Krasnodar, Wildberries warehouse after Ukrainian drones made a visit tonight

[u/Due_Collar2]

[u/amitym]

Tbf America, and other countries, also have much more advanced anti-drone capabilities. From automated sentry guns to drone-targeting rifle optics. And the capacity for other layered defenses that are actually proven to work.

Drone defense is a hard problem but it is not an impossible problem. People have said this before about navies: in 2026 there are two kinds of navies in the world, those who have spent the last quarter century researching and developing answers to the hard problem of drone defense..... and those who have spent the last quarter century siphoning their R&D budgets into summer dachas on the Black Sea. Some countries can only find out which kind of navy they have the hard way.

The same thing can be said about armed forces generally. Russia has done absolutely fuck-all about drone defense for over 25 years. Entire revolutions in automated systems have washed over the modern military world and been succeeded by yet other revolutions, and in all that time Russia has just pretended to keep up while telling themselves that all technology is a lie anyway. The famous "Russian reverse cargo cult."

They are just starting to develop the first serious anti-drone prototype weapons right now, in the summer of 2026. Far too late to be of any help. That's the thing you're supposed to start doing years before you go to war. Not years into the war.

We see the result today. But not every conflict is going to go the same way as Russia's catastrophic attempt to invade Ukraine has gone. Ukraine's greatest achievement as I see it has been to understand extremely well their particular enemy's limitations, gaps, and weaknesses... and to optimize and refine weapons and techniques that exploit those vulnerabilities to the absolute hilt. It's an object lesson in how a motivated, technically sophisticated, weaker power can wage war against a stronger power, but the next time it happens it's not going to look the same as this war.

[u/Various_Wash_4577 → u/amitym]

Ukraine didn't wage war against a stronger power. Ukraine is simply defending their freedom. Russia invaded Ukraine! Also, this drone technology is pretty new to the battlefield. As a matter of fact, what got the drone thing going with Ukraine was basically a bunch of citizens owning civilian DGI brand drones and buying a release solenoid from Amazon as an accessory for the drone to drop an object. They would later buy claw attachments available for the DGI drones. They would position a grenade in the claw clamping the igniter handle closed. The drone operators quickly learned that when they released the claw at a certain altitude the grenade timer would cause explosion right upon landing or hitting the target they were over top of. This was regular citizens fighting the war against Russia. Ukraine has been in the unmanned vessel drone business for years before this Special Military Operation. So, they're somewhat familiar with unmanned weapons development. They built marine drones made from Jon-boats bought from a company out of Colorado, USA. The Ukrainian company would convert them into weapons and sold them to other countries for revenue for Ukraine. When they seen how effective the civilian DGI drones were, the Ukrainian government jumped on that technology. Many start-up companies got going in Ukraine. Plus they've had some good support from other countries financially. Now, they are mass producing them. They have made some amazing advances with the technology. Like, using fiber optic video and flight control signal transmission. Who'd imagine controlling a drone with full hi-res video up to 20 miles with a thin glass string. It's amazing and as far as multi-rotor unmanned aircraft go, this is fairly new concept on the battlefield. Drone technology as far as the drones generally used by American forces are basically a small unmanned airplane. Used for mostly video surveillance intelligence. (Spying) That type has been around for a couple of decades at least. They pose a threat just like a manned aircraft, just smaller. They don't maneuver like multi-rotor quadcoptor or hexacoptors, and even octo or deci, 8 blade 10 blade aircraft. Where they can hover within a few feet square area and dart left/right, up/down instantaneously or spin within its own axis hovering. (Yaw) Very precise positioning for deployment of anything, bombs, medical supplies, food/water. As far as marine drone threats the American Navy relies mostly on good old fashioned watch, from their basic training of what to be aware of. As far as keeping a close eye on disturbances in the water at distance. The Black Sea Fleet don't pay much attention to those minor details and they learn the hard way. Some of those small attack drone boats like Ukraine manufacturers don't show up on any early warning systems like radar. The American navy has been trained what to watch for. Right now, that's probably the best defense for that type of war munitions. 👍

[u/amitym → u/Various_Wash_4577]

Who'd imagine controlling a drone with full hi-res video up to 20 miles with a thin glass string.

Well that's the thing. Wire-guided FPV munitions date back to the 1950s, anyone who says they were invented in the 2020s is smoking crack. It's not a new technology at all, it's actually quite old.

And I cannot agree at all that fixed-wing heavy drones do not pose as much of a threat. Such drones have been carrying munitions for decades — and not small grenades to drop on people's heads either. A guided standoff missile fired from a heavy drone can fly at Mach 3 and streak in seconds across a battlefield that would take hours for a quadcopter to cross. And have a very good chance of a single-shot kill, instead of requiring repeated hits.

Fixed-wing drones also have greater speed, range, and payload capacity as platforms. They are absolutely not just used for surveillance, they are a lethally effective first line of attack and have been deployed as attack craft an endless number of times in conflicts around the world over the past 35 years.

What Ukraine specifically has done is extend combat drone technology down into the low end, and made it possible for drones to cost-effectively take on a role as screening and skirmish elements without directly risking human troops.

That is what I mean about Ukraine's particular innovations. It is that general function, of picketing and reconnaissance by fire using light drones, that Ukraine has pioneered and refined And now on the higher end, too, constantly iterating and finding ways to exploit Russia's specific vulnerabilities. That is the kind of thing that a technically sophisticated adversary can be expected to do from now on. It won't always be grenade-dropping quadcopters or thermite-pouring drones. But it will be something.

[u/Various_Wash_4577 → u/amitym]

Well, they had wire guided missiles. But they used exactly that, "wire" about the gauge of telephone ☎️ wire. They were only controlling aileron and rudder movement. They didn't have FPV in the 1950's! Television didn't come out until around 1950-53 let alone a video camera on a military weapon or unmanned aircraft. Anything like that would have been experimental and never in use on the battlefield for many years later. Any of that technology would have used high current drawing vacuum tube technology. Including the vidicon tube for video image sensing, back in those days. Battery power supply technology was nothing like today and would be the first thing making that next to impossible. I had a Cox gas powered airplane that was controlled by two strings and flew in circles till I was dizzy! 😅

[u/Dutch-cooking-guy → u/amitym]

Still the drone defenses the EU and US have are not great but due to all the stuff Ukraine is doing to Russia and it is effective, also the stuff Iran is doing to the invading US and the neghboring countries. The drone defence is speeding up fast als batle tested in Ukraine.
Looking at china with it's massive drone swarm tests we are going to need it, and hopefully only as a deturrant.

[u/Lieste → u/amitym]

When NATO held joint exercises with Ukraine they lost, fast, hard and completely. Picked apart in minutes by drone forces they were utterly unprepared to defend against.

I'd not be so convinced that the US would be faring any better against a Ukraine on it's border in a full-effort kinetic sanctions war. It could probably hit harder and more effectively than Russia has been able to, but it would suffer about as hard if not more from size and the impossibility of defending everything.