This is a missile targeting system which does not require target painting with any active system, thus avoiding lock detection by the target. The system has the following components: - A processing unit which can be carried in a pocket or backpack - A stereoscopic camera which reads the direction the eyes are looking at, which provides the direction to the target based on the operator's location, and the lens shape, which provides the target's distance from the operator. - The launcher has minimal computing capacity and pairs with the operator's processing unit. - The missile, which also pairs with the processing unit.
Besides avoiding early warning to the target, the system also has the advantage of allowing the operator to move away from the firing position while keeping the target locked or move to cover retaining only minimal exposure. This reduces the chances of getting hit by the target firing back in the direction of the coming missile and reduces the chance of being spotted after firing. Another advantage of this system is that the operator can drop the launcher, which improves mobility of the operator, increasing the number of options to get to a safe position.-- PauloSargaco, Mar 18 2022 Command guidance https://en.wikipedi...ki/Command_guidanceall about telling missiles where to go [Loris, Mar 18 2022] Ukraine War: What the West Doesn't Understand EP 3 https://www.youtube...watch?v=K5BAZ2bBUzMNote this is very old information, but the doctrine behind the Russian advance is well-described. [Voice, Mar 20 2022] Interesting.
So you're saying you have a device that knows the direction it's pointing via gps and a simple compass I'd presume, then it judges the angle it's turned to and the focal length to get the target into focus.
Am I understanding this correctly?-- doctorremulac3, Mar 18 2022 There are a significant number of missile systems which use operator visual tracking of the target while in-flight. Older systems used wires (see 'wire guided missile'). Newer ones use radio, or 'beam riding' of a laser. So none of that is novel. You might say that detecting the guidance would warn the target, sure ... but how is /this/ idea communicating with the missile?
The idea of ditching the launcher and still guiding the missile is fine, but realistically that's not something which can be done reliably by someone on the move from a forward position in combat. So you'd need a dedicated missile guidance operative, in close communication with the launch team immediately before missile launch, as well as the missile while in flight. Unless they're doing all that by land-line (or the operator is riding the missile), it's interceptable. And furthermore, it seems like an eye-based tracking system is both going to need more processing power and less reliably score hits where the launch and control are separated from a straight line to the target.-- Loris, Mar 18 2022 Yes, [doc]. I see that there was a proposal from 1993 which is similar to my idea.
[Loris], the idea only proposes a way to track the target without an active signal on the target and removing the need to use the launcher for that purpose. All remaining parts of the process remain the same, namely the communication between the operator and the missile. The system could also be used with a third element as you suggest, much like the ground teams that can be used to paint a target with a laser.-- PauloSargaco, Mar 18 2022 //the idea only proposes a way to track the target without an active signal on the target and removing the need to use the launcher for that purpose. All remaining parts of the process remain the same//
You seem to make two claims: 1) targetting using eye-reading instead of scope-aiming, and 2) taking guidance functionality out of the launcher.
Regarding the first, I have little confidence that you would see an improvement in targeting by an interpreting eyeballs instead of a traditional scope/crosshair aiming approach.
//The system could also be used with a third element as you suggest, much like the ground teams that can be used to paint a target with a laser.//
Laser-illuminating a target has the advantage that the missile can aim itself, while an off-axis eyeball looking at the target doesn't convey range information and hence cannot. You could triangulate using multiple observers I suppose, but I'm not convinced this would be a win in terms of minimising risk.
Regarding the second... I don't have much of a problem with it except that it does introduce extra complexity. Depending on how much of a benefit it gives, it may not be worth it.
Passive (visual) sensing on missiles can already involve them being fed a target image to aim for when they're fired, making them 'fire and forget'.-- Loris, Mar 18 2022 Okay, originally I had thought this was reading eyeballs too then I thought I was misunderstanding it.
There's no benefit from reading an eyeball when you can just aim something. Measuring an eyeball's movement of thousandths of an inch to gauge its aim at something 1,000 yards away isn't going to happen. An eyeball is a big, sloppy, inexact lump of flesh whose elements change size every second. Guess you could insert some kind of readable elements into them but you're still getting more accuracy just aiming something.
I think this might have been inspired by those helmet aiming systems in Cobra attack helicopters, but those are just binoculars attached to remote cameras whose angle matches the movement of the helmet. Neat but not anything particularly magical like reading eyeballs would have to be.
I liked what I thought this was though so I'll leave the bun.
Well, wait, on second thought if you threw image recognition into it you could read the eyes to get the general direction and have it click on tank shaped stuff or whatever. Still not sure what benefit you get though.-- doctorremulac3, Mar 18 2022 //I have little confidence that you would see an improvement in targeting by an interpreting eyeballs instead of a traditional scope/crosshair aiming approach.//
I don't think the intended improvement is in targeting accuracy, but in letting the person launching move away from that place, as long as he can still keep eyes on the target. Although using iron sites (which are capable of communicating with the missile) from other locations would do the same thing and more accurately.-- Voice, Mar 19 2022 I've recently read an eyewitness account which claimed that Patriot missiles aimed at targets in Baghdad could wind around and avoid buildings. This speaks to the idea that eye-tracking might adjust its target. Not sure what the Russians are doing wrong, except everything.-- 4and20, Mar 20 2022 Militarily they are accomplishing their goals.-- Voice, Mar 20 2022 How are you defining their goals? Certainly, they are advancing rather than retreating (albeit rather slowly), but at what point do you think they will have accomplished their goals? Regime change? Expulsion of last Ukrainian forces from the Donetsk and Luhansk regions? Do they have to find and kill all 200-odd Nazis in the Azov Battalion? Arrive at the Polish frontier?-- pertinax, Mar 20 2022 The main goal appears to be a really outrageous forum for Putin to scream "I am angry". Wouldn't it have been easier to just start with the nuclear threats and leave it at that?-- 4and20, Mar 20 2022 //How are you defining their goals?//
Right now it's obviously to capture and temporarily secure territory. Don't get me wrong, I don't think they can win the war. Or rather, I don't think they can hold Ukraine against the ginormous guerilla war that's going to fester for the next 50 years if they don't give it up sooner.
But as far as achieving base level military goals like "move the trucks and troops here and keep them there without dying much", they're accomplishing them.-- Voice, Mar 20 2022 // I think this might have been inspired by those helmet aiming systems in Cobra attack helicopters,
Nope. [Doc], this was inspired by watching the video of an Ukranian soldier shooting a rocket at a tank and remaining completely exposed to maintain the launcher aimed at the tank until the rocket hit.-- PauloSargaco, Mar 20 2022 // I don't think the intended improvement is in targeting accuracy, but in letting the person launching move away from that place
Yes! Thanks, [Voice].-- PauloSargaco, Mar 20 2022 If the enemy knows you are using this system (which they will), a brief flash of light somewhere nearby (that is "safe" for a missile to explode) will distract the observers eye enough to mess it up, unless they have REALLY good focus on the target.-- neutrinos_shadow, Mar 20 2022 I think their aim is to make Ukraine miserable enough to offer them Donbas and Mariupol and whatever other regions are in between Rostov-on- Don and Crimea in exchange for just going away. The rest is just indiscriminate terrorism designed to those ends + whatever bonus goes along for the ride.
We really hate TOW missles in land defense. Pain to deal with packaging.-- RayfordSteele, Mar 21 2022 random, halfbakery