Ashlee VanceNYT Best Seller | Reporter at Bloomberg Businessweek

The Future of American Super-Soldiers #america #military #defensetech #defense #tech

2 Jun 2026 · 1 min

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1:28

In this brief interview, Speaker A outlines the current state of Phantom’s brain‑machine interface (BMI) work. Early adopters such as Alex are using external sensors placed around an amputation site, while Phantom is conducting clinical trials to implant a sub‑dermal device. Speaker A notes that a realist, identified as Connor, views the technology modestly compared to more sensational projects like Neuralink. The conversation then shifts to speculative, non‑medical military uses, with Speaker B hinting at “super hand” capabilities and Speaker A joking about the prospect of “octopus soldiers,” suggesting future augmentations such as additional limbs or wearable extensions for combat tasks.

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The earliest people using Phantom's technology, like Alex, have had external sensors placed around their amputation site. Phantom, though, is in the midst of running clinical trials where its device will be implanted right under the skin. In the near term, Connor is a realist when it comes to brain-machine interface technology. Phantom's implant is, in many ways, less flashy than the devices from Neuralink and others. As for where this technology's going, though, I guess it's time to prepare for octopus soldiers?
We're working on some interesting things that I can't talk too much about that are non-medical.
And so— And so you're giving me like a super hand?
Those are the kinds of things that are going to happen, right? So there absolutely will be like additional appendages, like wearable wings that they can control, or, you know, the Doc Ock kind of thing, you know, with multiple arms. We will quickly get to a point where humans more or less can be what they want to be and where your body is kind of like a blank canvas of sorts. Now, there are situations in the defense world too where you would want to do that, such as bomb defusion. The dream is that you have human arms or maybe even superhuman arms attached to a remote operated vehicle that then you can have somebody kind of transport themselves into that and then be able to operate these arms from a distance with 1-to-1 human dexterity to defuse a bomb or something like that, right?