persian gulf war

Sheathed in a chilling veil of
rain, under cover of darkness, a few Navy Seals descend from a ship into a small rubber boat. They motor to a nearby harbor, idle the engine, and gently lower three torpedo-shaped objects into the water. The mission? Locate that persistent nemesis of amphibious operations: undersea mines. But tonight, instead of the specially trained dolphins or human divers who would normally do this work, the Navy is relying on robots.

Turning a fighter into a bomber may seem like trying to convert a Honda S2000 roadster into a pickup truck. Fighters, which are designed to dogfight with hostile airplanes and perform short-range attack missions, are fast and agile; bombers are made to haul heavy loads for thousands of miles. But Lockheed Martin is designing a fighter-bomber hybrid based on the F-22 Raptor fighter that's in flight-testing at Edwards Air Force Base in California.