cyborg soldiers?

[jps]

http://www.guerrillanews.com/sci-tech/doc2758.html

a DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency)-sponsored conference was held in Washington, DC, that showcased the latest love child of the Bush Pentagon: military bioengineering. The euphemisms being used by the Pentagon to disguise the true nature of this research are being spread as thick as bondo and cheap paint at a used car lot. For example, the title of the conference was: 'Harvesting Biology for Defense Technology,' while the subheading of the section on human 'bioengineering' was entitled, rather ominously, in light of the military's history, 'Enhancing Human Performance.'

So how does the Bush DARPA seek to 'enhance' human performance? In a kinder, gentler administration, the solution would be better training, better food, better pay, more leave time, and greater use of stress-reducing duty rotations. But this is not a kinder, gentler -or even rational- administration. Bush and Company plan to enhance soldier performance by squeezing the most that can be humanly -and not so humanly- squeezed from troops without having to resort to anything as primitive as decent pay. Their motto: Get the most human output for the least human input: After all, it's the corporate way!

The article goes on to describe the goals of theis research: strength enhancement, planes wired to the minds of pilots, pain suppression, etc

Is this a good idea?
Upon first reading this article(which clearly takes the position that this is a very bad thing) I couldn't help but thinking(as a sci-fi fan)that this stuff sounds pretty cool, however that has no bearing on whether its ethical.
If this is made mandatory or done to soldiers without their knowing it then I'd say its clearly wrong, but if people fully understand what they're getting into and volunteer, then why not?

 

[Mystech]

Well I hope that this isn't anything so drastic as hacking off soldiers limbs to replace them with tank treds and machine guns, or the like I'd like to know more about what they really have in mind.

Also, it's not as if there is no president for the idea of "Bioengeneerd" soldiers in the American military. We already do certain things in order to try to make our soldiers better than human, as it were. For instance, pilots in our Airforce are given speed in order to make them stay awake and alert during very long periods of flight.