Satellites are rare, planes won't spot sneaky units and can be shot down anyway.
Drones with good thermals at say, company level are a complete change of the meta.
IGI-111
God was a dream of good government.
No_one 3mo ago
You already know what I'm going to say: the variants that have good optics are not kamikaze unless they're purpose built to destroy HVTs and are therefore not what we're talking about.
Smart artillery shells are a boutique implement, anything at that price is cool tech that's situationally useful but not meant for mass.
And my concern is that the nature of war is mostly defined by mass.
You're right to say that company level reconnaissance has been greatly improved and that it's a game changer. I would never deny (relatively) cheap optics isn't an important development.
Everyone is saying this is why Ukraine is an artillery war, because both sides have almost total information.
But again none of that is really what we're talking about when we talk about autonomous warfare. Because none of that changes the game in ways that create a novel equilibrium. We're just back to a state where defense has a large advantage and firepower beats maneuver. Which is certainly a change, but not one that has much to do with automation or robots in character.
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Notes -
They're already in use.
The recon drone has good thermals, costs less than smart artillery shells, the fpvs have shitty. (looks like 320x240) or less.
Lancet UAV has a thermals variant.
Satellites are rare, planes won't spot sneaky units and can be shot down anyway. Drones with good thermals at say, company level are a complete change of the meta.
You already know what I'm going to say: the variants that have good optics are not kamikaze unless they're purpose built to destroy HVTs and are therefore not what we're talking about. Smart artillery shells are a boutique implement, anything at that price is cool tech that's situationally useful but not meant for mass. And my concern is that the nature of war is mostly defined by mass.
You're right to say that company level reconnaissance has been greatly improved and that it's a game changer. I would never deny (relatively) cheap optics isn't an important development. Everyone is saying this is why Ukraine is an artillery war, because both sides have almost total information.
But again none of that is really what we're talking about when we talk about autonomous warfare. Because none of that changes the game in ways that create a novel equilibrium. We're just back to a state where defense has a large advantage and firepower beats maneuver. Which is certainly a change, but not one that has much to do with automation or robots in character.
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