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This is a little tongue-in-cheek but also kind of serious. But isn't a single use drone also known as a missile? More seriously, the operational domain between
by hervature 5y ago
This is a little tongue-in-cheek but also kind of serious. But isn't a single use drone also known as a missile? More seriously, the operational domain between reusable drone and missile must be very small no? Like maybe something that can fly into a building before blowing up.
- andkenneth 5y agoMy understanding is that a missile is usually about hitting the target soon. A suicide UAV can do surveillance, maybe launch secondary munitions, and hover around quite a while before delivering its main payload. You might even be able to recover the UAV for a second mission if you decide to not use the suicide charge.
- killjoywashere 5y agoHave a look at the aerostats used in Afghanistan. Just pour concrete, tether the balloon high enough they can't shoot it. https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/news/features/history/ptds.html https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/news/features/history/p...
- is_true 5y agoI think Google Loon might be great for this
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- stirfish 5y agoSpecifically, a cruise missile. Those can look at terrain and follow landmarks, among other things.
- Someone 5y ago“Missile” is an extremely broad concept (Wikipedia calls it “a guided airborne ranged weapon capable of self-propelled flight usually by a jet engine or rocket motor”), but I think most people think of a missile as something without wings (but quite possibly fins) where the target is known at launch time, life expectancy is calculated in, at most, hours, and that doesn’t cooperate with other missiles. I wouldn’t see a dozen airplane- or (especially) helicopter-like drones that get launched with, say, the goal of preventing a piece of road to be used by the enemy, and that distribute themselves over the to be protected area and, Hang around for weeks as missiles. Because they aren’t weapons, I also wouldn’t think of reconnaissance drones as missiles, even if they are rockets that follow a pre-planned trajectory and then crash. That’s getting close to an edge case, though.
- stonemetal12 5y agoAny military hardware not coming back needs to be destroyed so it doesn't fall into enemy hands. If they aren't missiles they are at least bombs.
- mcv 5y ago> I think most people think of a missile as something without wings Don't cruise missiles have wings?
- Someone 5y agoMaybe. If I look at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomahawk_(missile) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomahawk_(missile), I can’t tell whether those things that point out from the main body produce lift (which, I guess, is the difference between a fin and a wing) I added “quite possibly, fins” because I thought of that missile, but could hav been more explicit, and yes, those may be wings.
- usrusr 5y agoEventually the space between drones, missiles and mines will get populated on any coordinate in between. Pure forms will continue to exist, but maybe we can hope that mine use will drop, getting substituted by alternatives ("perching missiles" or whatever they would be called) that don't outlive their conflicts quite as much.
- renewiltord 5y agoThere's a whole spectrum: UAV, loiter munition, missile. It's pretty cool!
- azernik 5y agoYup. One place where this binary gets problematic is what's called "loitering munitions" - basically a cruise missile that stays up in the air for a while looking for targets, and when its sensors pick something up it hits like any missile. Very similar devices developed from drones tend to instead get called "suicide drones". One possible way to distinguish the two might be the level of communication with a controller or launch platform, but even then the line isn't quite clear - what about a CLOS guided missile?