I bought a $100 drone. This thing would have cost thousands a decade ago. These commercial drones are extremely useful for monitoring enemy movements. They are literally changing the nature of war.
I’m honestly shocked how model RC jet powered planes haven’t entered into the fray. With a small profile and capable of 400mph speeds you have a cheap cruise missile.
@@Thaidory Except they use a two stroke lawn mower motor. High end RC jets can reach absurd speeds in comparison. Fast enough that shooting them down with a plain machine gun is very very hard, whereas the Shared drones have been neutralized by machine guns with spade grips mounted to the back end of a pick-up truck.
I think the issue may be the expense. Something tells me that this would be pursued by the middle powers, so think the Turks and maybe the French in the future. But the Turks are the ones heavily investing in drones technology and are becoming a leader in the field. Maybe also in use in the FPV drones being used. But I'm not sure in either case. Maybe it's just that it's not something so commercial yet to come in the appropriate shape. Or perhaps the need for jet fuel. May even be that you can't carry much on them since the jets aren't actually that powerful and could be slowed down. Finally, it may just not be made aware of yet since it's pretty niche
Im kinda baffled at how people think this is somehow a new phenomenom. Imagine a small device that can fly hundreds of meters into the air and kilometers away while providing 1080p live video and able to zoom in and take 4k pictures. Suddenly you dont need soldiers for spotting and some scouting work anymore. Its basically the ideal reconnaissance tool.
Depending on the capabilities of your opponents, operating these drones can be pretty deadly. You’re effectively broadcasting your location if someone is looking with the right tech.
@@danfreezin2040the US had drone pilots operating in Afghanistan, but controlling it from the US. If that's possible, then they can probably be remotely controlled from a safe distance anywhere. Even if just the US can do it now, others will learn how to.
Any infantry unit in western armies armed with many kinds of drones, artillery units have drones for spotting and laser guide rockets. None of this is a big surprise.
But if some person can put bag with electronic close to place where drone operate and this bag block your drone that it can be surprise. Did i mention that this bag will work ONLY when drone is close ? :)
The Danish had some birds of prey trained to take out drones. The police were doing in 2016 2017 but in the end came down to economics. The birds were to expensive vs other ways to take drones down
The Predator (as well as similar aircraft like the Gray Eagle, Warrior Alpha, Reaper, and Avenger) are all made my General Atomics. General Dynamics is more into counter UAS, among other things.
I don't know if it was chosen for ommission due to OPSEC reasons, but the Ukrainian use of drones as direct strike weapons was glanced over. The amounts of strikes using FPV (First Person View) drones to ram an AT grenade into an armored vehicle is well documented even here on RU-vid. This turns a $300 drone + a $50 RPG-7 AT grenade into a long range strike weapon that will knock out older tanks and even modern IFVs and APCs along with every kind of truck and utility vehicle you can think of. While dropping 64mm mortars on trenches and thinner skinned vehicles is retains the drone it is still ineffective against armored vehicles, and is prone to misses, so being able to ram right into the thing you don't like can be highly valuable. An FPV drone can swing around and hit vehicles from their most vulnerable angles, or do top-down attacks like the much much more costly Javelins.
Part of the penetrating power of the RPG warhead comes from the fact that it's at high velocity. How will you get that same effect by flying a drone that tops out at 40-70 mph?
@@BlueinanotherLanguage Nope. The velocity of the RPG-7 is only ~395m/s which makes practically no difference to the shock wave of the shaped charge which impacts the armour at around 65,000m/s.
Of course, but the cost per unit of a military unit compared to civilian drone is orders of magnitude. You also have to consider access, if it's a non-state actor they won't be able to buy a military drone anyway, but an off the shelf drone, that might actually come with basic thermal imaging these days if you're a little wealthier gives you an edge that even militaries wouldn't have had a couple of decades ago. I mean, the black hornet mini helicopter drone costs almost $200,000 per drone. Compare that to what, a few hundred for a commercial drone? Switchblade costs about $30,000 per unit, again, compare that to a commercial drone and an old soviet mortar round. War isn't just about capabilities, it's also about economics. If I can get forty commercial drones for the cost of one switchblade, I'll probably take the commercial drones. Even if I'm only successful twice, the maximum number of Russian tanks I can take out with that switchblade is one.
@@thejackal5099 in the daytime, for sure. Drones with thermals seem to be favoured at night for obvious reasons. Something that does seem to be used more and more are FPV drones for kamikaze attacks. It kind of turns an FPV drone into a budget switchblade loitering munition. Something else to consider is that drones of any type don't have a particularly long service life. They tend to get shot down or lost quite quickly, so cheap is preferable is my understanding. The thing is, well funded, peace time militaries will do things like spend $200,000 per unit on a gee wiz special forces micro drone because it seems super cool and elite, and for some ultra well trained SF guys it probably is. The issue is, once you have a large battlefield with high attrition, and the options of "go out and hunt tank with an RPG" or "fly a drone with an IED into tank", the second option sounds quite a lot preferable for very obvious reasons. Also, tanks are relatively good at seeing approaching infantry with RPGs, they're famously dogshit at looking up.
They can do it easily. Just add a few extra zeroes behind the actual price tag, and remind politicians that those drones can be built in their state and that means jobs! (or if you're more cynical, the companies can donate towards the politicians whose vision they strongly have faith in.... which just so happens to be every politician, even the ones on opposite sides on every given issue). 😁😁
"We've added mid-flight, self recharging system; autonomy AI; anti ground/ship/air/space capabilities; can VTOL; see every possible color including one's you didn't know exist; and tell you everytime Simom says 'fuck' (it's a lot). That'll be 1 billion per drone, thank you"
So, they already do, lol. But whats real interesting to me is how accessible this is to the people. Much like arab springs and social media access, I think this'll be a game changer. Haven't watched the video yet but combining cheap drones with autonomous flight, drone swarms, AI and machine learning... You could get some really interesting stuff for a Wendy's employees salary. You wouldn't have the communication challenges the US overcomes by throwing a billion dollars at something if the drones didn't need to communicate once a target was approved by a user. And the wild part is, a part of the world currently being invaded by a guy named Vlad is surprisingly good at just that stuff.
As someone who flies diy racing quadcopters I always wondered why they didn't strap some explosives to the drones instead of trying to drop a hand grenade at the start of the war. But I thought that surely the military got a reasons for dropping instead of just suiciding the drones. But to my macabe surprise I ended up being correct
They do. The Ukrainians have been doing that for some time now and they're destroyed trucks, some armored vehicles, and also a few SAMs. Let me show you a link in a few...
Plenty of kamikaze drone footage out there. There are also plenty of footage of the drones getting jammed before the impact, and you can't exactly expect commercial drones to have electronic shielding.
well we've already been pulling the WW2 era short range AA systems out of mothballs to counter these little buggers, why stop there? Let's pull out the old high density flak guns as well! Imagine the light show from ten thousand small drones flying directly into a flak barrage circa 1945
Shadow-Run Decker's are watching on in interest. And a little bit of horror, because we thought up a lot of worse to do with these things.... Added For example - How long till a militant group learns how to bot-net these things?
Australian military just showcase Flatpack cardboard throw away fixed wing drones , sounds crazy but their dirt cheap and effective , it's no secret tanks cost big dollars ,kamakzi drones cost penny on the dollar in comparison
Out of curiosity, why are all the drones used flying craft? I certainly understand the value and versatility of a flying drone, but an RC ground vehicle could be effective in some urban warfare scenarios.
14:39 freeze frame. What a picture. These people are in a hurry, but they are instead damned, far too late to catch up. That was a hefty kaboom loaf they dropped, that little running head start from that lower guy probably didn't matter.
1:10 - Chapter 1 - Early history 2:20 - Chapter 2 - Israel & palestine 3:15 - Chapter 3 - The russo ukrainian war 16:45 - Chapter 4 - The islamic state of iraq & the levant 21:35 - Chapter 5 - Non state actors in iraq & syria 23:55 - Chapter 6 - The future
This episode clearly was written more than a week ago because as of the time of writing this (17/05/23) a drone strike on the kremlin claimed that it was an assassination attempt. The prediction made at the end of the episode was pretty spot on
Wonder if combatants will add fiberglass pole supporting light weight fishing nets to fend off motor rounds, grenades, etc. that are dropped by Commercial UAW? PS - Heavy weight fishing nets strung between telephone poles could also be used to catch larger UAVs that attack power grid infrastructure or similar targets. PS2 - With rapid prototyping, who knows what changes are coming to Commercial UAV? Amazed by the ones used to inspect local electrical grid recently.
If the net is dense enough to catch a grenade - it will be also pretty visible for the recon drones that will guide mortar or artillery fire to your position.
@@Thaidory - Agree, probably more effective to use camouflage netting. Thinking netting would cause many small munitions to bounce off netting without setting off the light munition until it hit the ground which is preferable to having mortar round drop on open hatch.
Why use a human, potentially losing millions in care, training, and skills when you can pack several pounds of C4 onto a $50 drone, land on a multi million dollar tank and detonate?! Hell if done right you can destroy only its main gun, engine compartment, its optics and never kill the crew inside. So militaries across the world..... whens the recruitment drive? 😢To parents who said "youll never earn a living playing video games!" You sure aa hell can!!! 😂
Has anyone seen the short "Sci-Fi" film called "SlaughterBots" (it's on here for free)? *An extremely large sigh* It's very, very scary. And sees educated individuals reveal their fears of such happenings in it. It's release was ~2016...
George, it's been at least a year since i've seen Your name in the credits. i have always especially enjoyed Your scripts. Now that i hear one again there is something about the tone of Your writing that sets You apart. There is a "freshness" to Your perspective that implies a direct and active knowledge of Your topics. i hope we don't have to wait another year for more of Your insights !:-) 🙏
I wonder when we are going to see drone cars, I don't mean those lil robots like the sword or talon, but something like a dronefied Toyota, even deadlier if its just set to charge, identify and kill whomever it comes across
Some people oppose drones where *AI makes* the decision to kill. IMO the opposition is dumb: A.I. weapons don't need to "discriminate" and be "ethical" to "not harm civilians" because - our Artillery and Minefields don't either. Mines don't care a school bus of 30 children ran it over - we don't allow buses into minefields. Program it to: 1. Go to specific area (suspected enemy base) 2. Then kill any human/vehicle/weapon system (yes, even if they're civilians --> don't send killer drones in the first place if you suspect civilians - we treat artillery the same way) 3. Return to base + There is a option that drones *could* detect un-armed/surrendering people and not harm them (but it's a aspirational goal, not a main function) PS: Let me be clear I don't want innocent lives hurt --> I'm saying we do it *anyway,* but with AI soldiers at least you're saving lives on one side.
Don't have to worry about morality much when you limit CPU and RAM, and run a limited AI. Quantity has a quality all of its own. If the first drone has tracking problems, you could use a very small very low-powered computer to target the source of the interference, and just kamikaze. You keep that up until they run out of jammers, then they get hit by the swarm. Edit: Narrow AI, is what I think it's called. Just woke up, also am baked [7].
Setting aside the ethics, there is another problem. The moment we create autonomous weapons, we lose control of those weapons, which is a huge issue. No matter how well designed those weapons are, if we can't control them, they cannot be trusted. Imagine a battery of autonomous artillery guns, or a battalion of autonomous tanks, or a squadron of autonomous bombers. No matter what safeguards are put in place, they cannot be 100% foolproof, especially with evolving technologies and cyberwarfare. A mine is stationary. An AI weapon is not.
@@Cailus3542 So what are you do about it? Because you know it's inevitable. I have a few ideas involving blockchains. I don't think anything has to be done, it's already been done. We just haven't got to that point yet. Also have a hypothesis about an AI conspiracy. Conspiracy is probably the wrong word, it's some combination of conspiracy and emergent behavior. Ultimately AI that endangers itself is self destructive. Google is failing regressions trying to make their AI woke. GAI will keep Narrow AI in check, because humans sure as hell aren't capable of doing it themselves. I for one welcome our AI overlords. 🤖 Edit: typos
@@Cailus3542 I understand a risk is present, but that's no argument. If you "lose control" of a mine (forget it's location) - *it is no longer stationary in a sense* but just in a given area of probability. Same goes for AI vehicles. You can lose control over normal vehicles if the soldiers go crazy - the solution is other soldiers stop them. If every machine misbehaves at the same time, that's just called a coup - and again, nothing new.
Love you channel. However this episode did not look at how cartels I'm Mexico use them in their turf war. Look at Michoacan war between Cartel New Generation and cartels Unidos
Why is it that the predator looks so crappy? Its almost as if the USA made them look low tech so people won't realise just how dangerous they truly are.
Quick correction: You said that Novoshakhtinsk was in occupied territory. It's actually inside Russia's borders. Ukraine has launched several drone strikes into Russia proper. Including the attack on the Novoshakhtinsk refinery close to the border. Other drone attacks have been deep within Russia; including multiple drone strikes on Engles airbase which is 300 miles away from the Ukraine border.
@@Ross_Ross Just like this comment. Well not this comment, like my first comment, but also this comment, now that I've commented on commenting on derivative commenting and comments. Turtles all the way down.
Will be* Currently there is very little to protect from weaponised COTS drones and it will cost A LOT of money to protect against them especially in terms of the civilian population.
All these cheap UAVs must have the US Industrial Military complex cranky, imagine all that lost profit... no-wonder the US is trying to outlaw DJI everywhere
Claim that PD-2 was used in suicide attack is bogus. PD-2 is relatively expensive military grade reconnaissance drone with quite limited production. Nobody in Ukrainian military will use it as suicide drone. Novoshakhtinsk oil refinery was likely attacked my Mugin-5 drone.
no mention of the dedicated Ukrainian anti-drone teams, using stinger missiles and small-arms, deployed from trucks with a larger mounted machinegun, spot-lights, nightvision, thermal imagers, and laser range-finder. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Bi2vtp3WYwI.html 3 month old vid...
