http://youtube.com/watch?v=6Ehtxey0mdE&feature=user

Any ideas what we can do with all the upcoming surplus of plowshares and pruninghooks?

http://youtube.com/watch?v=6Ehtxey0mdE&feature=user

Any ideas what we can do with all the upcoming surplus of plowshares and pruninghooks?

Make more swords to fight the Jihadis? You know a crusade is coming...because there are no civil programs setup to live in harmony.

perhaps I didn't set up the OP clearly
I was scoping out anyone's idea on what can be done with the build up of military vehicles, etc - assuming that one day soon we will wake up to our senses (or alternatively be forced to fight with rocks and sticks to settle our disputes and thus have car yards full of inert military junk to deal with) - hence the anticipation of a surplus of plowshares and pruning hooks

perhaps I didn't set up the OP clearly
I was scoping out anyone's idea on what can be done with the build up of military vehicles, etc - assuming that one day soon we will wake up to our senses (or alternatively be forced to fight with rocks and sticks to settle our disputes and thus have car yards full of inert military junk to deal with) - hence the anticipation of a surplus of plowshares and pruning hooks

I think you got it backwards. You will have a suplus of swords and you want to convert them to....

The only time, you will have sticks and stones to fight with, if suddenly the laws of physics go screwy and you lose electromagnetism and hence no electricity.

The other time could be a giganto asteroid hit earth...or a trillion watt gamma ray pulses illuminates the planet for 24 hours. Only a few may survive.

I'm looking for alternatives to plowshares and pruning hooks
:shrug:

Depends on what is left...what you need to work with? Toys for tots? kitchen knives, refrigerators, lawn mowers? school bus? possibilities are endless

Many years ago I was at work, when the Fax machine started chirping, and out popped a fax from 'Ploughshare Industries' offering amongst other things, SS-20 launch vehicles (sans warhead, price on application).

This was as the USSR was dissolving, and various treaties were limiting types of launch vehicle, so Russia, and some of the orphaned countries were trying to profit by selling Soviet hardware. The people I worked for did make satellite parts, but we didn't launch them ourselves, so we never enquired further. At first, I had thought this was some kind of joke, but the fax had gone to a lot of people at other sites, and was genuine. I wonder how fussy 'Ploughshare Industries' were about inspecting end user certificates.

Decommissioned APCs could be the new SUVs!

I recall that the surplus of heavy machinery from WW2 was dovetailed to with the agricultural industry (all the industry that surrounded military vehicle manufacture started producing tractors instead of tanks, convoy carriers etc)