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Is the attack helicopter dead?

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Re: Is the attack helicopter dead?

#221

Post by JohnBooty »

sidewndr46 wrote: post #92
HPsquared wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Efficiency starts to matter in a near-peer conflict.

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.

    A near-peer conflict involves a nuclear exchange
Respectfully, I think you're misunderstanding the term. The term is meant to represent the level of resources and weapons each combatant is bringing to the theater of conflict.

It does not mean that the two sides are necessarily using the most destructive possible weapons in their arsenals. A hypothetical US/China armed conflict over Taiwan (god forbid) would be "near-peer" even if neither side goes nuclear.

"Near-peer" is meant to distinguish that sort of conflict from, let's say, US vs. Taliban in Afghanistan where the two sides had vastly different levels of technology and capability.

Or maybe you're making the point that two nuclear states would be hard-pressed to fight an open war that did not devolve into a nuclear exchange. Which is a very valid concern. If that's your point, I apologize.

Re: Is the attack helicopter dead?

#222

Post by ahmeneeroe-v2 »

Loughla wrote: post #157
ahmeneeroe-v2 wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

War never changes. The future will be boots on the ground, men engaging in hand-to-hand combat, one dies/one lives. That might occur in the context of standoff weapons or cheap drones or AI or whatever, but all of those things will be to facilitate a scenario where your side brings more men to that fight, that your men have an advantage in that fight, and that the fight actually reduces the other side's ability to do…

What? In what world is hand to have combat the nature of war anymore? I don't think I understand what you're saying here. Also, I would argue that winning battles is about numbers and advantage. Winning wars is about effectively reducing supplies and support.

Hey not sure why you're getting downvoted, you had a genuine question and I think it's a common misconception.

If you play out the drones, standoff weapons, ICBMs, whatever...at the end of the day war is about taking something from someone or stopping someone from taking from you. All the tech nets out and it's you face to face with another human.

All of the tech is context of the face to face.

And your comment about battles vs wars isn't wrong, but reducing "supplies and support" just sets you up to have a an easier battle. Maybe you reduce the other side's capacity to do battle so effectively that the next "battle" is just you walking into the other side's capitol/village/home, but you still actually need the boots on the ground to go do that thing.

Re: Is the attack helicopter dead?

#223

Post by jvanderbot »

newsclues wrote: post #220
drawnwren wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with shotguns is that you either have a small number of pellets (12ga) or a small amount of mass to do damage (bird shot). So with 12ga specifically, while it's more effective than a rifle round -- the pellets spread quickly enough that it's only a huge advantage when the drone is in the terminal phase. This is why in WW2, they would put timed fuses inside the AA shells so that they didn't have to hit the…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shotgun_slug

You may as well use rifle bullets then.

Re: Is the attack helicopter dead?

#224

Post by the_af »

vFunct wrote: post #205
navbaker wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I spent tons of hours as a kid playing Comanche on our old 486!

My game of choice was Gunship on the Commodore 64, the AH-64 Apache attack helicopter simulator from Microprose. Spent YEARS playing that. Best part was the instruction manual that came with it that was basically a guide of all the military equipment of the Soviet Union that you could target in the game.

Gunship 2000 here!

I loved that it had a dynamic campaign where the frontline moved according to how well you did.

Before that, I also enjoyed LHX.

> Best part was the instruction manual that came with it that was basically a guide of all the military equipment of the Soviet Union that you could target in the game.

Do you remember what the copy protection was for MicroProse's F-19 Stealth Fighter? It was the silhouettes of US and Soviet fighters and bombers from the Cold War era: "identify this aircraft". Somehow they thought my teenage self, obsessed as I was with Cold War military tech, wouldn't learn the shapes. It's how I learned the shapes of most fighter jets.

Yes, I had a pirated copy. We all did back then, legal games were unheard of.

Re: Is the attack helicopter dead?

#225

Post by HKH2 »

marginalia_nu wrote: post #136
sidewndr46 wrote: post #92

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.

Who are America's near peers then? Afghanistan? Vietnam?

Re: Is the attack helicopter dead?

#227

Post by jvanderbot »

dsv3099i wrote: post #201
jvanderbot wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dumb question: Why are 12ga shotguns, possibly on small auto-targeting platforms, not a thing yet? Like a CWIS/CRAM but tiny and for close-in engagements?

Apparently they are a thing. https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidhambling/2024/05/09/shotgu... If attack drones can move like racing drones, that’s going to be a hard shot to pull off though

The FPV impactor types have some kind of approach phase I'd imagine.

The loitering "drop grenades on cars" kind are probably much easier to knock down.

Re: Is the attack helicopter dead?

#228

Post by anonylizard »

wisty wrote: post #198

It's always worth remembering that a soldier who costs a million dollars to train can be killed by a 20 cent bullet. But soldiers still exist. Everything in a war will involve losses that appear asymmetric if you consider losses in isolation. War is a horrible affair. Helicopters won't disappear because they can be shot down, but if UAV, communications, plus artillery can replace them. Communication is the most likel…

Soldiers exist, but expensive western soldiers are basically a different species compared to the cheap militia of the third world.

All the strategic decisions of western militaries is based on the sheer expensiveness of their foot soldiers, which means reluctance to fight ground wars, extreme aversion to casualties etc.

It also meant advanced militaries generally shrunk massively in terms of soldier count, ending conscription, making the existing forces more elite and more equipped (Since the meat solider is so expensive anyways).

So helicopters, given their decreasing cost effectiveness, is likely to entirely disappear as a tactical weapon. They will be transport only going forward, or some sort of a big drone carrier.

Re: Is the attack helicopter dead?

#229

Post by m4rtink »

torginus wrote: post #51
Retric wrote: post #19

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.

While the regular Switchblade is essentially a glorified flying granade, many FPVs use RPG7 warhwads and are regularly used to take out tanks (possibly using multiple hits, but still).

Also there is a trend recently to see more and more AA FPVs taking down Russian recon drones, some flying up to 3 km high! This already had an interesting side effects of many such drones being covered by expletives or even fake Ukrainian markings - did not really help.

Re: Is the attack helicopter dead?

#230

Post by [deleted] »

meiraleal wrote: post #161
Loughla wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What? In what world is hand to have combat the nature of war anymore? I don't think I understand what you're saying here. Also, I would argue that winning battles is about numbers and advantage. Winning wars is about effectively reducing supplies and support.

Drones can't occupy land (yet).

[deleted]
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