UAV World Record - 3,051 Drones Simultaneous Display - Military Discussion

[Orange Joe]

and where are you putting all of the c-rams? one on every street corner by 2025!

I'm assuming we are talking about hitting a high value target. If you just going to do mass destruction there are much cheaper and easier solutions.

[cubby]

I'm the one being childish? Have I called you any names or insulted you in any way? yeah... I'm not the one being childish here.

And you don't think something that can shoot 4.5k round in a minute can drop at least a couple hundred drones. add in at least 5 more c-rams and you think drones would still be an issue? lmfao....Have fun with your discussion lol.....

Still making up more numbers...you're hysterical.

[Orange Joe]

Still making up more numbers...you're hysterical.

You have absolutely 0 room to talk.

[cubby]

and where are you putting all of the c-rams? one on every street corner by 2025!

The cycle target rate would be the key issue, and apparently that info isn't available.

[Orange Joe]

The cycle target rate would be the key issue, and apparently that info isn't available.

[cubby]

[c-ram live fire youtube video]

Does it answer any of the questions I keep asking? The cycle rate is key. Number of serviceable targets per minute as well. Those fucking things are awesome, of course.

[Orange Joe]

Does it answer any of the questions I keep asking? The cycle rate is key. Number of serviceable targets per minute as well. Those fucking things are awesome, of course.

as many as 4.5k bullets per minute can hit. Do you not understand how many rounds that is. You can see how fast it can acquire a target in the video and those are rockets it's taking out.


But yeah, You keep thinking your $500 amazon drones are invincible

[cubby]

as many as 4.5k bullets per minute can hit. Do you not understand how many rounds that is. You can see how fast it can acquire a target in the video and those are rockets it's taking out.

But yeah, You keep thinking your $500 amazon drones are invincible

Hey, I'm just asking the same questions as before. I can "see" it just fine. But you somehow think the number of bullets it shoots out is equivalent to how many targets it can hit - and it's not; you even admitted as much. Until we know the target cycle rate, we have zero idea how it would deal with a drone swarm.

[Orange Joe]

Hey, I'm just asking the same questions as before. I can "see" it just fine. But you somehow think the number of bullets it shoots out is equivalent to how many targets it can hit - and it's not; you even admitted as much. Until we know the target cycle rate, we have zero idea how it would deal with a drone swarm.

What would the rate have to be to take your drones out? How fast do the drones travel? Whats the range they are coming from?

[cubby]

What would the rate have to be to take your drones out? How fast do the drones travel? Whats the range they are coming from?

We need to know the target cycle rate to see how many targets a c-ram can address per minute. It's effective range would be another number as well - but I think we have that. Cycle rate plus effective range will give us a target acquisition rate.

You admitted we don't have that number, and that's ok - we don't need it for this discussion. C-ram might be able to handle a 5k drone swarm, it might not - we'll literally never know without that targeting data (and frankly I'm sort of glad it's not easily accessible).

We don't have to keep going here. We can let this issue go now, and get back to the broader conversation.

[Nihilist74]

The Chinese could not afford a growing drone gap after they seen the Koreans do this in the Winter Olympic opening ceremonies.

[Orange Joe]

We need to know the target cycle rate to see how many targets a c-ram can address per minute. It's effective range would be another number as well - but I think we have that. Cycle rate plus effective range will give us a target acquisition rate.

You admitted we don't have that number, and that's ok - we don't need it for this discussion. C-ram might be able to handle a 5k drone swarm, it might not - we'll literally never know without that targeting data (and frankly I'm sort of glad it's not easily accessible).

We don't have to keep going here. We can let this issue go now, and get back to the broader conversation.

You can't answer can you... lol so you need to know some info that you won't even know if that shows it can deal with the drones or not.

Or feel free to say what it the required "cycle rate" to take out your drones.

[Thekri]

A whole lot of missing the point in this thread. The truth lays somewhere in the middle of the two arguments being made here. Drone swarms are a real thing, and have been a major concern for the military for quite a while now. Big flashy displays by the PRC really don't have any military consequence though, that is just scaling the technology for a visual demonstration. The relevant indicators have been the frequent, and constantly increasing, series of drone attacks in low intensity conflicts all over the world. Small drones have extremely low infrastructure requirements, but defending against them requires significant infrastructure.

The concern isn't really that a drone swarm poses significant risks to well defended targets like Warships or major military infrastructure. The problem is that a theater of conflict tends to spread over entire countries, and you can't reasonably defend everything from them. Yes, something like a CIWS or a C-RAM can deal with these. So can lots of other things. But those are multi-million dollar systems that only defend a few square kilometers at altitude, and less then that very close to the ground. Instead, drones can effectively be used against small scale logistics elements, forward air bases, convoys, and political/civilian targets. They are already being used for this purpose, and it is unlikely that trend will reverse.

Short version: Nothing here suggests the PRC has any sort of advantage in this technology, nor does anything suggest the US (And every other military) isn't working overtime to adapt to it. It is a legitimate military issue, but it isn't nearly as game changing as some pretend, nor is it a major threat to a military operation. Small drone operations are just a cost effective way to get in constant chip damage. Using them in vast numbers defeats the purpose, and ties them to exactly the sort of major infrastructure that can be dealt with.

[cubby]

You can't answer can you... lol so you need to know some info that you won't even know if that shows it can deal with the drones or not.

Or feel free to say what it the required "cycle rate" to take out your drones.

?...no...I can't answer it. That's my point. Because it's been my question the entire time. And you said that info wasn't available. So we don't have to continue this discussion anymore. But for some reason you just need to keep coming back to it. Really tells us a lot about you.

Hey! Remember when you asked:

I'm the one being childish?

You emphatically and objectively are at this point.

- - - Updated - - -

A whole lot of missing the point in this thread. The truth lays somewhere in the middle of the two arguments being made here. Drone swarms are a real thing, and have been a major concern for the military for quite a while now. Big flashy displays by the PRC really don't have any military consequence though, that is just scaling the technology for a visual demonstration. The relevant indicators have been the frequent, and constantly increasing, series of drone attacks in low intensity conflicts all over the world. Small drones have extremely low infrastructure requirements, but defending against them requires significant infrastructure.

I find in most discussions the answer is "it depends". In retrospect I should have phrased the OP differently.

The concern isn't really that a drone swarm poses significant risks to well defended targets like Warships or major military infrastructure. The problem is that a theater of conflict tends to spread over entire countries, and you can't reasonably defend everything from them. Yes, something like a CIWS or a C-RAM can deal with these. So can lots of other things. But those are multi-million dollar systems that only defend a few square kilometers at altitude, and less then that very close to the ground. Instead, drones can effectively be used against small scale logistics elements, forward air bases, convoys, and political/civilian targets. They are already being used for this purpose, and it is unlikely that trend will reverse.

We were just talking about C-RAMs. From what you're saying, if I understand correctly those systems should defend against small number drone swarm attacks, but if they turn into large scale swarms, then we get into infrastructure requirements that can be eliminated in other ways, prior to the drones being an issue.

I can definitely see these being used against soft targets - as you pointed out that has already happened. The balancing point will be interesting. If we're in a major conflict, how will we defend our power generation and other significant but "soft" targets. Or will we just have to fund a CIWS or C-RAM or similar. I'm sure there either is a middle ground, or one is in development.

Short version: Nothing here suggests the PRC has any sort of advantage in this technology, nor does anything suggest the US (And every other military) isn't working overtime to adapt to it. It is a legitimate military issue, but it isn't nearly as game changing as some pretend, nor is it a major threat to a military operation. Small drone operations are just a cost effective way to get in constant chip damage. Using them in vast numbers defeats the purpose, and ties them to exactly the sort of major infrastructure that can be dealt with.

If a country could put out major drone swarms, such as my suggestion of 5,000+ in one attack, does the United States have the ability to defend a military target from it?

[Kellhound]

Some things to keep in mind.

1: Small civilian drones are vulnerable to electronic warfare. Both the command and control signals and the GPS signals can be jammed. Even a simple air search radar can interrupt a control signal on a harmonic frequency at close range.

2: CIWS and C-RAM are significantly limited in the number of targets they can hit by their ammo capacity, a bit more than 1500 rounds. That gives them about 20 seconds of firing time, and reloading is SLOW.

[PC2]

If a country could put out major drone swarms, such as my suggestion of 5,000+ in one attack, does the United States have the ability to defend a military target from it?

The biggest military can almost always defend 1 target if it wants to put enough planning and resources into it. I think a better question is whether there is a specific application in which a drone swarm attack is more effective and/or low cost than any other type of attack? I'd be surprised if there's not a single one.

[Kellhound]

The biggest military can almost always defend 1 target if it wants to put enough planning and resources into it. I think a better question is whether there is a specific application in which a drone swarm attack is more effective and/or low cost than any other type of attack? I'd be surprised if there's not a single one.

They are effective against high value soft targets, and effectiveness and cost are of less concern than availability.

[PACOX]

It would be better to fire off 5000 missiles than 5000 drone. At least the missiles have a chance of outrunning counter measures.

[Kellhound]

It would be better to fire off 5000 missiles than 5000 drone. At least the missiles have a chance of outrunning counter measures.

Not really. Missiles are very expensive, and in the case of cruise missiles, very large. It would take over half of all US Navy cruisers and destroyers armed with nothing but cruise missiles to fire off 5000 of them.

[cubby]

Some things to keep in mind.

1: Small civilian drones are vulnerable to electronic warfare. Both the command and control signals and the GPS signals can be jammed. Even a simple air search radar can interrupt a control signal on a harmonic frequency at close range.

2: CIWS and C-RAM are significantly limited in the number of targets they can hit by their ammo capacity, a bit more than 1500 rounds. That gives them about 20 seconds of firing time, and reloading is SLOW.

If I were the Red Team here, I would program them ahead of time, so any on-target signal would be unnecessary. I don't have an answer to the GPS jamming, however. Interesting re the C-RAM cycle rate, there have been some...discussions on that matter. I guessed their cycle rate would prevent them from defending a target.

I enjoy discussing both sides of an issue, so to poke holes in my own idea, I think mass production might be a factor, along with transportation to an effect launch/initiation range.