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Perhaps someone among the Ricochetti can educate me. I keep hearing that while the US and Israel are making great strides against Iran's ballistic missile threat, Iran's drones are a genuine problem. This seems to be borne out by the fact that, as I understand it, the 6 US servicemembers killed were killed in a drone strike. And many of the targets the Iranians have managed to hit, they have done so with drones. I understand that the drones are smaller and easier to launch - about the size of a car or SUV and requiring no launch infrastructure to speak of. The US and Israel have deployed massively expensive Patriot, THAAD, Iron Dome, David's Sling and Arrow anti-missile systems with great success. But the task of defeating a ballistic missile in flight seems orders of magnitude more difficult than shooting down a relatively slow-moving drone. I would think they would be vulnerable to old-fashioned anti-aircraft defenses. What is it that makes them such a problem? Clearly, I'm missing something. What is it?
Discussion (57)
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Quantity of drones can be a problem. I don't know if that's the issue here, but it certainly is in Ukraine. There are always some that get through.
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I'm not an expert on this topic, but I do have aviation knowledge and some technical background, so I'll offer some feedback that might help.
(1) Practically speaking defenses have been built to counter missiles and not drones. However, the Ukraine-Russian War has opened eyes to the cost effective use of drones in war. I think Israel has made progress in anti-drone tech but the USA is still on the back foot playing catch-up. As a result, an anti-drone system and sales has probably not been adequately distributed to US allies and assist for a for on shootout war.
(2) Missiles (especially ballistic) tend to follow a pre-determined path according to physics. This makes them predictable to hit. Drones can maneuver. Drones can fly much lower. (aside from special type missiles)
(3) Missiles better show up on heat traces whereas lawn mower engine powered drones not so much.
(4) Radar and other detection systems likely need to be calibrated to ID drones without having a ton of false alarms. Being non-descript can be a benefit.
(5) the old-fashioned anti-aircraft measures you mention (aka guns frequently) must be mated to new tech ID and auto shooting systems. Unless you can somehow get Arabs to man some WW2 system setup with high skill. I have read about the US military testing such systems. I don't know if they are active however. I do believe the USA already has such systems on current war ships though. I once met a former General Dynamics engineer who helped built a crude prototype autonomous shooting machine post 9/11. It was meant for urban and ground use though. Its initial testing was extremely effective. The Pentagon, he claimed, shut down the program and ordered the prototype totally dismantled after the AI-auto-shooting machine they created was reviewed. Apparently someone further up the chain viewed it as too much as a liability. I recall him mentioning the sensors they build into it being able to impressively distinguish between humans and animals.
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To quote Stalin, quantity has a quality of its own. If you can flood the zone, something gets through. Like the old Space Invaders game, where more and more appear until you cannot get all of them.
Another issue is the golden bb. Someone gets flat lucky, once. That's what seemed to have happened with the Americans killed on the first day of the war.
As the Iranian command structure gets more scrambled, coordinating mass attacks becomes increasingly difficult. That makes it more difficult to flood the zone. You cannot order a mass attack of the density required to get leakers.
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Yeah, the cost angle is a big problem here too. Shooting Million Dollar interceptors to take out $15,000 suicide drones is a big issue. Especially when it takes more missiles than the swarms of cheap drones being released. This is problem that needs to be addressed. The US and its allies need to come up with a more cost-effective solution.
Even if an enemy doesn't score hits, he can still drain your resources and counter weapons for other objectives.
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We used to understand that as well. Sherman tanks were not as lethal as many German tanks one on one. That's not how they were used. We had the capability of manufacturing and deploying thousands more than Germany could at that point in the war. Liberty ships also fit the bill. Make a lot of them and more will get through even as the German u-boats sink a lotta tonnage.
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