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The glass backbone: Why the Army's logistics will break in the next war

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Re: The glass backbone: Why the Army's logistics will break in the next war

#631

Post by RealityVoid »

Edman274 wrote: post #610
RealityVoid wrote: post #489

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You need hardware for these things. High speed image processing and high precision control and global shutter cameras. You can't just slap a raspi on it with any run of the mill camera and call it a day.

So what? A Google Pixel 9 Pro costs only about 4 times what a bare RPi 5 with a run of the mill camera costs, yet with its NPU it can perform 45 trillion operations per second with a camera that can reach 240 frames per second at a resolution of 2 megapixels. Do you think that's insufficient to autonomously pilot a drone moving at highway speeds towards a target that it identified as a fighter jet? In addition, it ha…

It's not as easy as plopping a new SW on it. Have you wondered why, despite this conflict dragging on for this long, autonomous targeting is still not common? It's just much harder to do, and doing it reliably is actually super hard.

Hw access is also not as easy as you think. Try getting a Pixel 9 class SoC board that you can actually dev stuff on, you'd be surprised how hard it is to get such a thing. And when you get it, it will probably be 2x as expensive for just the board.

Oh, put the Pixel 9 on it then. Have you tried doing optical flow on rolling shutter cameras?

Then, whatever solution you get, you need sufficient volume and reliable supply of the thing. Oh, you can't find the chip anymore? Good luck porting the stack you have since the pipeline is different.

Whereas these rc FPV drones you can basically build what what you find in the back of your drawer.

Re: The glass backbone: Why the Army's logistics will break in the next war

#632

Post by bumby »

ceejayoz wrote: post #628
bumby wrote: post #617

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not in scientific edge domains. Eg: quantum computing is shown to be scientifically feasible right now, but nowhere close to having economic viability in a business sense. Same with fusion etc etc

> Not in scientific edge domains. That's JWST-style stuff, not SpaceX at this point.

That’s kinda the point.

40 years ago it was questionable whether it was technically possible. It was “JWST-stuff”. The forerunners of ULA showed it was feasible.

20 years ago it was questionable whether it was economically viable. SpaceX changed that.

Your previous statement was too vague to make the distinction and implied Spacex did both, while ignoring the contributions of the previous group.

Re: The glass backbone: Why the Army's logistics will break in the next war

#633

Post by user_7832 »

user_7832 wrote: post #551
wahern wrote: post #525

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point was just that gameification is just a modern word that doesn't reflect any change in behaviors. Presumably you were familiar with these practices under previous descriptors. And your moral objections would have been shared by many millions before you, long before gameification was coined. On the other side of the coin to thinking there's something new about the way war is waged are the people who think they…

I think something fundamentally new is not only the incentivisation directly affecting kills - as a top team/unit can iterate up much faster, unlike a soldier who could boast more kills, but still have the same rifle as his colleagues - but the layers and desensitisation overall. Part of this probably admittedly isn't new, and likely started with drones, where you could kill someone in Iraq sitting in DC, on the othe…

I'm intrigued (but unfortunately not surprised) by the downvote.

I suspect it's primarily due to folks missing nuance/misinterpreting thing (and/or getting emotional and running off with it).

I ran a thread to analyse hidden/missed nuance - where I tried to be as "neutral" as possible (by never identifying myself), if someone's genuinely interested I can share the link. (Hint: Gemini 3.1 Pro at max thinking mode in AI Studio says others are missing a point/some nuance.)

Re: The glass backbone: Why the Army's logistics will break in the next war

#634

Post by user_7832 »

godwinson__4-8 wrote: post #586
user_7832 wrote: post #551

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think something fundamentally new is not only the incentivisation directly affecting kills - as a top team/unit can iterate up much faster, unlike a soldier who could boast more kills, but still have the same rifle as his colleagues - but the layers and desensitisation overall. Part of this probably admittedly isn't new, and likely started with drones, where you could kill someone in Iraq sitting in DC, on the othe…

This post is so insanely out of touch with reality. What an irony. Their country is being invaded. Their families are being affected and killed. Their land is being taken. The goal is to end their country. Trying to project criticisms of the American drone program onto Ukraine in such an openly transparent and uncritical manner is the only thing sickening here. For your platitudes about humanity you clearly care so l…

> That seems the most charitable way to interpret your post. And I'm really trying.

Ps, if you're genuinely curious, I can share a link where I got Gemini 3.1 Pro (at max thinking) to analyse this chat as neutrally as I could. Seeing as Gemini had an easier time than you did, maybe it could give you some help?

Re: The glass backbone: Why the Army's logistics will break in the next war

#635

Post by xp84 »

Epa095 wrote: post #577
xp84 wrote: post #375

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would bet Japan, Korea, Taiwan all produce some of the needed things in an emergency scenario (obv Taiwan may be under artillery attack, but then again, does China want a destroyed Taiwan or do they want to own it, with its priceless industries intact, as a crown jewel? They may avoid such destruction). But honestly, I don't think China wants Taiwan "reunification" quite as much as they want to have their economy b…

> If massively provoked, e.g. Taiwan declares independence and joins NATO, sure. You think NATO would stand there with open arms in such a case? NATO membership requires agreement from all member states, and I don't sense a great appetite among the European countries for a war with China. I agree with the overall point of your post though.

Sorry, yes, that scenario went past believability. Clearly no one in Europe or North America is interested in inviting conflict that way!

Re: The glass backbone: Why the Army's logistics will break in the next war

#636

Post by stevenwoo »

0x59 wrote: post #301

WWII? Fabius did this to Hannibal more than a thousand years ago. The core of his strategy was to dunk on supplies, stall, and have the Carthaginians run out of food. I imagine Iran, Ukraine, and Russia all know about Fabian strategy.

It appears that Ukraine is executing on this (after building up its internal defense production), and Russia is not adjusting well, yet. https://foreignpolicy.com/2026/07/09/ukraine-russia-war-theo...

Re: The glass backbone: Why the Army's logistics will break in the next war

#637

Post by cyberax »

nswango wrote: post #513
cyberax wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most drones don't use anything cutting-edge. Even 15-year-old chips are more than enough.

You don't think neural networks are going to be a factor in drone wars? How far out do you think this prediction will hold?

Most drones are controlled by humans, so they don't need neural networks. Larger drones still don't use anything too advanced, as specialized neural networks actually don't need beefy hardware.

Maybe this will change in future, but the US still has enough semiconductor manufacturing capacity to produce a few million chips for drones.

Re: The glass backbone: Why the Army's logistics will break in the next war

#638

Post by stevenwoo »

silvestrov wrote: post #15
kayo_20211030 wrote: post #2

A very insightful, and correct, piece. I'll quote in full the following, which I think gets to the heart of the matter. If you have no push, you can't apply pressure to the point. > The notion that amateurs talk tactics and professionals talk logistics is frequently discussed in military academies and war colleges, yet it is rarely reflected in the Army’s budget requests or modernization priorities. The outdated conc…

One of the most interesting innovations in the Ukraine war is their internal market place for drones, letting each drone group decide which drones they want to procure and use in battle. It is not a top-down decision, production and supply as other armies use for their weapons logistics.

I posted this in another reply, but this is relevant to your point about the market place (deeper in article) and for the hacker news audience - the current Defense Minister for Ukraine is a 35 year old from the tech industry, Mykhailo Fedorov https://foreignpolicy.com/2026/07/09/ukraine-russia-war-theo...

Re: The glass backbone: Why the Army's logistics will break in the next war

#639

Post by troupo »

esseph wrote: post #625
troupo wrote: post #499

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and 24/7 airlifts of critical weapons and equipment that beat them back? There were no 24/7 airlifts of criticql weapons and equipment at any point in this war. Ukraine was expected to fall quickly, and any help it needed started arriving very reluctantly, very slowly, in small batches stretched over months and years of deliveries much much later.

> Ukraine was expected to fall quickly, and any help it needed started arriving very reluctantly, very slowly, in small batches stretched over months and years of deliveries much much later. This is bullshit from anyone in the know. There had been multiple YEARS of Western Special Operations inside Ukraine leading up to and during the opening phases of the war . Some were pulled back to defend Kyiv / Zelensky during…

> There had been multiple YEARS of Western Special Operations inside Ukraine leading up to and during the opening phases of the war.

That is why Russia quickly reached Kiev, and Ukraine still can't win the war? Because there were inhales, screams MULTIPLE YEARS OF SPECIAL OPERATIONS?

> Without UK SOF and their initial deployments of anti-armor weapons, there is a good chance Russia would have gotten much further.

No one denies that there were Western Weapons in Ukraine. What is bullshit is that they were somehow airlifted 24/7 during initial phases of the war. They decidedly weren't. Neither before the invasion, nor during the first days. Nor, indeed during any phase of the war.

Re: The glass backbone: Why the Army's logistics will break in the next war

#640

Post by fiatpandas »

graysnow86 wrote: post #418
fiatpandas wrote: post #415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>A project spiderweb in the US What is that referring to?

A Ukranian operation where they launched drones from semi trucks driven deep into Russian territory, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Spiderweb

Thank you.
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