Hobby Drones in War Scenario

[Benm]

As to using microwave ovens to lure in expensive radar seeking missiles:

They'd surely hit the actual radar station given it's so much more powerful, unless you would turn it off for some time during the attack. The wavelength is also off by quite a bit, but this is not overly important: once such a missile is fired it is a financial write off regardless of what useless structure it hits, or runs out of fuel, etc.

Then again even in modern warfare things like chaff and flares are still used to confuse enemy missiles.

So putting up a decoy whilst shortly disabling radar makes sense - that very expensive rocket will hit something other than the radar station, regardless of if that is a bodged microwave oven on a scrapyard or just the ground randomly due to fuel starvation.

Equipment built for war is not always the best suitable for actual warfare. If you build a tank, you compare how it would perform against an enemy tank. You might not consider the enemy simply driving over it with a big piece of mining equipment that is several orders of magnitude heavier than either tank, though that strategy might actually not be so bad.

And that applies to other arena's as well: You may think an aircraft carrier is some kind of allmighty ship, but if you'd ram it with the largest, innocent looking, cargo/tanker ship available it would have no chance at all.

 

[CE5]

And that applies to other arena's as well: You may think an aircraft carrier is some kind of allmighty ship, but if you'd ram it with the largest, innocent looking, cargo/tanker ship available it would have no chance at all.

A carrier never sails alone, they operate in what is termed as a Carrier Battle Group. Not only does the carrier itself have an impressive array of radar and sonar suites, but the other vessels in the CVBG, have similar array's of radar and sonar suites (subs are also a component of a CVBG) so these other ships are fanned out around the central carrier to form what is known as a Picket Line. So the radar and sonar coverage for the central carrier extends out to encompass thousands of square miles. The carrier itself also sends aloft E-2D Hawkeye's for (AEW&C) Airborne Early Warning & Control.

Let's just suffice it to say that no threats, let alone a slow moving cargo/tanker ship, will be able to even get near a carrier unless that carrier wants it to be there. And as far as some rougue action by any vessel allowed within close proximity to a carrier- as this often happens especially in confined shipping lanes where carriers at times operate, (click here) well here again those carriers are a bit more nimble than most folks realize.

And Benm, I'm not going to directly address the other shovel swinging defense tactics that you are putting forth other than to say, it is not advisable to bring a shovel to a gun fight.

And just for giggles because this is a laser forum after all. Since this is rather neato, here is a short vid clip that illustrates the 'reach out and touch the drone' capabilities of the Rafael 'Drone Dome' that I referenced in my previous post. And FWIW, the U.S. and other NATO allies have similar systems as well.
(click here) As a reference taken from the OP's original link reveals ongoing developments in the public commercial arena as well.

 

[lasersbee]

Interesting video and thoughts CE5.

Jerry

 

[Light superglue]

Hi CE5,

Agree with you.
As a former soldier of USSR army I know that any "Shovel" (just a joke in our russian blogs) only has a chance against High-tec if there is another High-tec hidden in the background ready to come to rescue if needed.

But I have also read that in WW1&2 germans have used cargo ships with hidden guns and torpedos to sink "innocent" british battleships, so maybe the reality was not so easy to preview... what if Serbs had invented Ironman who could carry the showel and sack full of gravel... (just for fun).

Cannot understand your location: 209 should it mean -151° Greenwich somewhere in Pacific?

 

[Benm]

The thing with the aircraft carrier vs the tanker is that there are numerous options for this to occur. First of all the tanker may seem legtimate at first, and wants to take the shortest route to conserve fuel and time, despite getting a bit close to the aircraft carrier.

The other option is that is it clearly hostile and wants to ram the aircraft carrier. If you discover this fairly late options are pretty limited: The support ships in a battle group may kill everyone on board of that tanker, but that does not stop it from going.

Another approach would be to attempt to skuttle/sink that tanker before impact. This also is problematic with tankers having dual hull designs making them pretty hard to sink in purpose or by accident.

You could also attempt to steer clear of it, but that's not so easy either with big ships that don't change direction or speed rapidly.

This is all presuming the aircraft carrier doesnt see it coming and has no reason to avoid passing the tanker at a safe but not enourmous distance. Assumptions could be very wrong here.

As for low tech versus high tech: You could throw a shovel into one of a 777s engines in the taxi queue. Nobody would probably die, but you can be fairly certain that 777 will not arrive at it's scheduled time by a long run

 

[Alaskan]

...And just for giggles because this is a laser forum after all. Since this is rather neato, here is a short vid clip that illustrates the 'reach out and touch the drone' capabilities of the Rafael 'Drone Dome' that I referenced in my previous post. And FWIW, the U.S. and other NATO allies have similar systems as well. (click here) As a reference taken from the OP's original link reveals ongoing developments in the public commercial arena as well.

We could use that defence against drones here in Iraq, recently we have had some small drones fly in from outside of the base to look at us.

 

[paul1598419]

That's kind of scary, Chris. Sometimes it's the least technologically advanced thing that blind sides you.

 

[CE5]

@Light superglue & @Benm, in my previous posts above, I have embedded links in the body of text within the posts, simply mouse over the text to reveal the links. The link where I mentioned the F-117, is a very honest and respectful examination of that incident. What Zoltan, achieved with a shovel was impressive. But again, the NATO commanders own shortcomings aided folks like Zoltan. By Simply placing too much confidence into overwhelmingly superior assets does not and should not provide an absolute unfounded sense of security and or guarantee success. Again, as the referenced article closes "never underestimate your enemy'. The NATO commanders did underestimate, and they paid the short term price.

Far as the WWII reference, a similar scenario still of course remains something that needs to be taken into consideration within a Battlespace* However in the modern Battlespace, sphere that we are talking about here, it is of course possible for a merchant or other small vessel to covertly carry and deploy an Anti-ship missile. And again, to be effective this sort of Fire Ship ploy* would have to close to within a distance of it's intended target ie; carrier, etc; in order to have a chance at being effective. But again, during a conflict any vessel within the Battlespace, would 'A' not be allowed within the space and 'B' would immediately be designated as a target itself once it does enter the outermost fringe of Battlespace.

And @ Light superglue, about my location. As a matter of course I monitor various topics on the web, and when I signed up here on LPF, there was some chatter making the rounds on Reddit, 4Chan, and several UFO, Prophecy and Conspiracy sites about an anomaly in the Constellation of Virgo* I entered the coordinates for my location as a beacon of sorts, to see if anyone here would catch it or inquire about it. You are the first to inquire. Sorry there is no prize involved other than for me to offer this explanation, and to also now ask you and others reading this a question. NASA, has been continually imaging pics of this anomaly with it's IRAS Skyview, program.* And when the chatter first started back in 2016, NASA responded by claiming this was something to do with Saturn* but while this may seem plausible, there are others (including myself) that also recognize that the Saturn, explanation also provides a level of 'Plausable Deniability'* So here is the question, after reviewing and doing your own research of the info contained within the links that I just provided above* what do you think this anomaly is?

Hopefully this will be a fun exercise, as that was another one of my reasons for using those coordinates for my location. So here again, I guess the virtual 'prize' is the what do others think or feel this anomaly is? that has and continues to receive ongoing attention not only from the web, but more specifically from NASA itself, as a review of the IRAS image archive reveals.

@Alaskan, sorry that I can't personally comment on your current situation because I have no knowledge of it. And even if I did, I would not comment on it. Although, within the OP's link that was within my post that you quoted, there was also This* And not knowing your opsec, I would hazard a guess, that the drones you observed were more than likely friendly, unless you have direct confirmation they were otherwise?

And here is another neat drone swarm centric short vid clip to ponder.

 

[Alaskan]

@Alaskan, sorry that I can't personally comment on your current situation because I have no knowledge of it. And even if I did, I would not comment on it. Although, within the OP's link that was within my post that you quoted, there was also This* And not knowing your opsec, I would hazard a guess, that the drones you observed were more than likely friendly, unless you have direct confirmation they were otherwise?

Nope, they weren't our drones or the Iraqi militaries, I'm surprised they didn't shoot it out of the sky.

On the space subject, I am keenly interested in such things, didn't catch your earlier post, but I'm kind of hit and miss, much of the time I don't read every thread or whole threads.

 

[lasersbee]

We could use that defence against drones here in Iraq, recently we have had some small drones fly in from outside of the base to look at us.

Aren't you at a military installation ??
Nobody got guns to shoot it out of the sky
if it's not considered a friendly "Drone" :thinking:

Jerry

 

[CE5]

@Alaskan, Hhmm stay safe brother. And, Congratulations! 'Super Repper'.
I tried to +rep you but the sys wouldn't allow it?

@Lasersbee, if some 'bogey' drone is observed simply doing surveillance, sometimes they are allowed to RTO- return to operator. For reasons I'm sure you will be able to deduce. But we shouldn't be discussing this.

Let's talk about that Perdix Micro-UAV Swarm Demo, vid I threw up instead.
What is kinda neat about those Perdix Micro's is their semi-autonomous hive mind.*

Towards the end of that clip where they filmed the actual drone swarm orbiting the designated target area, that was really a site to behold. And to know that they were navigating autonomously to not only avoid each other in such close quarter maneuvers, but to also remain on station to complete their mission tasks was really something. I'm telling ya' this AI, is awesome and scary at the same time.

 

[Benm]

I suppose the main problem is that most weapons systems were designed for major warfare between nation states - from fighter jets to strategic nuclear bombs.

In the current situation we have something totally opposite: in the fight against IS the main difficulty is not killing civilians. If you just wanted to defeat IS and not care about any collateral damage a couple of nukes would have solved that issue in an hour or so.

The problem is you have an enemy that mingles (at least geographically) with innocent civillians, so a full force attack, nuclear on conventional, is not an acceptable option.

This also allows the use of things like civilian drones by groups like IS to gather intelligence on your position. Shooting one down could be pretty problematic as well: if they fly high enough you cannot hit them with machine guns and such, yet they are so small proper anti-aircraft installations (intended to shoot down things like cruise missiles or fighter jets) will not reliably target them: their heat signature is very small to begin with, and they could even attempt evasive manouvers as they are quite nimble.

Obviously you could consider 'sod all that' and just ram the thing with a manned helicopter, but that would probably put said helicopter in range of a shoulder mounted anti-aircraft system like a strela-3 which are not that rare in the region.

All things combined a good civilian purpose drone outfitted with a good camera could be an excellent means of gathering intelligence for insurgents.

They could also be used to deliver explosives and such, but in that case you could at leat shoot them down (with hand operated firearms) before reaching their target.

 

[Alaskan]

Appears terrorism is here to stay, isolated cells without knowledge of one another can be far more effective than fighting a known enemy. Kind of like we did with the Brits, shooting gorilla style, they couldn't deal with it, real men don't fight that way, but they can win, in time. I don't know if there is a winner with terrorism, or will ever be... Is it possible? If terrorism succeeds they it promotes more terrorism. I'd rather fight a known enemy than these guys who blend in.

About 30 years ago I was building small hobby RC planes and thought how easy it would be to turn one into a weapon, I could see how to do with with off the shelf camera's and ham radio ATV transmitters, but I never expected UAV's to become what they are today. I used to work directly on Predator and Reaper UAV aircraft for the Air Force, they sure are impressive machines.

 

[Benm]

The main thing that is keeping the death toll limited in my opinion is that most terrorists are retards (in the medical sense).

Let's assume the goal is to just kill as many people as possible, they are not doing an efficient job. Planting small explosives, running into crowds with lorries, randomly shooting around with machine guns, things like that.

This is all pretty horrible, especially for the people that lose loved ones in these incidents, but objectively seen very ineffective.

I presume in the mind of these terrorists killing a handful of infidels will grant them acces to paradise, a shitload of virgins, and what not. To some degree this is a good thing for the rest of humanity - killing a handful is sufficient to them.

My concern is that someone with a proper scientific background carry out an attack going for maximum casualties. Luckily people with academic scientific education are not that likely to attempt such things.

The problem is that you cannot really prevent it: little boms and vehicle attacks are really easy to perform but don't result in that many casualties. A never gas attack on a packed football/baseball stadium, airport or train station would be a bit more difficult but still quite feasible to perform by a single person.

I'd hope to think that noone with proper education would ever attempt this out of ideology, not for the risk of getting caught doing it for pay, but i honestly don't see it as an impossble event either - it only takes one desperate scientist to kill tens or hundreds of thousands in a single attack.

 

[CE5]

@Alaskan & Benm, As often said 'One groups Terrorist is the other groups Freedom Fighters'. And the clash of cultures/religions has been going on since time immemorial*. When the 'others' appear, the tribes band together to oppose and assimilate or eliminate.

And about 30+ years ago, I was personally engaged as an active participant beginning in 81' with an incident in the Gulf of Sidra. Meh, at least we got a cheesy Hollywood movie made out of it. So really in some form or another everyone reading this has grown up dancing with tango's. And using this as a reference, there have been and continue to be regimes with 'desperate scientists' backed with state funding and support that are working on doing bad things to large groups of innocent people. And how has this played out so far? Of course there are the 'desperate scientists' of Iran & NK that have become a focus. And speaking of 30+ yr old memories, it's something to note that the F-117 (now long retired?*) is 30+ yrs old tech to boot.

And yeah, even the UAV's ie; the X-47B UCAS-D* that we are using have advanced quite a bit since the Predators and the Reapers. Not to mention (really ) some of the other TR-3B+ TR8-BR3 tech that we have in the inventory. I won't even mention things like Solar Warden.

And here is another thought to ponder. What would be a good way to ferret out and gather this 'other' contingent than to have a group form like say IS, so that for the most part the majority of these 'others' can be dealt with*, even if they 'blend in' they are still open season. It is regrettable that many innocents are being killed by the 'others' and also by friendly fire, but well yeah.

These current events convolutedly conjure up the memory of a theme from a recent? SciFi movie, Serenity-2005 where the Serenity, crew travel to the planet Miranda, to find all its 30+ million? colonists dead and a recording by the last surviving member of an Alliance survey team (Sarah Paulson*). She explains that an experimental chemical designed to suppress aggression was added into Miranda's air. Most residents became so docile they stopped performing all activities of daily living and placidly died. A small portion of the population, however, had the opposite reaction and became extremely aggressive and violent, turning into Reavers.

And p.s. @Light Superglue and others that want to chat about my location, location thingy- let's take it over to the Space discussion thread*, so we don't derail this droning one.

 

[lasersbee]

I presume in the mind of these terrorists killing a handful of infidels will grant them acces to paradise, a shitload of virgins, and what not.

I've heard that those Virgins in Paradise are all male....

Jerry