3 ms·

I broke a sweat reading. I have a question, please remember that I am a weapon noob. Isn't this similar to the hand-held bazookas that are daily fried into Is

I broke a sweat reading. I have a question, please remember that I am a weapon noob. Isn't this similar to the hand-held bazookas that are daily fried into Israel & well defended by Iron dome?

jmpman 7y ago
Sorry to trigger your anxiety. The Qassam rockets are basically the same as an Estes model rocket, if constructed from steel, with a TNT warhead. They have a ballistic trajectory, arcing high into the air making them visible to radar, are fired from a location limited by the rocket range (under a few dozen miles) and their exact location at each time until they explode can be calculated and fed into an Iron Dome to intercept. It’s very difficult to coordinate the launch, difficult to launch more than a few simultaneously, and very difficult to get them to land in the same location at the same time. For the defenders, it’s easy to identify where they were launched from (responding with a Hellfire from a waiting Apache), and easy to detect on radar - meter long metal pipes have a much different radar cross section than a bird. The drones I’m suggesting are possible would have a 1000 mile range. Instead of launching a couple dozen Qassam rocket to be shot down in an evening, the same group could build hundreds of drones, and then launch them over the course of an entire night (or two), from throughout the Gaza Strip, flying not to their destination immediately, but out into the Mediterranean, where they will spread out to fly at a few meters off the ocean until they need to head back to land for their detonation. At that point, these hundreds of drones are all converging on a single location, at a single time, from many different directions. Some high, and some just 50 feet above ground level. They would be very difficult to detect due to their size, altitude (low to avoid radar, or high to avoid human perception), dispersion and speed. From a radar perspective, the metal engine components could be small enough to be outside most radar wavelengths and shaped to minimize radar cross section, while encased in basically a plastic/wooden frame. From radar, it’ll probably look like a bird. Unlike with the Qassam, it’s not just Sderot which is in range.
- bythckr 7y ago
  Please don't be sorry, it's important to know the risk we face daily. Trillions are spend globally on security, but we are more insecure daily. There needs to be a change in the way we ensure safety. The elected officials who are suppose to do this are too busy in bed with the military industrial complex. Basically the dog is napping and letting the wolfs "watch over" the sheep. This is a security nightmare. I presumed that the Saudi attack happened due to the incapabilities of Saudi forces. I did read that despite all the fancy toys from Uncle Sam, they dont know how to use the toys well. How is it compared to the Russian s400? For the trillions that the Americans pour into their defence, do they have some way to fight this "swarm of drones"? Aren't the US leading in drone technology? Guess in an IT lingo, I can say that distributed systems are better than a monolithic system.
  - jmpman 7y ago
    I’m actually impressed with the US and Israeli progress on drone defense. Laser defense is going to be the primary solution and the US and Israel are working diligently. Unfortunately even laser can be swarmed, attacks can be scheduled during fog (lasers don’t work through fog) etc. All systems have weaknesses and ultimately it comes down to an economic battle. Your enemy must not have the resources to use this asymmetric warfare. So, you increase the chance of reprisal attacks working (raising the price of attack from a $500 drone to the attackers life), increase the cost of a successful attack by being able to defend against a large number of drones at the most probable attack location. The majority of the anti-aircraft defenses are targeted at standard warplanes. The S400 is one of those. Shooting an S400 missile at one of these tiny drones is like shooting a shotgun at a swarm of gnats. You’re not taking out the swarm and you just spent a ton of money to battle something insignificant. The power of these drones comes not from the individual, but the ability to coordinate together. In IT lingo, it would be like trying to battle a DDOS botnet. Further, the S400 is designed to detect a huge airplane. Yes those planes are radar absorbing and reflect radar away from the receivers, but they don’t really resemble a bird. They’re too fast, they go straight, they reflect radar strongly in other directions (to be detected by radar receivers distant from the transmitter) and at their size are capable of being detected by other techniques. These small drones could be made to look like birds from a radar perspective. Hard to justify shooting your S400 at a bird. The justification for spending more money on defense is that the more you spend, they better you’re protected. I don’t believe that to be completely true, but our investments in laser defenses is justifiable.

I broke a sweat reading. I have a question, please remember that I am a weapon noob. Isn't this similar to the hand-held bazookas that are daily fried into Israel & well defended by Iron dome?

jmpman 7y ago

Sorry to trigger your anxiety. The Qassam rockets are basically the same as an Estes model rocket, if constructed from steel, with a TNT warhead. They have a ballistic trajectory, arcing high into the air making them visible to radar, are fired from a location limited by the rocket range (under a few dozen miles) and their exact location at each time until they explode can be calculated and fed into an Iron Dome to intercept. It’s very difficult to coordinate the launch, difficult to launch more than a few simultaneously, and very difficult to get them to land in the same location at the same time. For the defenders, it’s easy to identify where they were launched from (responding with a Hellfire from a waiting Apache), and easy to detect on radar - meter long metal pipes have a much different radar cross section than a bird. The drones I’m suggesting are possible would have a 1000 mile range. Instead of launching a couple dozen Qassam rocket to be shot down in an evening, the same group could build hundreds of drones, and then launch them over the course of an entire night (or two), from throughout the Gaza Strip, flying not to their destination immediately, but out into the Mediterranean, where they will spread out to fly at a few meters off the ocean until they need to head back to land for their detonation. At that point, these hundreds of drones are all converging on a single location, at a single time, from many different directions. Some high, and some just 50 feet above ground level. They would be very difficult to detect due to their size, altitude (low to avoid radar, or high to avoid human perception), dispersion and speed. From a radar perspective, the metal engine components could be small enough to be outside most radar wavelengths and shaped to minimize radar cross section, while encased in basically a plastic/wooden frame. From radar, it’ll probably look like a bird. Unlike with the Qassam, it’s not just Sderot which is in range.

bythckr 7y ago
Please don't be sorry, it's important to know the risk we face daily. Trillions are spend globally on security, but we are more insecure daily. There needs to be a change in the way we ensure safety. The elected officials who are suppose to do this are too busy in bed with the military industrial complex. Basically the dog is napping and letting the wolfs "watch over" the sheep. This is a security nightmare. I presumed that the Saudi attack happened due to the incapabilities of Saudi forces. I did read that despite all the fancy toys from Uncle Sam, they dont know how to use the toys well. How is it compared to the Russian s400? For the trillions that the Americans pour into their defence, do they have some way to fight this "swarm of drones"? Aren't the US leading in drone technology? Guess in an IT lingo, I can say that distributed systems are better than a monolithic system.
- jmpman 7y ago
  I’m actually impressed with the US and Israeli progress on drone defense. Laser defense is going to be the primary solution and the US and Israel are working diligently. Unfortunately even laser can be swarmed, attacks can be scheduled during fog (lasers don’t work through fog) etc. All systems have weaknesses and ultimately it comes down to an economic battle. Your enemy must not have the resources to use this asymmetric warfare. So, you increase the chance of reprisal attacks working (raising the price of attack from a $500 drone to the attackers life), increase the cost of a successful attack by being able to defend against a large number of drones at the most probable attack location. The majority of the anti-aircraft defenses are targeted at standard warplanes. The S400 is one of those. Shooting an S400 missile at one of these tiny drones is like shooting a shotgun at a swarm of gnats. You’re not taking out the swarm and you just spent a ton of money to battle something insignificant. The power of these drones comes not from the individual, but the ability to coordinate together. In IT lingo, it would be like trying to battle a DDOS botnet. Further, the S400 is designed to detect a huge airplane. Yes those planes are radar absorbing and reflect radar away from the receivers, but they don’t really resemble a bird. They’re too fast, they go straight, they reflect radar strongly in other directions (to be detected by radar receivers distant from the transmitter) and at their size are capable of being detected by other techniques. These small drones could be made to look like birds from a radar perspective. Hard to justify shooting your S400 at a bird. The justification for spending more money on defense is that the more you spend, they better you’re protected. I don’t believe that to be completely true, but our investments in laser defenses is justifiable.