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  • This is the story no one is talking about. Trillions invested in the US millitary industrial complex in terms of r&d, strategy think tanks, you fucking name it.

    And yes, 1 fly boi w/ some 3d printed parts beats their ass. Not that the US approach to militarism is irrelevant, but a country can produce 10k drones for the price of 1 tomahawk. The US went way too far over its handlebars in terms of its monolithic approach to "high technology", treating it like a moat. Afghanistan was the MS thesis publication on this, but man, Ukraine has been the PhD work.

    • As much as I love drones, the current tech has a lot of limitations. They’re awesome for small kamikaze stuff, but they don’t even compare to real weapons like a tomahawk if it really came down to heavy combat. With that said, drones offer so much more precision and a safer war.

      1. Power the weight ratio is pretty bad. 7” drones or smaller can’t carry a large load.
      2. Battery life is pretty awful with lipo and li-ion lasts longer but much less burst power for maneuvering.
      3. Range is decent, a few miles (Tomahawk can go 100’s of miles), but need a clear flight path and longer distance introduces more latency. Additionally any interference can ground you easily especially at very long range, granted you can program return to home.
      4. Wind plays big factor especially at high elevation.
      5. Not very stealthy. Granted a war zone is loud, but you can hear a drone coming pretty easily.

      All that said, I’m very interested in where drone tech will be in 20 years.

22 comments