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It's scary to think about the damage an actually competent force can inflict in this day and age.
by bllguo 10y ago
It's scary to think about the damage an actually competent force can inflict in this day and age.
- douche 10y agoIt really is. I can't imagine the havoc that an actually-trained strike team with some real equipment could cause. I was reading Band of Brothers recently, and the description of how accurate and deadly their mortar-men were in a number of engagements was impressive. A light mortar is not the most high-tech weapon, is mass-produced by every army in the world, and does not take a huge amount of training to handle effectively. Not to mention that it can strike from up to a mile away, from a position without direct line-of-sight to the target; with an accomplice acting as an FO to send adjustments by text. Or skip the accomplice, and use a drone (Is the army doing this? Seems like a natural application). I don't want to imagine the indiscriminate horror that could be inflicted at any kind of open-air event.
- pjc50 10y agoSee https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downing_Street_mortar_attack https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downing_Street_mortar_attack - although in that case the bomb-proof windows worked. The second time the IRA nearly managed to assasinate the head of government. The US army already has small portable tube-launched drones that function as a sort of guided mortar, although I can't remember the name at the moment.
- omarforgotpwd 10y agoYes, we're lucky so few competent forces exist
- dwaltrip 10y agoI think the greater factor is that, among those who have the competency, virtually none are actually interested in doing something so malicious.
- flukus 10y agoDo they even need to be particularly competent? I wonder how much you could accomplish with a drone and some explosives?
- vacri 10y agoExplosives need to be encased in something for best effect. You could use drones for a delivery device, but you would be limited in location selection due to what was both accessible and vulnerable.
- flukus 10y agoDoes it need peak effectiveness to take down a substation? I don't know how sturdy the components are. Alternatively, could an explosion of metallic powder be enough to short out equipment?
- vacri 10y agoI'm not an expert, I've just heard enough times that an explosion that's not enclosed isn't very effective. My plucked-from-the-air guess is that with today's consumer drones, you couldn't fly enough explosive-by-weight anywhere that's vulnerable enough to do anything but superficial damage. With the metallic powder, while that stuff can fry a circuit-board, power substations have a ton more energy in them, and have much more durable hardware. They already have to be weatherproof in externally accessible areas - I can't see an explosion of metal powder doing any more damage than rain already does. IANAPSEOAE (I am not a power station employee or an electrician), though.