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Mods: 2017, please. I think about this video all the time. This is the future of warfare, and it's coming. Like it or not, this is where the world is going to

Mods: 2017, please. I think about this video all the time. This is the future of warfare, and it's coming. Like it or not, this is where the world is going to go. Recently, I listened to a podcast about the second civil war in America (It Could Happen Here), and it was chilling. It showed the warfare is asymmetric now, and a 2B bomber is useless against a motivated attacker with 20k worth of drones. The future of warfare is through 3D printing and ML tech; and, the future is here.

arminiusreturns 6y ago
See, what I find interesting is that even before it was a reality (in the public sphere), this was one of the main justificatons being used in the smoke filled backrooms for the turning on of the total surveillance system. The end of the nation state threat actor and the beginning of single-actors being able to do just as much damage if they wanted. Hence, they want to track everything and everyone in the hopes that at a minimum they can "walk the cat back", but things are headed for predictive analytics which have all kinds of dangers/downsides. I don't agree with it, but understanding that is the position many of the machiavellian natsec experts are coming from really helps in having more productive conversations.
- mckirk 6y ago
  Ah yes, I hadn't mentally added the Minority Report angle to my dystopian visions of the future, but you're completely right...
detritus 6y ago
Ha, I'm just back from a walk down the street where a thought popped into mind, upon seeing a group of people, how 'easy' it would be to drop a load of simple flechettes from a drone and cause havoc all for an impressively low amount of money. No complicated to make/source explosives or poisons or chemicals - just a quadcopter and some bits of metal. I have a lot of such happy thoughts.
- TeMPOraL 6y ago
  Ever since I saw it in some old GTA game, I keep wondering why bombs strapped to small RC cars aren't used much more often by gangs and terrorists. I'm still not sure why, but I think for the same reasons the attack you just described hasn't happened yet, despite it being easy to do.
  - detritus 6y ago
    Well, my happy thought doesn't require explosives, just a bit of altitude!
    - amelius 6y ago
      And lifting power. You'd need quite a lot of it if you'd want to deploy this to a larger group of people. For this reason I think it's not allowed to fly larger/heavier drones without a permit.
      - detritus 6y ago
        Sure, but who would procure a permit for a one-time use terrorist device built from off the shelf parts? Also, you only care about getting the thing into position and then dropping its payload - it doesn't much matter what happens to it after, so your energy requirements don't need to require landing. Heck, the drone itself could be considered a secondary payload.
- opwieurposiu 6y ago
  This idea has been tried, for example in the vietnam war. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lazy_Dog_(bomb) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lazy_Dog_(bomb)
  - detritus 6y ago
    Aye - 'flechettes' were used in WWI - basically arrow heads dropped from the barest of planes able to be described as such. It's incredibly old 'tech'. - ed - oops! I see that's right there in your link.
PeterisP 6y ago
It's the present of warfare. It's worth looking at video evidence of drone usage examples from the recent conflicts. We've seen small drones dropping mortar rounds in trenches simply by flying above the correct spot near the entrance to a bunker and releasing it. We've seen ammo dumps being ignited by drones carrying thermite loads. We've seen long-range drone attacks on oil processing facilities, getting through expensive anti-air defences simply by sacrificing many cheap drones. Etc. The currently ongoing Azerbaijan-Armenia conflict in Arcah/Nagorno-Karabah (in some aspects, a proxy "test" of Turkish tech vs Russian tech) is worth looking at, since drones/UAVs are a key part of military activity there.
- amelius 6y ago
  If this is real, then what are some countermeasures?
  - HillRat 6y ago
    In the short terms, EW and CIWS, which can be countered by “Wild Weasel” drones and overwhelming CIWS systems with cheap decoys. Now that low-tier states are fighting it out with autonomous systems purchased from mid-tier states in conditions significantly different from how (e.g.) the US has been using them, expect to see a brutally Darwinian evolution of TTPs in the field.
    - Valgrim 6y ago
      For those who don't speak warspeech: EW: Electronic Warfare; any action involving the use of the electromagnetic spectrum (EM spectrum) or directed energy to control the spectrum, attack an enemy, or impede enemy assaults CIWS: Close-in Weapon System; a point-defense weapon system for detecting and destroying short-range incoming missiles and enemy aircraft which have penetrated the outer defenses, typically mounted shipboard in a naval capacity. A gun-based CIWS usually consists of a combination of radars, computers and rotary or revolver cannon placed on a rotating, automatically aimed gun mount. Wild Weasel: an aircraft, of any type, equipped with anti-radiation missiles and tasked with the Suppression of Enemy Air Defenses. In brief, the task of a Wild Weasel aircraft is to bait enemy anti-aircraft defenses into targeting it with their radars, whereupon the radar waves are traced back to their source, allowing the Weasel or its teammates to precisely target it for destruction. TTP: Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures; The role of TTPs in terrorism analysis is to identify individual patterns of behavior of a particular terrorist activity, or a particular terrorist organisation, and to examine and categorize more general tactics and weapons used by a particular terrorist activity, or a particular terrorist organisation.
imtringued 6y ago
10k worth of drones? That pays for like one and a half Warmates [0]? Drones are far more expensive than you think. Also there are unmanned autonomous ground vehicles that can launch these like the mission master[1]. It's merely a force multiplier for soldiers. Not some indiscriminate killing machine. Imagine a slaugherbots video based on conventional fighter jets or bombers. They would show them used indiscriminately too. The video is mostly FUD. Any military that gives AI the authority to designate targets is no longer in control of their weapons so it would never happen. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zzzOH5fBAqw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zzzOH5fBAqw [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_O85m6VXn8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_O85m6VXn8
rektide 6y ago
Pretty terrifying. Recent news was China building a 48x drone suicide swarm launcher[1], yikes. Meanwhile robotic wingmen seem to be increasingly talked up everywhere, everyone wants em. [1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidhambling/2020/10/14/china-releases-video-of-new-barrage-swarm-drone-launcher/#438ebe7e2ad7 https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidhambling/2020/10/14/china-...
tim333 6y ago
130 comments back then https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15731913 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15731913

arminiusreturns 6y ago

See, what I find interesting is that even before it was a reality (in the public sphere), this was one of the main justificatons being used in the smoke filled backrooms for the turning on of the total surveillance system. The end of the nation state threat actor and the beginning of single-actors being able to do just as much damage if they wanted. Hence, they want to track everything and everyone in the hopes that at a minimum they can "walk the cat back", but things are headed for predictive analytics which have all kinds of dangers/downsides. I don't agree with it, but understanding that is the position many of the machiavellian natsec experts are coming from really helps in having more productive conversations.

mckirk 6y ago
Ah yes, I hadn't mentally added the Minority Report angle to my dystopian visions of the future, but you're completely right...

detritus 6y ago

Ha, I'm just back from a walk down the street where a thought popped into mind, upon seeing a group of people, how 'easy' it would be to drop a load of simple flechettes from a drone and cause havoc all for an impressively low amount of money. No complicated to make/source explosives or poisons or chemicals - just a quadcopter and some bits of metal. I have a lot of such happy thoughts.

TeMPOraL 6y ago
Ever since I saw it in some old GTA game, I keep wondering why bombs strapped to small RC cars aren't used much more often by gangs and terrorists. I'm still not sure why, but I think for the same reasons the attack you just described hasn't happened yet, despite it being easy to do.
- detritus 6y ago
  Well, my happy thought doesn't require explosives, just a bit of altitude!
  - amelius 6y ago
    And lifting power. You'd need quite a lot of it if you'd want to deploy this to a larger group of people. For this reason I think it's not allowed to fly larger/heavier drones without a permit.
    - detritus 6y ago
      Sure, but who would procure a permit for a one-time use terrorist device built from off the shelf parts? Also, you only care about getting the thing into position and then dropping its payload - it doesn't much matter what happens to it after, so your energy requirements don't need to require landing. Heck, the drone itself could be considered a secondary payload.
opwieurposiu 6y ago
This idea has been tried, for example in the vietnam war. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lazy_Dog_(bomb) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lazy_Dog_(bomb)
- detritus 6y ago
  Aye - 'flechettes' were used in WWI - basically arrow heads dropped from the barest of planes able to be described as such. It's incredibly old 'tech'. - ed - oops! I see that's right there in your link.

PeterisP 6y ago

It's the present of warfare. It's worth looking at video evidence of drone usage examples from the recent conflicts. We've seen small drones dropping mortar rounds in trenches simply by flying above the correct spot near the entrance to a bunker and releasing it. We've seen ammo dumps being ignited by drones carrying thermite loads. We've seen long-range drone attacks on oil processing facilities, getting through expensive anti-air defences simply by sacrificing many cheap drones. Etc. The currently ongoing Azerbaijan-Armenia conflict in Arcah/Nagorno-Karabah (in some aspects, a proxy "test" of Turkish tech vs Russian tech) is worth looking at, since drones/UAVs are a key part of military activity there.

amelius 6y ago
If this is real, then what are some countermeasures?
- HillRat 6y ago
  In the short terms, EW and CIWS, which can be countered by “Wild Weasel” drones and overwhelming CIWS systems with cheap decoys. Now that low-tier states are fighting it out with autonomous systems purchased from mid-tier states in conditions significantly different from how (e.g.) the US has been using them, expect to see a brutally Darwinian evolution of TTPs in the field.
  - Valgrim 6y ago
    For those who don't speak warspeech: EW: Electronic Warfare; any action involving the use of the electromagnetic spectrum (EM spectrum) or directed energy to control the spectrum, attack an enemy, or impede enemy assaults CIWS: Close-in Weapon System; a point-defense weapon system for detecting and destroying short-range incoming missiles and enemy aircraft which have penetrated the outer defenses, typically mounted shipboard in a naval capacity. A gun-based CIWS usually consists of a combination of radars, computers and rotary or revolver cannon placed on a rotating, automatically aimed gun mount. Wild Weasel: an aircraft, of any type, equipped with anti-radiation missiles and tasked with the Suppression of Enemy Air Defenses. In brief, the task of a Wild Weasel aircraft is to bait enemy anti-aircraft defenses into targeting it with their radars, whereupon the radar waves are traced back to their source, allowing the Weasel or its teammates to precisely target it for destruction. TTP: Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures; The role of TTPs in terrorism analysis is to identify individual patterns of behavior of a particular terrorist activity, or a particular terrorist organisation, and to examine and categorize more general tactics and weapons used by a particular terrorist activity, or a particular terrorist organisation.

imtringued 6y ago

10k worth of drones? That pays for like one and a half Warmates [0]? Drones are far more expensive than you think. Also there are unmanned autonomous ground vehicles that can launch these like the mission master[1]. It's merely a force multiplier for soldiers. Not some indiscriminate killing machine. Imagine a slaugherbots video based on conventional fighter jets or bombers. They would show them used indiscriminately too. The video is mostly FUD. Any military that gives AI the authority to designate targets is no longer in control of their weapons so it would never happen. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zzzOH5fBAqw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zzzOH5fBAqw [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_O85m6VXn8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_O85m6VXn8

rektide 6y ago

Pretty terrifying. Recent news was China building a 48x drone suicide swarm launcher[1], yikes. Meanwhile robotic wingmen seem to be increasingly talked up everywhere, everyone wants em. [1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidhambling/2020/10/14/china-releases-video-of-new-barrage-swarm-drone-launcher/#438ebe7e2ad7 https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidhambling/2020/10/14/china-...

tim333 6y ago

130 comments back then https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15731913 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15731913