A swarm of cheap drones will be able to take out a 100 million dollar fighter jet and its highly trained pilot in a matter of seconds. I hate to say it, but something I’ve loved since childhood, fighter planes piloted by brave knights of the air will be obsolete when faced by comparatively cheap autonomous drone swarms.
These majestic symbols of military might will take their place in history with the cavalry charge after the invention of the machine gun, the archer after the rifle and all out war itself with the advent of the hydrogen bomb, ICBM and mutually assured destruction.
So be it, the purpose of the military is to defend its people from aggressors and anyone intent on world domination who certainly has visions of drone swarms darkening the skies of their target countries with deadly drones designed to kill anybody in the way of the aggressor country’s plans for domination. The way to fight this is with allocation of funds commensurate with the task at hand, and the best way to do this is to have a branch of the military specifically tasked with dealing with this new challenge.
Naming it Drone Force would send a message to powers intent on using this tech, that defensive systems, counter measures and offensive response drones would be well in place should someone cross the Rubicon of AI warfare.
Then there needs to be an international treaty against using such technology in a first strike understanding that treaties are meaningless unless backed by force, hopefully with these two things in place: deterrence and international consensus, we can successfully stave off an AI apocalypse the way we’ve so far avoided nuclear Armageddon.
To be clear, the proposal is to specifically create and name a new branch of the military “Drone Force” to achieve the desired message of deterrence.-- doctorremulac3, Dec 09 2023 I'm sure many (if not all) countries already have such a department in their militaries.
So this is really just a naming / marketing proposal.-- pocmloc, Dec 09 2023 No need to separate the drone operators from the squad and platoon level and make a new “Force.” All you need is the training that allows any small unit to make use of drones. Every member of a squad is not a machine gunner, but they all know how to fire on. The same is now true at the squad level in UAF units, with spotter drones provided by the army or donated by patrons. Specialized FPV squads (ex. K-2) train their noobies themselves. Soon every rifleman will get drone training along with their basic. If jet pilots are becoming obsolete due to UAV slaved drones, how far behind can the mechanized infantry be?-- minoradjustments, Dec 09 2023 //So this is really just a naming / marketing proposal//
As clearly stated several times and with great specificity.-- doctorremulac3, Dec 09 2023 So I was agreeing with you.-- pocmloc, Dec 09 2023 Thank you. :)-- doctorremulac3, Dec 09 2023 On a side note, they already use mirrored surfaces to protect drones from lasers.How long do you think it will be before drones with mirrors are used to purposely reflect lasers at targets which are not in direct line of sight?-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Dec 09 2023 //How long do you think it will be before drones with mirrors are used to purposely reflect lasers at targets which are not in direct line of sight?//
I think this would be
a) difficult to stay on track long enough to do damage to hard targets b) illegal to cause damage to soft targets, i.e. human eyeballs. c) a waste of time if what you want is a targeting spot - just put a laser on the drone.-- Loris, Dec 09 2023 The scariest concept to me is micro drones, billions of tiny armed drones that never sleep, hiding, pouncing, unrelentingly attacking by the billions every minute of every hour day and night. Self replicating and part of a system to overpower any defense by sheer force of numbers.-- doctorremulac3, Dec 09 2023 [doc] See Neal Stephenson “The Diamond Age.”-- minoradjustments, Dec 10 2023 Checked out the synopsis, looks very interesting. I’ll get the audio, thx.-- doctorremulac3, Dec 10 2023 //just put a laser on a drone//
How powerful a laser can you put on a drone?How powerful a laser beam can you bounce off of a drone with an orientable mirror or serious of drones with orientable mirrors?
It's coming. You've been warned.-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Dec 13 2023 random, halfbakery