Air Force picks Anduril, General Atomics to develop unmanned fighter jets

Post by kornhole » Fri, Apr 26, 2024, 4:46 AM UTC

kornhole wrote: post #373

exhilaration wrote: post #354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought Russia's hypersonic missiles were a failure, with the Ukrainians shooting them down with 30 year old Patriot missiles? There were a lot of articles about it last year, here's one: https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2023/09/what-ukraines-...

That was fake news. https://www.theinteldrop.org/2023/05/14/confirmed-ukraine-ly... Additionally, Iran claims that Israel did not intercept any of the hypersonic missiles they fired at Israel. NATO does not possess any hypersonic missiles. Some people might say that NATO is keeping them secret, but that makes no sense. Nations exhibit their technologies as a deterrent.

Post by RF_Savage » Fri, Apr 26, 2024, 5:49 AM UTC

dgroshev wrote: post #207

Animats wrote: post #68

It's impressive how much hardware they've been able to develop. Their "Fury", which they acquired from Blue Force, is "a single engine business jet with no cabin." It was originally intended as a target drone, something for fighter pilots to practice against. Anduril repurposed it as an autonomous weapons system. They do mean autonomous. Their slogan is "Autonomy for Every Mission". We're seeing the future of warfare…

I don't think we as laypeople should even attempt to draw conclusions from Ukrainian battlefields ourselves, seeing how strong the survivorship bias is. Take FPV drones. In [1] Michael Kofman estimates (based on talking to a number of frontline units) that on average Or TB2s. Remember how they were the future of warfare after their success in Nagorno-Karabakh and the first few weeks in Ukraine? Few months later TB2s…

Post by fullspectrumdev » Fri, Apr 26, 2024, 6:54 AM UTC

chasd00 wrote: post #206

threeseed wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ukraine is constantly inventing new techniques that are re-thinking what drones can do. Recently they have been using them to drop spikes to slow vehicles which are then hit by a second set of drones. At some point soon these drones will have specialised capabilities and will go out in swarms to autonomously figure out how to take down objects.

Aren’t these drones regular cots drones with some modification? Wouldn’t taking the door off a microwave and pointing it at the drone cause it to fall to the ground? Surely it’s more complex than that and I’m missing something.

Post by fullspectrumdev » Fri, Apr 26, 2024, 6:57 AM UTC

RF_Savage wrote: post #383

dgroshev wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think we as laypeople should even attempt to draw conclusions from Ukrainian battlefields ourselves, seeing how strong the survivorship bias is. Take FPV drones. In [1] Michael Kofman estimates (based on talking to a number of frontline units) that on average Or TB2s. Remember how they were the future of warfare after their success in Nagorno-Karabakh and the first few weeks in Ukraine? Few months later TB2s…

Ain't basic fpv drones around half the price of a 155mm HE shell?

Post by defrost » Fri, Apr 26, 2024, 7:12 AM UTC

082349872349872 wrote: post #386

defrost wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heh - hardened crop duster. I'm getting strong PAC 750XL family vibes from that, we had a modified version hardened to fly 80 m drapes across all of Mali some years back .. locals were taking random potshots as it passed over: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_MO5Wfomks

Can't SOCOM afford the good stuff? Our civilian aerospace industry had a scandal a decade or two back because apparently various African countries were buying our trainers, discovering that as shipped the trim was a little off, and rebalancing by mounting MGs in the too-light-because-it-was-empty space.