2 ms·

Shot exchange is indeed a problem, but it's far more complex than this makes it sound. The opportunity cost of _not_ shooting down the drone isn't the cost of t

by aftbit 6mo ago

Shot exchange is indeed a problem, but it's far more complex than this makes it sound. The opportunity cost of _not_ shooting down the drone isn't the cost of the drone, it's the cost of whatever it's going to destroy if you don't shoot it down. Sometimes it makes sense to use a million dollar missile to destroy a $5,000 drone, if that drone would otherwise destroy an even more expensive air defense radar or energy production facility. This says nothing about the cost and value of the lives that might be lost in an enemy strike. We would not be safer if the enemy had cheap drones and we had no weapons capable of fighting back. The main problem is that air defense interception is incredibly challenging and expensive primarily because a mid-course defensive interceptor needs considerably greater capabilities than the weapon it is intercepting, because it needs to catch up to the incoming missile or drone mid-flight. Sure, this can lead to massive overkill problems. Yes, the US should invest more in the low end of the high/low mix. But no, this does not mean there's no place for the high end, or that they should never be used to destroy lower end targets if that's all that is available. A more interesting challenge, if you ask me, is in the naval domain. Imagine a capital ship has two options for defending against incoming threats - either fire an expensive and limited stock interceptor missile with a 99% kill chance, or wait until the threat is inside the range of a cheap cannon or laser system with a 95% kill chance. There's a real command level tradeoff to be made here. If you shoot every drone with interceptors, you lose shot exchange badly, and you just run out of interceptors. But if you let every target through into the engagement range of your close range systems, you run the risk that one makes it through to your ship, potentially causing damage and casualties. The future of war is going to be wild one way or the other.

LorenPechtel 6mo ago
I disagree on air defense inherently being very costly. Old school was guns. Price per round was cheap. But the expensive missile kills the platform holding the cheap gun, you have to go with missiles. But the drone war is a different beast entirely. Drones can't shoot back. Thus the answer is guns. How well will their light drones fare against a Cessna armed with an automatic shotgun? How would the jet drones fare against a WWII warbird? Lots of cheap, mobile guns. No meaningful self defense but doctrine is to always depart after shooting. The naval one is much harder because you're not free to disperse your ship into many pieces. But, still, consider your cannon. Let's step down a bit, cheaper cannon with a 90% kill rate--but you put several of them.
- loglog 6mo ago
  There are videos on the internet of drones being shot down with an assault rifle out of a 50 year old training plane, 1914 style.
- aftbit 6mo ago
  IMO, modern sensors paired with robot controlled guns are one of the most promising hard kill solutions for drone combat. Gepard and the newer Skyranger 30 have proven themselves against low-spec threats in Ukraine. C-RAM (aka Land Phalanx Weapon System) is an already deployed system that is very effective against even higher spec threats like missiles. Of course, there are always tradeoffs. Even the best guns have much shorter ranges than air defense missiles, and that means you need more systems to provide the same area coverage. As you mentioned, the guns themselves (and the sensors and networks feeding them) become a target. As usual though, likely the solution will require a mix of capabilities across the spectrum, working to cover each others' weaknesses. Nothing is fool-proof, but all can force costly adaptations. Take EW for example. Nothing is cheaper than jamming out the drone's comms or nav. This forces adaptation to autonomy or fiber optic drones, which have their own costs, supply pinch points (Russia now consumes somewhere around 10% of the world's fiber, for example), and tradeoffs. This is nothing new - layered air defense has been around a long time. The new thing is the explosion of cheap, low-spec threats forcing development of a cheap and sustainable answer to them. Nets, EW, beam weapons, gun systems, interceptor drones, AMRAAM, Patriot, SAMP/T, etc etc... all fill an important role in targeting different threats.
FpUser 6mo ago
>Sometimes it makes sense to use a million dollar missile to destroy a $5,000 drone, if that drone would otherwise destroy an even more expensive air defense radar or energy production facility. " If that $5000 drone was alone then sure. However if they launch 200 drones (money equivalent of one missile) you'd be looking at totally different picture. Also they usually launch combo. Few missiles and whole bunch of drones. even worse

by aftbit 6mo ago

LorenPechtel 6mo ago

I disagree on air defense inherently being very costly. Old school was guns. Price per round was cheap. But the expensive missile kills the platform holding the cheap gun, you have to go with missiles. But the drone war is a different beast entirely. Drones can't shoot back. Thus the answer is guns. How well will their light drones fare against a Cessna armed with an automatic shotgun? How would the jet drones fare against a WWII warbird? Lots of cheap, mobile guns. No meaningful self defense but doctrine is to always depart after shooting. The naval one is much harder because you're not free to disperse your ship into many pieces. But, still, consider your cannon. Let's step down a bit, cheaper cannon with a 90% kill rate--but you put several of them.

loglog 6mo ago
There are videos on the internet of drones being shot down with an assault rifle out of a 50 year old training plane, 1914 style.
aftbit 6mo ago
IMO, modern sensors paired with robot controlled guns are one of the most promising hard kill solutions for drone combat. Gepard and the newer Skyranger 30 have proven themselves against low-spec threats in Ukraine. C-RAM (aka Land Phalanx Weapon System) is an already deployed system that is very effective against even higher spec threats like missiles. Of course, there are always tradeoffs. Even the best guns have much shorter ranges than air defense missiles, and that means you need more systems to provide the same area coverage. As you mentioned, the guns themselves (and the sensors and networks feeding them) become a target. As usual though, likely the solution will require a mix of capabilities across the spectrum, working to cover each others' weaknesses. Nothing is fool-proof, but all can force costly adaptations. Take EW for example. Nothing is cheaper than jamming out the drone's comms or nav. This forces adaptation to autonomy or fiber optic drones, which have their own costs, supply pinch points (Russia now consumes somewhere around 10% of the world's fiber, for example), and tradeoffs. This is nothing new - layered air defense has been around a long time. The new thing is the explosion of cheap, low-spec threats forcing development of a cheap and sustainable answer to them. Nets, EW, beam weapons, gun systems, interceptor drones, AMRAAM, Patriot, SAMP/T, etc etc... all fill an important role in targeting different threats.

FpUser 6mo ago

>Sometimes it makes sense to use a million dollar missile to destroy a $5,000 drone, if that drone would otherwise destroy an even more expensive air defense radar or energy production facility. " If that $5000 drone was alone then sure. However if they launch 200 drones (money equivalent of one missile) you'd be looking at totally different picture. Also they usually launch combo. Few missiles and whole bunch of drones. even worse