Lighter-Than-Air Force describes how the Department of Defense plans to transport its 1,800-person “units of action” in the near future:
The scheme, code-named Walrus, is just getting off the ground. But the agency is clear about what it wants: a prototype ‘tri-phibian’ (air, land, sea) zeppelin with a range of 6,000 nautical miles, ready to go aloft by 2008. ‘The program will not repackage 1930s technology or upscale the more limited commercial dirigibles of today,’ Darpa promised in its proposal. The Walrus will rely on new technologies, like static ion propulsion, says Preston Carter, the program manager.