Zombie defense blimp doesn’t work

When a Florida postal worker landed a gyrocopter on the U.S. Capitol lawn last April, his mission was to deliver letters to Congress in protest of big money donations into politics. That flight shed light on a “zombie” defense blimp initiative, called Joint Land Attack Cruise Missile Defense Elevated Netted Sensor System (JLENS), designed to protect against low-level “impossible to kill” attacks by drones and small vehicles, according to the Los Angeles Times. The postal worker, although interviewed in advance by Secret Service, didn’t alert the North American Aerospace Defense Command, which could have deployed JLENS. But, even after 17 years, JLENS doesn’t work. The LAT reported the ineffective system has survived kill efforts – by the Army - amid critical reports from the Pentagon’s Operational Test and Evaluation Office and GAO, which rated its reliability as “poor.” Foreign Policy magazine reported in May 2014 that DOD planned to “preserve the sanctity of human life” among all “non-zombie” humans. CONOP 8888’s provided for a “zombie survival plan, how-to guide for military planners trying to isolate the threat from a menu of the undead -from chicken zombies to vegetarian zombies and even ‘evil magic zombies’ - and destroy them.” (The document’s “disclaimer section” noted that “this plan was not actually designed as a joke.”) (Waterloo Cedar Falls [Iowa] Courier 10/08/15) Central Mississippi Note: The “zombie” project lives on because its manufacturer, Raytheon, spread job-producing subcontracts throughout congressional districts across 10 states; and deployed heavyweight lobbyists like former senators Trent Lott (R-Miss.) and John Breaux (D-La.).