141–150 of 650 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I live in the US. A near-peer conflict involves a nuclear exchange. The world will change in ways forever that none of us can ever foresee at that point.
Worth noting that Russia has nuclear weapons, yet elects not to use them against their near peer Ukraine.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
We don't know if they underperfomed so much as weren't cost effective. If the switchblade costing $10k results in a kill 80% of the time, while the $1k drone is 30% of the time, you just get 3 times as many $1k drones, average about the same kill rate, and save 70% to boot. Or spend the same amount and get about 3x the kill rate.
> If the switchblade costing $10k results in a kill 80% of the time, while the $1k drone is 30% of the time, you just get 3 times as many $1k drones, average about the same kill rate, and save 70% to boot. Sanity check: 80% success is an 80% success rate; 3 shots at 30% success is a 66% rate, which is much, much worse. You need 5 cheap 30% drones to beat an 80% success rate, still a major savings at the prices you gi…
Point is just that it seems a little silly to try to reductively do these calculations - seems meaningless to try to compare without more information…
Part of a broader pattern in military technology right now. All weapon systems that consist of an expensive vehicle and an expensive-to-train crew are being re-evaluated against drones right now. If you're fighting a highly asymmetric conflict where your enemies can barely touch your expensive toys then it's less of a concern. If you're fighting near-peer it's a different story.
When we'll reach this inflection point with jet fighters? I remain skeptical that the F-35 will prove to be a prudent expenditure of resources both financial and in terms of R&D.
They are in effect the specced-down mass production version of the F-22 and are comparable in terms of cost relative to similar fifth generation fighters (and even comparable to many fourth generation fights) but go toe to toe with or outperform the competition.
This stacks the deck such that the F-35 will be a peer to or superior to any "opposition" aircraft or anti-air weapon system while the US keeps the F-22 around to serve as a dogfighter that is reserved for fighting the rare circumstance of something that's legitimately a threat to an F-35.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Near-peer conflicts have more meaningful targets which favors these kinds of expensive weapons platforms. A drone that can do meaningful damage to a factory 500+ miles from a front line is either an easy target or it starts to look a lot like a missile with all the associated costs from that.
I think it's more complex than that. The US made Switchblade drones which cost tens of thousands of dollars were outperformed with lightly modified FPVs with grenades, which came in under a thousand.
Part of a broader pattern in military technology right now. All weapon systems that consist of an expensive vehicle and an expensive-to-train crew are being re-evaluated against drones right now. If you're fighting a highly asymmetric conflict where your enemies can barely touch your expensive toys then it's less of a concern. If you're fighting near-peer it's a different story.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I live in the US. A near-peer conflict involves a nuclear exchange. The world will change in ways forever that none of us can ever foresee at that point.
Worth noting that Russia has nuclear weapons, yet elects not to use them against their near peer Ukraine.
To me a near peer implies that either side has a good chance of losing the war. It’s my opinion that Russia has not yet been at a real risk of losing this war and thus has not yet had a need to use nuclear weapons. I’m aware that the NAFO line is that Ukraine still has this in the bag - but I still don’t see a Ukrainian victory as a likely.
I assume this is why the gp post suggested ‘near peer’ implies nukes.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think it's more complex than that. The US made Switchblade drones which cost tens of thousands of dollars were outperformed with lightly modified FPVs with grenades, which came in under a thousand.
Lightly modified FPVs with grenades are a major concern for soldiers, but so are mortars and artillery shells etc. There’s a lot of low cost long range weapons vs infantry, but a drone with a grenade isn’t really effective vs tanks etc. A fleet of cheap drones just don’t do anything if bomber aircraft can simply fly higher than they can reach. Leave the realm of mass production and you can build drones that would be,…
You may be thinking of AP grenades, but broadly speaking this isn't true. UA has been dropping RKG-3 anti-tank grenades since early in the invasion. Any drone with a 3 pound lift capacity can knock out armor.
https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-cheap-grenades-expensive-tan...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
When we'll reach this inflection point with jet fighters? I remain skeptical that the F-35 will prove to be a prudent expenditure of resources both financial and in terms of R&D.
Without a capable stealth fighter the US & allies could lose air superiority to China very quickly in the Indo Pacific. And operations in the Middle East could become much more high risk from SAMs. However it’s interesting to compare the F35 program to the alternative of producing several hundred F22s, or some other stealth solution.
And importantly, the US wants to export the F-35 but keep the F-22 close to chest so that should push come to shove, the US can always maintain air superiority.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
In retrospect the money would have been better spent on building a Berry-compliant drone making company that can build consumer and attack drones. Instead, the retrospective will likely be: "I guess we should now build drones in addition to our jet fighter." Double the effort, half the efficiency, half the result.
Yeah that's where I'm at with this topic too. If we use the Ukraine war as a template for the next major war that the US faces (possibly against China) -- does the United States have the industrial capability to produce the tens to hundreds of millions of drones necessary to win? Like can it produce the propellers, the frames, the motors, the batteries, the ICs to make a FPV drone that blows up in an enemy soldiers f…
Yes
> Can that supply chain be made in the US and how long can will it take to make?
In a limited capacity yes but also in like 5 or so years the answer will be an unequivocal yes.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> If the switchblade costing $10k results in a kill 80% of the time, while the $1k drone is 30% of the time, you just get 3 times as many $1k drones, average about the same kill rate, and save 70% to boot. Sanity check: 80% success is an 80% success rate; 3 shots at 30% success is a 66% rate, which is much, much worse. You need 5 cheap 30% drones to beat an 80% success rate, still a major savings at the prices you gi…
Obviously this is just a binomial distribution, but another thing to consider I suppose would be if all trials are performed sequentially or simultaneously. If performed sequentially, on the one hand, you have a non-zero chance of not needing to expend the subsequent trials; on the other hand, it seems reasonable to think there might be a degraded (or increased!) probability for each sequential trial. If conducted si…
Yes! That definitely came up while I was thinking about the problem.
I concluded that, in cases where you desire to eliminate (1) a particular target (2) under time constraints, only simultaneous attempts make sense. (And that this combination of needs is common.)
If instead your goal is to cause random deaths, you can ignore the simultaneous/sequential distinction, treat every drone as having a different target, and just say that 3 30% drones will get 0.9 kills for every 0.8 kills from 1 80% drone.