that there is more than a few military applications of our favorite zed-heads for anyone willing to think about it:

1: Ammo Waster
2: Psychological Terror
3: Landmine Locator/Clearance
4: Bio Weapon
5: Diversion
6: Trackers

Thats just getting the ball started

Except Max Brooks got that so very wrong on so many levels that it's not even worth discussing. He even backhandedly admits he had to cheat to make it a loss for the living by stating that the officers in charge were ridiculously incompetent in a way which no officers I've ever encountered are.

[Tavar]

Except Max Brooks got that so very wrong on so many levels that it's not even worth discussing. He even backhandedly admits he had to cheat to make it a loss for the living by stating that the officers in charge were ridiculously incompetent in a way which no officers I've ever encountered are.
The analogy I've heard is that if our education system was failing in the same way, teachers would be handing out guns to the students and organizing death matches.

[Solaris]

The analogy I've heard is that if our education system was failing in the same way, teachers would be handing out guns to the students and organizing death matches.

... You know, that might actually be an improvement.

[The Glyphstone]

It'd be a heck of a lot more fun, that's for sure.

[Oslecamo]

If you have to add anything goes mutation to the equation doesn't that merely highlight how ineffective they are militarily?

A slump of metal by itself is no better than a rock.

A worked piece of metal can be transformed into a transport, armor, weapon, ammo, tool, and a variety of other uses. Who would guess it, hmmm?

But it was needed that someone at some time decided to heat metal and beat it for long hours untill it became something usefull.

Clearly metal, as well as all other raw resources, are completely ineffective to the military, because they need to be "mutated" before they become something usefull! Your troops will fight naked with their bare hands, wich are indeed the ultimate weapon! Oh, and no food, because food needs to be cooked and assimilated by your body before it becomes usefull!

So, I challenge your naked starved troops against my fully armored properly fed and well equiped troops, and see who comes out on top, ok?

[Prime32]

Zombies are different. They have exceptional strength and endurance, but they lack control and coordination. Putting in remote control microchips into their brains compensates for control/coordination. Putting them in heavy armor and giving them tank busting guns is ONLY possible because they are strong enough to carry that much steel without slowing down. If you put a normal human in the same situation, the chips would perform LESS optimally than his fully functional brain, and the weight of the armor alone would cause him to collapse. Ergo, zombies being strong in this case IS a particular trait of the zombie.
Sorry, WWZ zombies don't have superstrength, though they don't get tired either. They do have enhanced secondary senses though. Sorry, I mean "They make use of all their senses equally." :smallamused:

I was going to suggest microchips, but... I don't think we can do that yet. :smallconfused:

[Quincunx]

The analogy I've heard is that if our education system was failing in the same way, teachers would be handing out guns to the students and organizing death matches.

I'm cutting "death match" class on the grounds that it's got nothing I want to learn or own that desperately. :smallwink:

Hm. Solaris, since you're here, and presuming you can discuss it since you've alluded to it before, why don't people use animals or whatnot to clear minefields (or do they)? Would be good to hear the reasons firsthand.

[WNxHasoroth]

Obviously you are unfamiliar with the United States Marine Corps.

Yikes, you're either a marine or don't live near one :smallwink:

[Soras Teva Gee]

Zombies are different. They have exceptional strength and endurance, but they lack control and coordination. Putting in remote control microchips into their brains compensates for control/coordination. Putting them in heavy armor and giving them tank busting guns is ONLY possible because they are strong enough to carry that much steel without slowing down. If you put a normal human in the same situation, the chips would perform LESS optimally than his fully functional brain, and the weight of the armor alone would cause him to collapse. Ergo, zombies being strong in this case IS a particular trait of the zombie.

The core of this is you are simply adding fantastic elements to the basic zombie. No there is no zombie that is realistic strictly speaking, but there is a difference between a base human with their brain and circulatory systems turned off and then that same creature regaining intelligence (by proxy) and adding superstrength. How would the zombies get superstrength, since when do we have electronic puppet technology.

From an argument standpoint thoug you cannot simply imagine anything into existence to make your argument work.

As it invites me to imagine in something bigger to make my argument work. Like say, while your investing in your zombies I become allies with the Hellsing Organization and get Alucard on my side. From there we'd just get more ridiculous. Now yes if zombies are superstrong and controllable then there are military advantages over conventional troops. However those elements are far from genre standard tropes and the particularly the controllable element runs almost directly counter to the epidemic-phobia that underwrites the genre.

[Johel]

I agree with previous posters who outlined the "terror" potential of zombies.

Can anyone think of a biological weapon that target specifically humans, that can survive for decades without protection and can kill within minutes ?


A single team of spies could enter a country with plastic tubes full of the virus hidden in their luggages or on their very person. We only need for a single tube to enter the country.
The spies would then abduct random dudes in the streets. While hazardous, that's not some impossible feat for trained people to do. They would simply chain the dudes in a sound-proof basement.
Once the dudes victims are available, they'll be infected with the virus and become zombies soon after, their body now a fertile ground for the virus itself, from which more virus can be harvested.
Now, a biological attack can be planed anywhere in the country. It just requires careful planing but very little logistic. My preference go to drive a van from which you drop an single zombie at the entrance of a mall, an hospital, a airport or a tube station. Drive away and listen to the news...
Even if no true epidemic is started, the fear of such thing would force the authorities to quarantine the whole area for at least a week, resulting in millions of losses for the targeted country.

[Zom B]

You could put shipments of infected grain into a city and wait for a misguided Prince to come purge the city of the infected. I don't think anyone's ever done that before.

[Drakyn]

The issue I see with that is that you're leaving one or two zombies, which, if my memory serves me, are slow, tend to shamble and moan loudly when they're on the attack, and are generally pretty piss-poor when it comes to actually trying to catch people to use their one effective attack, which is biting. They're only really dangerous if they reach zerg swarm levels, and leaving one on its own seems to be a step down from this.
Plus, if they're the kind that are trying to eat people, even if they're lucky enough to mug one or two random folks (presumably caught by surprise on their own in an isolated spot, because one zombie is going to be noticed pretty fast in a busy place and be reeeaallly outnumbered), they're just going to consume the body, which cuts down the odds of the outbreak spreading pretty badly. So you have a solitary zombie mugger which is eventually going to get reported.

EDIT: Come to think of it, generic shambling zombies aren't that impressive a threat. They're only dangerous if they reach critical mass, and if they're trying to kill and eat people you've got Schroedinger's Zombies - zombies that are mysteriously JUST fast and deadly enough to catch people and infect them, yet simultaneously not good enough to actually kill and eat them, allowing them to get away and turn into zombies themselves. We have no choice but to acknowledge these zombies as effective and uneffective at the same time.

[Dervag]

Except Max Brooks got that so very wrong on so many levels that it's not even worth discussing. He even backhandedly admits he had to cheat to make it a loss for the living by stating that the officers in charge were ridiculously incompetent in a way which no officers I've ever encountered are.How exhaustively do you think you've searched the space of possible ways for officers to be ridiculously incompetent?

[Johel]

The issue I see with that is that you're leaving one or two zombies, which, if my memory serves me, are slow, tend to shamble and moan loudly when they're on the attack, and are generally pretty piss-poor when it comes to actually trying to catch people to use their one effective attack, which is biting. They're only really dangerous if they reach zerg swarm levels, and leaving one on its own seems to be a step down from this.
Plus, if they're the kind that are trying to eat people, even if they're lucky enough to mug one or two random folks (presumably caught by surprise on their own in an isolated spot, because one zombie is going to be noticed pretty fast in a busy place and be reeeaallly outnumbered), they're just going to consume the body, which cuts down the odds of the outbreak spreading pretty badly. So you have a solitary zombie mugger which is eventually going to get reported.

EDIT: Come to think of it, generic shambling zombies aren't that impressive a threat. They're only dangerous if they reach critical mass, and if they're trying to kill and eat people you've got Schroedinger's Zombies - zombies that are mysteriously JUST fast and deadly enough to catch people and infect them, yet not quite enough to actually kill and eat them, allowing them to get away and turn into zombies themselves.

Well, yeah, the zombi is eventually taken down.
And ? A single bit is enough to infect.

Malls, hospitals, tube stations, airports,... all are crowded places, especially at the entrances. Should a single person be bitten and survive the experience, there's a risk of outbreak.

Nobody even needs to be bitten, actually. The government must simply think that there's a possibility that somebody was. As a government, would you risk a nation-wide epidemic by letting people drive out of town after such thing ?

That, my friend, is the beauty of terror : the threat doesn't even have to be real. As long as people think it is, it works.

[Drakyn]

Well, yeah, the zombi is eventually taken down.
And ? A single bit is enough to infect.

Malls, hospitals, tube stations, airports,... all are crowded places, especially at the entrances. Should a single person be bitten and survive the experience, there's a risk of outbreak.

Nobody even needs to be bitten, actually. The government must simply think that there's a possibility that somebody was. As a government, would you risk a nation-wide epidemic by letting people drive out of town after such thing ?

That, my friend, is the beauty of terror : the threat doesn't even have to be real. As long as people think it is, it works.
But the thing is...I don't see what's so eventual. It's a zombie. It's slower than a person, fairly obvious about what it is - even fresh, most people don't stare hollowly ahead and moan while slouching menacingly towards you - and it's not physically more powerful beyond being fairly tireless. It'd be spotted and whacked incredibly fast if it was in any sort of busy place. A truck pulls up, dumps out a zombie, zombie wanders around mindlessly, someone spots it, problem solved. Few people are going to be slow or stupid enough to let it get anywhere near them, no matter how chaotic the hustle and bustle around them - and actually, that'd make it almost easier to avoid the zombie, because all it needs is one person to spot it and start screaming in a panic and everyone flips out and runs. You'd get riot casualties, not infectees. And even one or two zombies produced somehow from this would have the same issue - they'd be slow, isolated, and have to get incredibly lucky to infect someone while simultaneously not ruining the corpse. Zombiedom just doesn't seem like a good epidemic to me - it attempts to stop its own spread, for one thing.

[Oslecamo]

Actually, in most zombie movies, people seem to take a LOT of time to distingish a zombie from a real person, leting themselves get close and then biten.

So instead of "AH ZOMBIE!" it would be "AH DRUNK DUDE THAT BITED ME!". Zombie gets kicked, then wanders to bite someone else, gets kicked again, wanders some more, bites some more, and so on untill you've got several people infected.

Clearly, the place of choice for your attack would be somewhere full of drunk dudes and noise, like a bar or a concert. Nobody will notice anything untill it's too late!:smallbiggrin:

[Drakyn]

Clearly, the place of choice for your attack would be somewhere full of drunk dudes and noise, like a bar or a concert. Nobody will notice anything untill it's too late!:smallbiggrin:

That actually sounds like a really good idea.
Of course, if zombies are open house (I mean, you can't get much more ethically bankrupt), then so is pretty much everything but flat out MAD nuking. Which begs the question of why, rather than going to all the effort of setting up the zombie ploy, you haven't just saturated the city water supply with something equally lethal that doesn't end in you having to clean up a country full of wandering zombies or involve wandering around in a van looking for concerts.

[Johel]

Few people are going to be slow or stupid enough to let it get anywhere near them, no matter how chaotic the hustle and bustle around them - and actually, that'd make it almost easier to avoid the zombie, because all it needs is one person to spot it and start screaming in a panic and everyone flips out and runs. You'd get riot casualties, not infectees. And even one or two zombies produced somehow from this would have the same issue - they'd be slow, isolated, and have to get incredibly lucky to infect someone while simultaneously not ruining the corpse. Zombiedom just doesn't seem like a good epidemic to me - it attempts to stop its own spread, for one thing.

Again, you don't care if people get infected or not.
We aim for "-There's a zombie. Maybe there are more. People could get infected. Let's quarantine the area".

A few bites will just help to fuel paranoia but that's a bonus.


That actually sounds like a really good idea.
Of course, if zombies are open house (I mean, you can't get much more ethically bankrupt), then so is pretty much everything but flat out MAD nuking. Which begs the question of why, rather than going to all the effort of setting up the zombie ploy, you haven't just saturated the city water supply with something equally lethal that doesn't end in you having to clean up a country full of wandering zombies or involve wandering around in a van looking for concerts.

Because, once the biological hazard is detected, it's more difficult for a government to find potentially infected people (who might well not even exist) than it is to close the water supply. Also, the quality of water is checked at various points in the distribution network of big cities.

Remember, the aim is terror, not actual damage.
You don't care if there's an epidemic. You just want to spread fear and damage the economy, preferably in a non-durable way so you can even benefit from short-term panic.

[Drakyn]

Again, you don't care if people get infected or not.
We aim for "-There's a zombie. Maybe there are more. People could get infected. Let's quarantine the area".

A few bites will just help to fuel paranoia but that's a bonus.



Because, once the biological hazard is detected, it's more difficult for a government to find potentially infected people (who might well not even exist) than it is to close the water supply. Also, the quality of water is checked at various points in the distribution network of big cities.

Remember, the aim is terror, not actual damage.
You don't care if there's an epidemic. You just want to spread fear and damage the economy, preferably in a non-durable way so you can even benefit from short-term panic.

The issue I have here is that a normal epidemic - spread through water supply, or public areas, or whatever; there are certainly more quiet ways to get a plague off the ground and onto the streets than a zombie - would likely spread faster, farther, and more easily than a zombieborne one. Plagues panic people easily enough already - you don't need them to fear a disease because they'll become zombies, you just need them to fear disease. Zombies are much easier to detect than sick people, and even zombie carriers - both will look fine for a time, but one will be covering a bite mark somewhere and is definitely AWARE he's got something to hide, which is easier to notice.
And again, if you're bringing zombies into it, you're pretty much opening the door to whatever kind of warfare you can imagine. If you're going to use bioweapons, use the best you have, because you can expect the same in return.

[Oslecamo]

Because, once the biological hazard is detected, it's more difficult for a government to find potentially infected people (who might well not even exist) than it is to close the water supply. Also, the quality of water is checked at various points in the distribution network of big cities.


Nitpick, but if you can infect the main water supply of the city, it will cause chaos anyway, as the water supply needs to be shut down and whitout water a lot of stuff will stop.

Myself, I would simply go for old chemical-biological weapon bombing that spread trough air.

[Soras Teva Gee]

But the thing is...I don't see what's so eventual. It's a zombie. It's slower than a person, fairly obvious about what it is - even fresh, most people don't stare hollowly ahead and moan while slouching menacingly towards you - and it's not physically more powerful beyond being fairly tireless. It'd be spotted and whacked incredibly fast if it was in any sort of busy place. A truck pulls up, dumps out a zombie, zombie wanders around mindlessly, someone spots it, problem solved. Few people are going to be slow or stupid enough to let it get anywhere near them, no matter how chaotic the hustle and bustle around them - and actually, that'd make it almost easier to avoid the zombie, because all it needs is one person to spot it and start screaming in a panic and everyone flips out and runs. You'd get riot casualties, not infectees. And even one or two zombies produced somehow from this would have the same issue - they'd be slow, isolated, and have to get incredibly lucky to infect someone while simultaneously not ruining the corpse. Zombiedom just doesn't seem like a good epidemic to me - it attempts to stop its own spread, for one thing.

Which is why the zombie apocalypse doesn't generally make sense at any level. And incidentally why in the real world diseases like Ebola are less deadly then they sound in broad terms.

[JeminiZero]

The core of this is you are simply adding fantastic elements to the basic zombie.


No I'm not. I reiterate that this ISN'T my idea. It was done by Resident Evil. More on this later.



No there is no zombie that is realistic strictly speaking, but there is a difference between a base human with their brain and circulatory systems turned off and then that same creature regaining intelligence (by proxy) and adding superstrength. How would the zombies get superstrength,


The trouble herein is that the zombie genre is sufficiently diverse that every monster can be very different. I will confess that I am not familiar with WWZ zombies. That said, there ARE some instances where zombies do have increased strength (like D&D).



since when do we have electronic puppet technology.


We already have means of wiring really simple brains (http://wireheading.com/roboroach/index.html). Of course this has very little practical application at present, so it does not go much beyond the experimental stage. Should a major corporation with a serious R&D budget, say Umbrella, pour funds into building a more advanced system for say, zombies, I would think its certainly possible.



From an argument standpoint thoug you cannot simply imagine anything into existence to make your argument work.


While I did not concieve the idea, I must say that given a biological zombie, the idea of zombie supersoldiers isn't too farfetched. The Tyrant technology has 2 underpinning assumptions:
1) It is possible to use microchips to control zombies. As I pointed out above, this has already been achieved on a smaller experimental scale.
2) It is possible to enhance the zombification process to create a stronger/tougher super zombie before applying control chips. Resident Evil accomplished this by splicing the virus / adding various growth hormones to the victims / other unknown methods. Humans are already figuring out all sorts of ways to enhance themselves. It would not be too far a jump to apply similiar methods to zombies. The fact that you are using a virus also makes gene doping far easier.

If you got these first 2 steps down, the further addition of weapons and armor is really just a minor step.



As it invites me to imagine in something bigger to make my argument work. Like say, while your investing in your zombies I become allies with the Hellsing Organization and get Alucard on my side.


There is a difference between enhancing something that already exists (assuming that Zombies exist), and calling into being an Elder Vampire that has been enslaved by an London organization.



From there we'd just get more ridiculous. Now yes if zombies are superstrong and controllable then there are military advantages over conventional troops. However those elements are far from genre standard tropes and the particularly the controllable element runs almost directly counter to the epidemic-phobia that underwrites the genre.


Again, I didn't come up with this, I am merely pointing out how Resident Evil did it. (Where "it" refers to making practical military application out of zombies). And Resident Evil is certainly big enough to make it one of the major Genre contributors.

[chiasaur11]

Again, I didn't come up with this, I am merely pointing out how Resident Evil did it. (Where "it" refers to making practical military application out of zombies). And Resident Evil is certainly big enough to make it one of the major Genre contributors.

Resident Evil is kinda awful for "Real World" scenarios, what with the series wide attitude of, to quote Dr. Leo Spaceman, "Science is... whatever we want it to be."

[JeminiZero]

Resident Evil is kinda awful for "Real World" scenarios, what with the series wide attitude of, to quote Dr. Leo Spaceman, "Science is... whatever we want it to be."

Granted, the existence of a virus that is capable of cross infecting humans/animals and even plants, and which turns them into zombies that can withstand massive punishment and survive for years without food/water is highly unrealistic. (Not to mention the mystery of why animals retain their speed, whereas humans become shambling slowpokes). But given that already exists, wouldn't you agree that enhancing/controlling such zombies isn't that far a stratch?

[Soras Teva Gee]

Granted, the existence of a virus that is capable of cross infecting humans/animals and even plants, and which turns them into zombies that can withstand massive punishment and survive for years without food/water is highly unrealistic. (Not to mention the mystery of why animals retain their speed, whereas humans become shambling slowpokes). But given that already exists, wouldn't you agree that enhancing/controlling such zombies isn't that far a stratch?

In what context? Within the RE series if they've successfully controlled creatures then there is potential application. I somehow doubt it would put the risk lower then say Idiot Ball levels (deploying a diseased unstable creature, yeah smart...) and is still basically subverting the general modern zombie idea. And there's still the question of whether say chipping and suicide rigging every zombie would still be a cost effective notion.

It still doesn't help the broader genre-level argument at all, and not a tiny bit of operating under another verse's rules.

[secretbison]

The issue I see with that is that you're leaving one or two zombies, which, if my memory serves me, are slow, tend to shamble and moan loudly when they're on the attack, and are generally pretty piss-poor when it comes to actually trying to catch people to use their one effective attack, which is biting. They're only really dangerous if they reach zerg swarm levels, and leaving one on its own seems to be a step down from this.
Plus, if they're the kind that are trying to eat people, even if they're lucky enough to mug one or two random folks (presumably caught by surprise on their own in an isolated spot, because one zombie is going to be noticed pretty fast in a busy place and be reeeaallly outnumbered), they're just going to consume the body, which cuts down the odds of the outbreak spreading pretty badly. So you have a solitary zombie mugger which is eventually going to get reported.

EDIT: Come to think of it, generic shambling zombies aren't that impressive a threat. They're only dangerous if they reach critical mass, and if they're trying to kill and eat people you've got Schroedinger's Zombies - zombies that are mysteriously JUST fast and deadly enough to catch people and infect them, yet simultaneously not good enough to actually kill and eat them, allowing them to get away and turn into zombies themselves. We have no choice but to acknowledge these zombies as effective and uneffective at the same time.

Sure, if you're just talking about throwing a lone zombie into the Thunderdome, he's not going to be very good at a direct confrontation. But the advantage of the lone zombie is the element of surprise. A lone zombie can lurk in a dark corner for years, inert until it smells its prey. And if you're not currently experiencing a zombie apocalypse, your guard will be down. If you've never experienced a zombie apocalypse, you won't know what to do even if you see there's a problem. The zombies were able to reach a critical mass in World War Z for the singlular reason that nobody understood what they were until it was too late.

So zombies can be useful as a biological weapon, armor or no, particularly in lawless and/or isolated parts of the world that have never experienced zombies before.

[Tavar]

Well, we covered the WWZ earlier, but in it the organizations don't act intelligently(see my teacher analogy in an earlier post), and there's also some problems with how resistant zombies are to various weapons. Yes, a shot that doesn't hit the head won't kill, but if it shatters bones then the zombie can't move.

Also, this doesn't explain how the numbers would grow, which is the main problem. Yeah, and army of millions of zombies is a threat. How does it get to the millions, though?

[Johel]

Granted, the existence of a virus that is capable of cross infecting humans/animals and even plants, and which turns them into zombies that can withstand massive punishment and survive for years without food/water is highly unrealistic. (Not to mention the mystery of why animals retain their speed, whereas humans become shambling slowpokes). But given that already exists, wouldn't you agree that enhancing/controlling such zombies isn't that far a stratch?

Animate the deads :
Virus might not be the right tool for this.
They need living cells to reproduce and most are specialized for a single type of host. So, yeah, they don't exactly qualify as "universal zombie creator".

In RE, the reason given to why the deads rise is that a virus stimulate the dead brain with micro electric sparks. It sounds silly to begin with and especially for a virus. But, given some MAJOR s-f twist, a bacteria could do the job. It can feed on death flesh while emitting an electric charge, doesn't care what its host is as long as there's something to eat and while it doesn't reproduce as fast as a virus, it is a lot more reliable.

While not exactly a bacteria, the Myrmeconema neotropicum (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myrmeconema_neotropicum), a nematode, can "mind-control" living ants. Here, with our "Z bacteria", we aren't even going to do mind control : we simply animate the brain and let the most basic instincts do the rest.

Enhancing Zombies :
Before they are zombies ? Sure, that's what they did in RE : they injected the T-virus in living tissues to get...interesting results.

Slightly more realistically, if we could create a living creature through bioengineering, there's nothing that would prevent our bacteria to animate the thing once it's dead. But then, if you can create it alive, you can probably tame it. And then, why would you want a dead version ?

Unless dead in itself IS an enhancement...

Increased Strength :
You listed increased strenght and punishment tolerance.
What if both are linked to the same cause ?

It might come from the fact that undeads don't feel pain anymore . Or at least, their brain doesn't react the same as us to it, what with the lack of preservation instinct. Therefor, while we would use some restrain to avoid hurting ourselves and say "-stop !! I'll break something, there.", a mindless zombie will just hunt relentlessly whatever move, with complete disregard for his own well-being.