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Warfare has just changed forever...again

I think these methods will be more effective for terrorism rather than attacking sophisticated militaries.
 
What if...? said:
Its my understanding that radio control frequencies are routinely jammed around the president for just this reason.
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Are they going to jam all possible frequencies? This sounds like the old armor-vs-armament clash, wherein the technology available determines whether the offensive or the defensive is stronger. In WWI, the defensive was stronger...but in WWII, the offensive was stronger.
 
Glen Contrarian said:
Are they going to jam all possible frequencies? This sounds like the old armor-vs-armament clash, wherein the technology available determines whether the offensive or the defensive is stronger. In WWI, the defensive was stronger...but in WWII, the offensive was stronger.
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The real issue is autonomy/AI.

Nobody actually flies a multirotor. Its virtually impossible.

A computer flies the multirotor. The pilot just tells it where to go.

So "waypoints" can be set and no human needs to be involved.

My phantom can do 3D imagery.

Give it a subject and establish some basic parameters and it will fly around and around whatever it is taking picture after picture until enough are gathered for software to assemble them into a 3D image.

This is off the shelf consumer gear.

And groups developing/refining controller software/harware are super active.

Most racers are using small producer gear. The big players are involved. But importers have become manufacturers. Sponsors. I can't keep up with the tech. My job makes it hard to get out much most of the year. And six months is one or two "generations".

Its crazy.

And a racing drone is a potential weapon in and of itself.

1-2 pounds of carbon fiber and lithium battery and metal traveling at over 70mph piloted remotely by camera in a sport where we fly through gates that are six foot half circles. Duct tape a spike on it and its even worse.

Like I said, I'm stunned and grateful a bunch of bad things haven't happened already.

It really sucks because the multirotor is really going to change our lives. It seems like they find a new application every week. Something they can do faster, cheaper, more safely, with less environmental impact.

More automation, they're already taking jobs.

But think about drones that monitor fields by a variety of sensors can locate tiny areas of infestation/infection and then fly in and apply only the needed amount of chemicals to only the affected area.

The sky isn't really the limit anymore.
 
What if...? said:
The real issue is autonomy/AI.

Nobody actually flies a multirotor. Its virtually impossible.

A computer flies the multirotor. The pilot just tells it where to go.

So "waypoints" can be set and no human needs to be involved.

My phantom can do 3D imagery.

Give it a subject and establish some basic parameters and it will fly around and around whatever it is taking picture after picture until enough are gathered for software to assemble them into a 3D image.

This is off the shelf consumer gear.

And groups developing/refining controller software/harware are super active.

Most racers are using small producer gear. The big players are involved. But importers have become manufacturers. Sponsors. I can't keep up with the tech. My job makes it hard to get out much most of the year. And six months is one or two "generations".

Its crazy.

And a racing drone is a potential weapon in and of itself.

1-2 pounds of carbon fiber and lithium battery and metal traveling at over 70mph piloted remotely by camera in a sport where we fly through gates that are six foot half circles. Duct tape a spike on it and its even worse.

Like I said, I'm stunned and grateful a bunch of bad things haven't happened already.

It really sucks because the multirotor is really going to change our lives. It seems like they find a new application every week. Something they can do faster, cheaper, more safely, with less environmental impact.

More automation, they're already taking jobs.

But think about drones that monitor fields by a variety of sensors can locate tiny areas of infestation/infection and then fly in and apply only the needed amount of chemicals to only the affected area.

The sky isn't really the limit anymore
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Yeah, no offence or anything, but I think you might be exaggerating aboot the whole threat
 
Glen Contrarian said:
That doesn't mean that the Russians are lying, either. Perhaps the single most important rule of warfare - and the one most often broken - is to never underestimate one's enemy.
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Of course, but deliberate disinformation is also a common practice.

They claim to have taken Control of six but only recovered three. And as I said, I'm skeptical about missiles/radar finding them, especially since they could ground hug.

But it sounds better than we sprayed flak at them and got most of them. Or mostly shot them down with small arms. Pretty big and not going very fast.

To your own people and whoever sent them.

At the end of the day the world hears what Russia wants it to hear when they have editorial Control.
 
Desert Storm said:
Yeah, no offence or anything, but I think you might be exaggerating aboot the whole threat
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All the robotics aside I can fly a 1-2 pound racer through a six foot diameter circle at 60mph from a half a mike away.

And it is gonna suck for all forms of infantry before long.

They are working on it.
 
Glen Contrarian said:
Very crude...but clearly indicative of how the internet has made drone warfare a possibility even for low-tech rebels and terrorists. If they can do it, what are the great powers of the world capable of unleashing on the battlefield?
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Two thoughts:

1. After deploying both to Iraq and Afghanistan, I'm amazed at the ingenuity and intelligence (to a degree) of the insurgents and their ability to make improvised weapons. They aren't educated but that definitely doesn't mean dumb. I also would think that if they would just put that into building something, instead of tearing it down, they could really make some progress.

2. The counter to those drones was interesting as some of them were able to be taken over, I think this is what happened to one of our drones that Iran took because encrypted comms is such a pain in the ass that many of our drones were running unencrypted.

Anyways, yeah...kinda scary. Reminds me of a video:

 
What if...? said:
All the robotics aside I can fly a 1-2 pound racer through a six foot diameter circle at 60mph from a half a mike away.

And it is gonna suck for all forms of infantry before long.

They are working on it
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And I could borrow a few dozen Stinger missile launchers from the Yemeni's, and knock down at least a dozen commercial airliners coming out of JFK airport tomorrow!!! Just by standing on the side of the road.

Just because I could, doesnt mean it will happen
 
Desert Storm said:
And I could borrow a few dozen Stinger missile launchers from the Yemeni's, and knock down at least a dozen commercial airliners coming out of JFK airport tomorrow!!! Just by standing on the side of the road.

Just because I could, doesnt mean it will happen
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Of course not.

My posts were in response to people not being up on what the tech is capable of.

And I'm still surprised we haven't seen more terrorist application.
 
Warfare evolves - it changes form and shape. 1st generation night vision evolved to 4th generation night vision. Perry class Frigates evolve to the Freedom class.

The current drones that are of any value - like the Reaper ; operate off of satellite ( direct line of site ) frequencies. Hard to jam between the satellite and a drone that is at thirty thousand feet.

Drones will evolve and improve, Weapons platforms , recon and intel gathering, resupply of troops in desolate locations, Drones to protect a area and shoot down other drones.

Everything takes time. R&D , improvements and testing.

Warfare is not the same from one year to the next. Just as a infantry patrol might have to change from
A single column formation to a flanking or staggered formation due to a mission or terrain change.........
Warfare also changes.

Drones and missiles.......aerial bombing - saves lives and decreases the danger and jeopardy of our
Troops. Save troops lives, ask for more bombs and drones - equals a ton of more funding for the military from Congress.

And money is what the Department of Defense is after.




Major Lambda
 
Major Lambda said:
Warfare evolves - it changes form and shape. 1st generation night vision evolved to 4th generation night vision. Perry class Frigates evolve to the Freedom class.

The current drones that are of any value - like the Reaper ; operate off of satellite ( direct line of site ) frequencies. Hard to jam between the satellite and a drone that is at thirty thousand feet.

Drones will evolve and improve, Weapons platforms , recon and intel gathering, resupply of troops in desolate locations, Drones to protect a area and shoot down other drones.

Everything takes time. R&D , improvements and testing.

Warfare is not the same from one year to the next. Just as a infantry patrol might have to change from
A single column formation to a flanking or staggered formation due to a mission or terrain change.........
Warfare also changes.

Drones and missiles.......aerial bombing - saves lives and decreases the danger and jeopardy of our
Troops. Save troops lives, ask for more bombs and drones - equals tonmore funding for the miligary from Congress.

And money is what the Department of Defense is after.




Major Lambda
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Very well put, thank you.

Bottom line is, terrorists are at least 15 to 30 years behind when it comes to effective technology, and lets keep it that way
 
Desert Storm said:
And I could borrow a few dozen Stinger missile launchers from the Yemeni's, and knock down at least a dozen commercial airliners coming out of JFK airport tomorrow!!! Just by standing on the side of the road.

Just because I could, doesnt mean it will happen
Click to expand...

Desert Storm:

Why expose yourself? Use AI and remote accessing to take over control of the targeted aircraft and crash it from afar. No missile contrail to reveal your position and no bothersome witnesses to concern yourself about. That is the real danger of AI. Fly your micro drones into the turbines of the targeted airliner's engines and bring it down without using missiles. Don't arm your micro drones with explosives, but rather arm them with genetically-keyed, aerosol-dispersed cytotoxins to target certain individuals while leaving bystanders unharmed and fully panicked. Have the drones carry mini EMP emitters and cripple infrastructure so widely that it will take years to fix.

The problem with AI-mediated lethal autonomous weapon systems is that it puts nation states, PMSC's, terrorists and deranged hobbyists on a more level playing field with each other and that parity democratises highly disruptive technology to the level of a WMD's impact. Excuse my French, but we are soon going to be completely fracked!

Cheers?
Evilroddy.
 
What if...? said:
And I'm still surprised we haven't seen more terrorist application.
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I'm not joking ----------

I believe you will see a backpack / suitcase nuke go off.......before you see a terrorist drone.
The bad guys want another 9/11. They want to strike fear in America, how do you do that.
A backpack / suitcase nuke in the heart of our political system ----- Washington DC

The politicians whom are responsible for US actions abroad would get hit .......and America would be crippled.

This is why the US is paying so much attention to North Korea's, and Iran's nuclear programs. The theft of weapons grade material by a rogue worker.....and sold - or sale by the Govt to a terror group, the US and England will be in trouble.

Nuclear Warfare is no joke !


https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suitcase_nuclear_device




Major Lambda
 
Glen Contrarian said:
Like the first attack using gunpowder, or the first attack using a submarine, or the first attack using aircraft, the weapons were crude and nearly useless for the attack itself...but it has clearly signaled in the dawn of a new era of warfare, one that science fiction authors and manga/anime artists - and then military strategists - have long predicted: attacks using a massed wave of remotely-piloted drones.

Sure, America's been using drones to lethal effects for years, but we've only been using them for either recon or for carrying guided payloads to be released at great heights. This, however, was an attack by a swarm of 13 drones made partially of wood and held together with duct tape (which, as all men know, really is one of the most crucial materials known to man ;)). From the article:

The Russian military says it has fought an attack by a swarm of drones launched by jihadists against its bases in Syria. From the article:

Thirteen attack drones were launched against the Khmeimim air base and a naval facility in the city of Tartus on Syria’s western coast, the Russian defence ministry said. Russian forces shot down seven of the drones with anti-aircraft missiles while the other six were hacked by a cyberware unit and taken under Russian control, the ministry said. No damage or casualties at the two military bases were reported. The attack appears to be the largest example to date of insurgents using a mass of primitive drones in combat and Russia said it had never before faced such an attack. “It was the first time when terrorists applied a massed drone aircraft attack launched at a range of more than 50 km using modern GPS guidance systems,” a defence ministry spokesman said.
...
Three of the drones were recovered by Russian forces, the ministry said, and photographs showed a small aircraft made partly of wood and held together with masking tape. Another picture showed a row of small explosive.

Very crude...but clearly indicative of how the internet has made drone warfare a possibility even for low-tech rebels and terrorists. If they can do it, what are the great powers of the world capable of unleashing on the battlefield?

In the next couple decades, the future of the Army is cybernetic. While occupying land will still require boots on the ground for the foreseeable future, the time is not far away that the battlefield - whether urban or rural - will become even more lethal no matter how well our soldiers are protected. In my opinion, however, the future beyond that is in the very small. Nanotech was first predicted by Richard Feynmann in his "There's plenty of room at the bottom" speech in 1959, and the military - and even corporate warfare - applications of nanotech was predicted by Neal Stephenson in his seminal book "Snow Crash" in 1992. I have long thought that nanotech will eventually result in some ultra-small applications of drone technology, making assignment to any battlefield a virtual death sentence. By that time, great weapons systems such as modern tanks and missiles and aircraft carriers will have become useless relics, monuments to the excesses of the military-industrial complex. The convergence of nanotech with artificial intelligence may well be why great thinkers including Stephen Hawking and Elon Musk are warning that the rise of AI may well result in mankind's fall.

And if so, drones made with wood and duct tape were a big step on our ladder down into the dumpster of history.
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Drones, robots, automated weapons, yes.


Nanotech... probably not for a long time if ever. Von Neumann aside, there are plenty of reasons that nanotech will turn out to be more limited than the more imaginative and optimistic scenarios portray.

Molecular scale machines have a number of limitations in terms of power, computing capacity, communications, and scale issues, and their ability to dominate a macroscopic and uncontrolled environment has been seriously questioned.
 
Goshin said:
Drones, robots, automated weapons, yes.


Nanotech... probably not for a long time if ever. Von Neumann aside, there are plenty of reasons that nanotech will turn out to be more limited than the more imaginative and optimistic scenarios portray.

Molecular scale machines have a number of limitations in terms of power, computing capacity, communications, and scale issues, and their ability to dominate a macroscopic and uncontrolled environment has been seriously questioned.
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Again, the most serious mistake commonly made in warfare is to underestimate the enemy. History is replete with examples of "that could never happen"....
 
Glen Contrarian said:
Again, the most serious mistake commonly made in warfare is to underestimate the enemy. History is replete with examples of "that could never happen"....
Click to expand...

I do not anticipate a singularity or grey goo event in my lifetime.
 
What if...? said:
Of course, but deliberate disinformation is also a common practice.

They claim to have taken Control of six but only recovered three. And as I said, I'm skeptical about missiles/radar finding them, especially since they could ground hug.

But it sounds better than we sprayed flak at them and got most of them. Or mostly shot them down with small arms. Pretty big and not going very fast.

To your own people and whoever sent them.

At the end of the day the world hears what Russia wants it to hear when they have editorial Control.
Click to expand...

Whatever the facts may be, the overarching story is that we've entered a new era of warfare.
 
Evilroddy said:
Desert Storm:

Why expose yourself? Use AI and remote accessing to take over control of the targeted aircraft and crash it from afar. No missile contrail to reveal your position and no bothersome witnesses to concern yourself about. That is the real danger of AI. Fly your micro drones into the turbines of the targeted airliner's engines and bring it down without using missiles. Don't arm your micro drones with explosives, but rather arm them with genetically-keyed, aerosol-dispersed cytotoxins to target certain individuals while leaving bystanders unharmed and fully panicked. Have the drones carry mini EMP emitters and cripple infrastructure so widely that it will take years to fix.

The problem with AI-mediated lethal autonomous weapon systems is that it puts nation states, PMSC's, terrorists and deranged hobbyists on a more level playing field with each other and that parity democratises highly disruptive technology to the level of a WMD's impact. Excuse my French, but we are soon going to be completely fracked!

Cheers?
Evilroddy
Click to expand...
Yeah, I don't think we're quite there yet, but we have to stay vigilant, so I somewhat agree with you
 
What if...? said:
All the robotics aside I can fly a 1-2 pound racer through a six foot diameter circle at 60mph from a half a mike away.

And it is gonna suck for all forms of infantry before long.

They are working on it
Click to expand...
So basically what you're saying its just a matter of time before it happens??
 
The goal of terrorism is to terrorize people. What better way to do that than to have random drones suddenly flying into crowds of people and shooting people, then disappearing, or better yet, blowing themselves up and taking a few more with them?

A few dozen such attacks all over the country would be more effective than blowing up a city. Sure, there would be fewer deaths, but then, people would soon realize that no one is safe, not anywhere, any time. What better way to spread terror?
 
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