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I disagree: lots of cheap drones would be extremely effective against an aircraft carrier. They don't need to sink the ship; they just need to damage the jets
by shiroiuma 6mo ago
I disagree: lots of cheap drones would be extremely effective against an aircraft carrier. They don't need to sink the ship; they just need to damage the jets or disrupt operations on the flight deck. Even a small drone is a serious threat to a jet. How can a carrier defend against a drone swarm? They only have so much ammunition for those CWIS guns, and defending against the swarm will probably cost a lot more than the swarm itself does.
Of course, this assumes the carrier is within range of the drone swarm, but that seems to be the assumption in this line of argument.
Eventually, I think they'll have more cost-effective defenses against small, cheap drones, but they don't have them yet.
- hax0ron3 6mo agoYes, but it is not certain that cheap drones have the range or navigational technology to reach and hit a carrier in the current circumstances. More expensive drones do, but that's a different matter.
- shiroiuma 6mo agoThe Shahed drones have more than enough range for this, easily. Whether they're "cheap" I guess depends on your perspective; they're certainly not as cheap as some handheld drone, but they're still pretty cheap compared to all the stuff the US is using now.
- ceejayoz 6mo agoShaheds are $20-50k; F-35s are $100M-ish. You can use a thousand and break pretty even if you get even one good hit in.
- Axsuul 6mo agoAircraft carriers are part of a strike group so the other ships would be responsible for defending it.