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This was particularly interesting in regards to the US military not being at the bleeding edge: The trip underscored what they already knew: America was vulner
by BLKNSLVR 1y ago
This was particularly interesting in regards to the US military not being at the bleeding edge:
The trip underscored what they already knew: America was vulnerable. Russia and China produced millions of drones annually, while the United States barely made 100,000.
It almost feels as if the US need(s|ed) to be a bit more involved in the Ukraine war in order to keep their finger on the pulse of how conflicts are evolving, especially in regards to Russia's capabilities (and vulnerabilities).
Related:
Monroe-Anderson didn’t just read about Ukraine’s drone revolution—he flew to Kyiv to learn from it. That’s the critical insight here: battlefield necessity drove innovation cycles that lapped Western procurement systems entirely. Ukrainian operators testing drones under live fire generated iterative feedback loops traditional defense contractors couldn’t match.
- bethekidyouwant 1y agoRussia gets all their drone parts from China same as Ukraine not sure as assembling them is “making them”
- gonzo41 1y agoCounterpoint, the US has better other systems. Such as the 1st,2nd,3rd largest air forces in the world. Lots of Ukrainian commanders would happily trade FPV drones with grenades attached for mortar teams with lots of ammo and effective aircover. Modern militaries need drones, but the swarms that everyone gushes over aren't that effective when a 1000 pound gorilla like the US Army turns up to play.
- defrost 1y agoA swarm of dirt cheap drones flying through the jet engines of a 10,000,000 dollar gorilla is an asymmetric answer.
- brandensilva 1y agoYeah I think people are underestimating drones here. There is a reason this administration is fast tracking drone production and easing up on procurement. Some stuff doesn't need super sophisticated systems with traditional processes to get off the ground quickly with a cheap swarm approach. It's probably the only thing I can agree with this administration on. With that said America would be doing both drone swarms and advanced missile systems where they are most effective.
- gonzo41 1y agoFlak cannons are also really cheap to produce and use. But downing a modern fast jet with one is still hard to do. Especially when they can fire over the horizon. The war in Ukraine looks like it does because Ukraine has had to fight with constant equipment shortages. It's not really the future of warfare that modern militaries are prepping for.
- aviatobrainded 1y agoHuh? Do you know how high and fast modern jets fly?
- radicalShrimpl 1y agoThis is exactly correct. It's the same reason why US military doctrine worries very little about jamming. If something is jamming, the tactical response is to destroy the jammer. If someone is drone attacking you, the tactical response is to destroy the drone launches.
- BLKNSLVR 1y agoUltimately I think this is true, but you can't overlook any aspect, and it seems the US overlooked drone potential. Thus far it hasn't cost them. A disparate drone swarm taking out power distribution stations (I don't know what they're officially called) all over the country would be devastating. Lessons from https://cybersquirrel1.com/ https://cybersquirrel1.com/. (I think there's an 'imagination' and/or 'perspective' limitation when you're already the gorilla. You think like a gorilla, you're unable to think like a parasite)
- walletdrainer 1y ago> A disparate drone swarm taking out power distribution stations (I don't know what they're officially called) all over the country would be devastating I believe the military term of art for this would be a “nothingburger”. This kind of stuff is not expected to have a meaningful impact on your ability to fight. Yes, it’s inconvenient for civilians. Has next to nothing to do with winning wars, much of WW2 was fought in much worse circumstances than “the electricity doesn’t work”. Focusing on things like this results in diverting resources from fighting wars, and results in losing them (or at least hinders your ability to win). The goal isn’t to preserve quality of life for civilians, but to at the very least preserve the integrity of the nation.
- pas 1y ago> the swarms that everyone gushes over aren't that effective when a 1000 pound gorilla like the US Army turns up to play ... maybe. maybe not. the same army lost against stubborn Afghan shepherds. and before that against Vietnamese farmers.
- alex43578 1y agoThe US military didn't lose. They had overwhelming tactical and technological superiority, 20:1 kill ratios, and consistently inflicted heavy casualties whenever they engaged the enemy directly. Now that didn't translate into accomplishing the political war goals of nation-building, changing cultures, and counter-insurgency without massive troop presence; but that wasn't a failure of the armed forces. What's that line: the US doesn't lose wars, it gets tired of them?
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- lisdexan 1y agoThat's still losing. The enemy's simple and concise objective of "GTFO of my country" was achieved, and the U.S.'s vague idea of "something something stop commies/terrorists" wasn't. It's like the opposite of a Pyrrhic victory: you lost and squandered trillions while tarnishing your reputation, but your sheer economic and geopolitical power made it so you didn't feel pretty much anything, nor did you learn much. That might be okay if the national hobby is airlifting a BK to some forsaken land every 30 years. What happens when the technological gap is smaller and your opponents have access to a substantially higher manufacturing capacity? What happens when you have multiple conflicts and coincidentally suffer an economic slowdown? Being able to casually outspend your enemy is a nice luxury, not an advantage. I suppose in a sense you are right: superpowers never lose; they just get tired, and more tired until they become Russia or the UK.
- hollerith 1y agoBy that logic, Britain never lost the American revolution.
- 1y ago
- alex43578 1y agoAgreed. The military will certainly need smaller drones to support squads or platoons, and to perform a variety of functions on the battlefield. But, I think drawing too many and too specific of lessons from Ukraine/Russia is bad. It's tough to imagine a scenario where the US is so bogged down on a front line that a few miles of range on a Ukraine style FPV drone is going to be a critical weapon, especially if this scenario also requires that the US not be able to perform SEAD, destroy GPS jamming, or hit the target with JDAM/Hellfires/ETC. Having a Mavic or Mini drone that can perform recon, a small drone capable of delivering a grenade sized payload to hit entrenched targets, a larger drone that can offer BDA and recon for artillery/MLRS, or the "Loyal Wingman" airforce drones are all reasonable ideas. But I just don't see the US standing up a dedicated FPV regiment - it doesn't align with the rest of the force's composition or likely missions. Essentially it's this dichotomy: If we need to project force overseas, it's existing at the end of a massive chain of logistics, air/sea power and lift capability, and a lot of dollars. Whether the drone costs 500, 1000, or 10,000 doesn't really matter at that point because the soldier operating it and the logistics to get him there has already cost hundreds of thousands, and even a $50K drone-bomb is cheaper than the cost of the JDAM, F-35 flight time, pilot, and carrier that would otherwise be used to hit the target. If instead we are fighting on the homefront, battling over tens of miles of heartland and building drones from parts scavenged from a bombed out Best Buy or imported from some imaginary, untouched part of the world (because what would the world's supply chain look like in this scenario??), all assumptions go out the window and the idea of mass-producing any armament at all is impossible.
- cyberax 1y agoRussia is dominating Ukraine in air forces by about 10-to-1. Yet Russia is using aviation only to lob guided bombs from far beyond the front line. Apparently, air defense is good enough to make the aviation use too expensive too quickly. It's possible that the US can saturate the air defense by the sheer number of airplanes, accepting heavy casualties in return. But what if it fails?
- kragen 1y agoBoth Ukraine and Russia have more combat aircraft than the US, if you count drones. Of course the US has a far larger air force if you count by dollars rather than by airframe count, but if that's because they're buying US$10k milspec chips when US$1 parking meter chips would work just as well, that and a fiver will get you a cup of coffee. An F-16 costs US$200 million and can be destroyed by a US$500 FPV drone with a grenade attached, as Operation Spiderweb demonstrated with Russia's strategic bomber force. Surely you are correct that commanders would happily trade one FPV drone for one properly equipped F-16, even without the mortars. But it isn't clear that they would trade 400,000 FPV drones for the F-16, and that's the trade actually on offer. The US Army has never fought drone swarms, because they have never been fielded in any war, probably because they don't work very well yet; that's why the Ukrainians are dinking around with FPV. The US Army has never faced even the kind of FPV drone war we're seeing in Ukraine. Their materiel has, though, since they shipped a lot of it to the Ukrainians, and it doesn't seem to be doing very well. Both the Russians and the Ukrainians are trying to keep their tanks off the front lines when they can, and the vast majority of casualties on both sides are from drones.
- gonzo41 1y agoThink about mortars more. If you can be close enough for a drone 1-2km, then mortars should be what you're thinking about. Mix a targeting drone with a vehicle mounted mortar team and they can have faster rounds on target and get of the X quicker than drone teams. And nets don't stop mortars. 200M will by a lot of that and can be fielded in a very flexible way.
- kragen 1y agoMortars miss; suicide drones don't. And even the crappiest combat FPVs outrange mortars at 10+ km. The second drone gets through the net. And I wouldn't be surprised if US mortar rounds cost more than Ukrainian drones. But certainly they are synergistic, and tanks and IFVs are also widely fielded on both sides of the war. The obvious thing to do is to guide your mortar rounds with canards mounted slightly forward of the center of gravity, but the distance between "obvious" and done has a lot of rotting corpses in it.
- SanjayMehta 1y ago> 1000 pound gorilla like the US Army turns up to play. Afghanistan proves your point.
- postingawayonhn 1y agoYeah, I think it will be important to continue improving drone technology and have a plan to scale manufacturing in the event of a major conflict, but the lack of conventional air superiority is what has really brought this war to a stalemate.
- thaumasiotes 1y agoI found this one interesting: > “Vendors in the United States would laugh at us,” Hichwa said. American-made radios could cost $10,000 when he needed something for $30. The founders realized they’d have to build components themselves and seek suppliers outside the defense industry. Instead of using computer chips common in military equipment that cost hundreds of dollars, Neros used chips designed for parking meters at $1 each. By the time your certification process represents 99.7%+ of your total costs, there's a chance it's hurting you more than it's helping.
- kragen 1y agoIt helps Lockheed Martin by preventing 21-year-olds from waltzing into the Pentagon and selling weapon systems to the DoD, allowing them to capture 300× more value than if they were subject to market competition.
- thaumasiotes 1y agoWell, this is a requirement that gets passed through to Lockheed Martin and inflates their costs about as much as it inflates the Pentagon's costs. For Lockheed Martin to benefit, they need to be selling on a cost-plus basis, where lower efficiency mechanically means higher profit.
- kragen 1y agoGuess how Lockheed Martin's contracts with the Pentagon are structured?
- kenjackson 1y agoElon did the same thing with SpaceX. If you don’t need five 9s (for whatever the certification is measuring) and can get by with three — you can often save 10x on cost.
- dluan 1y agoBut the parking meter chips are still made in China...
- giantg2 1y ago"It almost feels as if the US need(s|ed) to be a bit more involved in the Ukraine war in order to keep their finger on the pulse of how conflicts are evolving" This has nothing to do with keeping up with the intel from the conflict. This is entirely the product of our manufacturing issues. Manufacturing drove our success in WW2. Now we can't even manufacture low cost low(ish) tech drones at 1/10th the volume of potential adversaries.
- bloqs 1y ago.... because the average american tech company is horrifically overvalued, and the average american worker is over twice as expensive as the equivalents
- wat10000 1y agoWe can, we just don't want to. Our military manufacturing volume was not very high before WW2. It wasn't until the potential adversaries became actual adversaries that we ramped it up. If a similar sort of nation-uniting threat arose, to the extent that we'd be willing to take extreme measures like halting all manufacturing of civilian automobiles, drone production could be massively increased. Of course, the problem is that the willingness is unlikely to be there until a serious war breaks out, and then we may not have the luxury of taking a couple of years to ramp up.
- hshdhdhj4444 1y agoWe did have a nation uniting threat arrive 5 years ago. On the plus side the govt did pull off a successful moonshot with the development of the vaccines. On the downside it got derailed by a bunch of internet trolls and social media influencers to the point that it was denouncing its own (and arguably only) achievement during this period.
- wat10000 1y agoThat had the potential to be a nation-uniting threat, but it turned out to be a nation-dividing threat.
- harry8 1y ago>It almost feels as if the US need(s|ed) to be a bit more involved in the Ukraine war in order to keep their finger on the pulse of how conflicts are... This grates a little after the utter debacle of Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya ... I'd go 180 degrees the other way. The US needs to be less involved so it can focus on the cancerous legal corruption of all the rackets. Without dealing with that the wrong things will always be built for the wrong reasons at huge cost.
- harry8 1y agoNeedless to say building the wrong things for the wrong reasons at huge expense is exactly what the military industrial complex wants and spends a great deal on influence to achieve.
- ivape 1y agoA good video game would probably simulate it well too.
- bigyabai 1y agoThat won't tell them anything they haven't already wargamed. I think the parent is suggesting that America starts exercising the manufacturing muscle.
- ivape 1y agoGive gamers a global map and a bunch of little drones. I think you’ll see more creativity than you would a bunch of military “experts”.
- llmthrow0827 1y agoPriorities switched to sending weapons to Israel. Ukraine is basically a proxy conflict and thus took (much) lower priority after October 7th.