Wednesday, March 23, 2005

Drone Vs. Drone

The Defense Department loves drones. There's some evidence that they always don't work as well as they might, but the DoD loves them dearly nonetheless - with all the tumultuous passion of its proud, headstrong nature - and it wants more. Lots more.

But as Defense Tech notes:

We're not the only ones with drones. China, Russia, Iran, France -- all sorts of enemies of freedom have unmanned aerial vehicles, or UAVs. All in all, "some 32 nations are developing or manufacturing more than 250 models" of drones, according to the Defense Department's UAV Roadmap.
With that many drones coming down the pike, there's only one possible solution: immediate, costly research into a drone-destroying drone. And of course, when you need costly research into a weapon system of dubious utility, DARPA is your best bet.
The Peregrine program will develop and demonstrate a UAV interceptor aircraft that will utilize a dual propulsive power system to provide very high endurance for the loiter and surveillance period, and a very high dash speed for intercept and kill....
And with any luck at all, we should be able to outsource operation of the Peregrine to private firms!

What happens when an anti-anti-drone system is invented - to destroy the drone-destroyers - is a question for another, less festive day.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

What happens when an anti-anti-drone system is invented...

What the hell; let's take it up today. We'll have the anti-anti-anti-drone system, then the anti-anti-anti-anti-drone system, and we'll keep the contracts flowing to the defense contractors.

robin andrea said...

"But as Defense Tech notes:We're not the only ones with drones. China, Russia, Iran, France -- all sorts of enemies of freedom..."

so france is now explicitly an enemy of freedom.

can't we use the killer laser satelites to zap bad drones?

there is that nice kid's song about the lady who swallowed a fly, then a spider....perhaps she'll die.....and on.

dread pirate roberts

Phila said...

DPR,

The Defense Tech guy is just being sarcastic. He has a fairly dry sense of humor.

CW FISHER said...

If we could just get them all to fight over some cornfield it would probably be a good show, but drones will so totally alter the nature of war that it could quickly become us against them. This is verified by the plot lines of every movie made since 1993.

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