I eat this stuff up. From Bird-Size Surveillance Craft See, Hear, Even Smell Enemy:
While most of the military’s attention in recent years has been focused on larger UAVs that can fly for hundreds of miles and fire missiles, scientists and military planners are trying to build aircraft that can fit in a backpack. The idea is to give individual soldiers a better idea of what might be over the next hill or, in the case of urban combat, what’s around the next corner.“For all of the high-tech intelligence that was available at upper levels during Desert Storm, a company commander had no more situational awareness of his immediate surroundings than a commander working for Robert E. Lee had during the Civil War,” says Col. Barry Ford, chief of staff for the Marine Corps Warfighting Lab in Quantico, Va. “We think these mini-UAVs will fill a critical capability gap.”
Naturally, I need one.