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> The probable result will be an arms race pitting increasingly sophisticated machine vision systems against cleverer and cleverer methods for fooling them. FP

> The probable result will be an arms race pitting increasingly sophisticated machine vision systems against cleverer and cleverer methods for fooling them. FPV drones are a thing. In, fact, I suspect most drones in the NATO-Russia war are FPV rather than fully autonomous.

djmips 3mo ago
It's the really long range that have always needed an autonomous end phase
ponector 3mo ago
How is it a NATO-russia war of NATO is not taking a participation? You can call it NATO-Iran, or NATO-NKorea war as well. Ukraine-Nkorea war? At least there were direct contacts between their forces.
- nine_k 3mo ago
  Indeed, the key low-cost mass-produced drone tech is Ukrainian, and NATO currently sorely lacks comparable capabilities.
- einpoklum 3mo ago
  NATO is certainly participating: * It supplies most ammunition and arms and much of the equipment. * It funds most of the war effort, including arms & ammunition, salaries, covering some of the civilian budget etc. Total expenditure by "Western" countries in the period 2014-2026 is 380 Billion USD [1] and the vast majority of that is by NATO; some by other US allies. * Its members train Ukrainian forces. * It imposes wide sanctions against Russia (along with a few other US allies). * Ukraine has already signed off half of all of its material resources to the US, the lead state of NATO [2]. * A negotiations process in Istanbul, having reached a draft agreement which would have concluded the war, in early 2022, was vetoed by NATO, or at least the US and the UK. [3] And this is in the context of NATO's long-standing strategy of expanding eastwards towards Russia, which includes introducing Ukraine into its sphere of influence and possibly inducting it as a member at some point. ---- [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_financial_aid_to_Ukraine_during_the_Russo-Ukrainian_war#U https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_financial_aid_to_Ukrai... [2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukraine%E2%80%93United_States_Mineral_Resources_Agreement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukraine%E2%80%93United_States_... [3] - https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2022/09/02/diplomacy-watch-why-did-the-west-stop-a-peace-deal-in-ukraine/ https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2022/09/02/diplomacy-watch...
  - psd1 3mo ago
    You're not exactly wrong, but it's disingenuous to paint the expansion of a defensive alliance of independent nations in the same light as annexation of sovereign nations by military force. For accuracy, replace "NATO" with "countries united in condemnation of Russia's invasion". The iron curtain pushed west on tanks; it's being pushed back by choice. Russia inoculated citizens against its own propaganda by disappearing their friends and loved ones. Read Solzhenitsyn.
    - einpoklum 3mo ago
      > of a defensive alliance NATO is an offensive alliance, and its activities in this century have demonstrated this. Unless you mean "defensive" as in the now-renamed US "Department of Defense". > of independent nations Also, many of its members are only partially independent, when it comes to global strategic matters. And that's not getting into whether EU member nations are in fact independent; I can introduce you to many greek people who would say otherwise... Many Brittons also consider their state to be somewhat subservient to the US on such matters. > annexation of sovereign nations by military force. Hey, that consideration didn't bother Ukraine in taking control of Crimea when the USSR broke up... To be less facetious though: Ukraine's sovereignty after the 2014 coup, and certainly by 2022, was also imperfect. To the level of Biden as US VP exercising veto power over who serves as their attorney general. But certainly, the annexation of the Zaporizhia and Kherson oblasts is such an annexation from a technically sovereign state. With Donetsk and Lugansk, Russia did not annex; those areas seceded from Ukraine, declared independence and fought a protracted war against the Ukrainian Army for some years. They also faced quite a bit of regular shelling targeting the civilian population, from their presumptive sovereign. Eventually, albeit under Russian influence, they asceded into the Russian Federation. Be that as it may - like I said, NATO is involved to the extent that it should rightly be seen as a proxy war of NATO against Russia.
      - mopsi 3mo ago
        > With Donetsk and Lugansk, Russia did not annex; those areas seceded from Ukraine, declared independence and fought a protracted war against the Ukrainian Army for some years. The European Court of Human Rights investigated this in their verdict relating to the shootdown of the Malaysian airliner. The court found no evidence of any separatist movement, any seccession or independence. Instead, the court found that the whole thing had been under Russian military command from the get-go, carried out by a mix of Russian military, operatives of special services and local collaborators acting under direct orders from Russians. The verdict: https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/?i=001-244292 https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/?i=001-244292 Key part: The reality of the relationship between the separatists on the one hand and the respondent State [Russia] on the other was such that, whatever their legal status, the separatists were completely dependent on military, political and economic support from the respondent State to carry out their activities and were, ultimately, a mere instrument of that State. It is for these reasons that the Court was persuaded that, from 11 May 2014, the relationship of the separatists to the Russian Federation was so much one of dependence on the one side and control on the other that it would be right to equate the separatists in the “DPR” and the “LPR” with de facto organs of the Russian Federation, within the meaning of Article 4 ARSIWA. Any other solution would allow States to avoid their Convention obligations by choosing to act through entities whose supposed independence is purely fictitious. There's nothing new about this. Russians did the same in the 1940s when they invaded Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. They staged coups, created fake "people's governments", and those governments promptly asked to be absorbed by Russians. The same was attempted with Finland too. For a short period, an absurd fictitious entity called the Finnish Democratic Republic existed: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finnish_Democratic_Republic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finnish_Democratic_Republic At this point, it's such a common Russian strategy that in several European countries children learn about in the middle school, from the times when it was used against their own countries.

djmips 3mo ago

It's the really long range that have always needed an autonomous end phase

ponector 3mo ago

How is it a NATO-russia war of NATO is not taking a participation? You can call it NATO-Iran, or NATO-NKorea war as well. Ukraine-Nkorea war? At least there were direct contacts between their forces.

nine_k 3mo ago
Indeed, the key low-cost mass-produced drone tech is Ukrainian, and NATO currently sorely lacks comparable capabilities.
einpoklum 3mo ago
NATO is certainly participating: * It supplies most ammunition and arms and much of the equipment. * It funds most of the war effort, including arms & ammunition, salaries, covering some of the civilian budget etc. Total expenditure by "Western" countries in the period 2014-2026 is 380 Billion USD [1] and the vast majority of that is by NATO; some by other US allies. * Its members train Ukrainian forces. * It imposes wide sanctions against Russia (along with a few other US allies). * Ukraine has already signed off half of all of its material resources to the US, the lead state of NATO [2]. * A negotiations process in Istanbul, having reached a draft agreement which would have concluded the war, in early 2022, was vetoed by NATO, or at least the US and the UK. [3] And this is in the context of NATO's long-standing strategy of expanding eastwards towards Russia, which includes introducing Ukraine into its sphere of influence and possibly inducting it as a member at some point. ---- [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_financial_aid_to_Ukraine_during_the_Russo-Ukrainian_war#U https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_financial_aid_to_Ukrai... [2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukraine%E2%80%93United_States_Mineral_Resources_Agreement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukraine%E2%80%93United_States_... [3] - https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2022/09/02/diplomacy-watch-why-did-the-west-stop-a-peace-deal-in-ukraine/ https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2022/09/02/diplomacy-watch...
- psd1 3mo ago
  You're not exactly wrong, but it's disingenuous to paint the expansion of a defensive alliance of independent nations in the same light as annexation of sovereign nations by military force. For accuracy, replace "NATO" with "countries united in condemnation of Russia's invasion". The iron curtain pushed west on tanks; it's being pushed back by choice. Russia inoculated citizens against its own propaganda by disappearing their friends and loved ones. Read Solzhenitsyn.
  - einpoklum 3mo ago
    > of a defensive alliance NATO is an offensive alliance, and its activities in this century have demonstrated this. Unless you mean "defensive" as in the now-renamed US "Department of Defense". > of independent nations Also, many of its members are only partially independent, when it comes to global strategic matters. And that's not getting into whether EU member nations are in fact independent; I can introduce you to many greek people who would say otherwise... Many Brittons also consider their state to be somewhat subservient to the US on such matters. > annexation of sovereign nations by military force. Hey, that consideration didn't bother Ukraine in taking control of Crimea when the USSR broke up... To be less facetious though: Ukraine's sovereignty after the 2014 coup, and certainly by 2022, was also imperfect. To the level of Biden as US VP exercising veto power over who serves as their attorney general. But certainly, the annexation of the Zaporizhia and Kherson oblasts is such an annexation from a technically sovereign state. With Donetsk and Lugansk, Russia did not annex; those areas seceded from Ukraine, declared independence and fought a protracted war against the Ukrainian Army for some years. They also faced quite a bit of regular shelling targeting the civilian population, from their presumptive sovereign. Eventually, albeit under Russian influence, they asceded into the Russian Federation. Be that as it may - like I said, NATO is involved to the extent that it should rightly be seen as a proxy war of NATO against Russia.
    - mopsi 3mo ago
      > With Donetsk and Lugansk, Russia did not annex; those areas seceded from Ukraine, declared independence and fought a protracted war against the Ukrainian Army for some years. The European Court of Human Rights investigated this in their verdict relating to the shootdown of the Malaysian airliner. The court found no evidence of any separatist movement, any seccession or independence. Instead, the court found that the whole thing had been under Russian military command from the get-go, carried out by a mix of Russian military, operatives of special services and local collaborators acting under direct orders from Russians. The verdict: https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/?i=001-244292 https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/?i=001-244292 Key part: The reality of the relationship between the separatists on the one hand and the respondent State [Russia] on the other was such that, whatever their legal status, the separatists were completely dependent on military, political and economic support from the respondent State to carry out their activities and were, ultimately, a mere instrument of that State. It is for these reasons that the Court was persuaded that, from 11 May 2014, the relationship of the separatists to the Russian Federation was so much one of dependence on the one side and control on the other that it would be right to equate the separatists in the “DPR” and the “LPR” with de facto organs of the Russian Federation, within the meaning of Article 4 ARSIWA. Any other solution would allow States to avoid their Convention obligations by choosing to act through entities whose supposed independence is purely fictitious. There's nothing new about this. Russians did the same in the 1940s when they invaded Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. They staged coups, created fake "people's governments", and those governments promptly asked to be absorbed by Russians. The same was attempted with Finland too. For a short period, an absurd fictitious entity called the Finnish Democratic Republic existed: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finnish_Democratic_Republic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finnish_Democratic_Republic At this point, it's such a common Russian strategy that in several European countries children learn about in the middle school, from the times when it was used against their own countries.