This Sky Sentinel is exactly facepalm concept I was mentioning. AI optical-radar driven heavy machine gun, for Shahed and small drones too 🙈
Make 40mm AGL with air burst for small drones, similar to HnK/Valhalla Midgard, with 500 m range. And 40 mm autocanon with airburst for anything large, fast, whatever, with 10 km range. All same optics and AI. Maybe a little bit less precision required as airbust will create a 1 to 1.5 meter killzone cloud.
Ski Sentinels will not work. They would abandon it after tests. Heavy machine gun would heat up and lose precision. Effective distance would be max 500 metres, really 200. The expenditure of ammo per one hit would be significant. As I said elsewhere -- 40mm AGL air burst as a most universal means, both anti drones and anti infantry, same 200 to 500 m range, but much higher effectiveness, and less strict requirements to precision. As for Shaheds, they are mostly now cruising at 2000m. While recon wings 3-4 kilometres. For those you still need to develop 40mm autocannon airburst. Those 2 are most versatile solutions to most of the current battle situations.
Armors can be easily protected with small shrapnel charges (hundreds of them could be placed at very small cost) at the perimeter.
Another way to tackle this. Imagine a very simplified drone, that is sitting on your armor surface. It does not have motors, propeller, or big cumulative charge, of throttle control unit (ECU), of very large capacity battery. But has instead only a camera, termal camera, microphone (or 4) and 4 front directed shrapnel charges. And it has a simple program that, if camera AI "sees" drone closer then 2 meters, it would blow one of the shrapnel charges, depends on which direction incoming drone is located. If it is out of its zone of control it will do nothing. And then simply cover the armor with such modules all over. You can connect them into Bluetooth network to coordinate.
Each block would be half the price of the attacking drone. And would be able to hit up to 4 incoming drones.
Like any such APS, it introduces a new danger to personnel and equipment in the vicinity, and probably couldn't act fast enough to intercept with a 2 meter window, given the high speed of current drones.
True, but debatable. If you bring infantry on top of your armor then of course. So mode of operation needs to change.
One Israeli system uses combustible casing and no shrapnel to minimize risks. Blast is enough to ruin propelled drone.
And this is more for a tank, APC should have an AGL with air burst as main weapon turret. With low recoil it can be installed virtually on any vehicle.
Regarding range 2 m is trigger range, simple camera would recognise such threat 20-30 meters away. Speed is relatively slow, say 30 meters per second. 100 ms (3 m) reaction time is more then enough for system that does not have moving parts.
I don't buy it..yesterday's tech. China's revitalization of the Australian "metalstorm" prototype is the way forward, I think, for it's ability to kinetically intercept at a greater (safer) distance and fire multiple volleys in any direction.
I am not selling. This solution is too far stretched, with no clear benefit. It does not have a benefits of reusing existing technologies, procedures and universality of air burst. But up to you.
Ukraine has such a weapon (https://youtube.com/shorts/-Dk_vu3W5OQ), it was tested in the field. Maybe effective even against artillery shells, under certain circumstances. But: expensive, bulky, power-hungry, unreliable in terms of weather. So best used for stationary, well powered positions, like cities defence. But neither British nor Ukrainian device is fully even there for cities defence.
Yes, and other providers, like Nammo. But this a kind of million dollar technology at the moment. But there is nothing so obscure about it. It is simply a programed timer detonator. More simple then currently used magnetic detonators Magyar birds unit using in their 70$ mines. It needs to be simplified and put on mass production since its versatile.
China seemed quite happy to sell weapons to both sides, and I suspect they only cracked down on Ukrainian sales and cozied up further to Russia because they were afraid of Trump engineering a reverse Sino-Soviet split. Luckily for China, Trump is a moron.
On the contrary no, I think Putin was *very* receptive of the idea of reaching some sort of mutual understanding with Trump's USA to not piss in each other's soup.
Russia wouldn't outright oppose China because that would be dumb (China is their neighbor, while the USA is not). But they would probably agree to do the same for China as China did for them, which is absolutely nothing.
Trump actually managed to fumble the Russia-China ball much harder than I expected, though I can't say I'm *surprised*.
Neither Russia or China "fears" anything about Trump or his schemes. Both are well aware of US intentions to belatedly attempt to drive a wedge between Russia and China, and unlikely to fall for any US gambits under Trump or the next cretin to follow him.
Thanks for the report. Do you have any info regarding the Link 16, as I've seen on Ukrainian aviation-centric telegram channels, that Ukraine got license on the CRS System Interface, that according to the, includes the Link 16.
Secondly, do you have any info about Ukrainian claim about shot down plain on 31 of May?
Excellent write up. I really hope the UA Ground Forces Commander's resignation is rejected and instead they tell him to fire any 10 people he wants to on the spot and then let him keep going. At this point, you need to put a nasty asshole in charge of this effort to root out the bad habits and back him to the hilt.
Australia's defunct "metalstorm" project of some 15-20 years ago would seem to be a fruitful path to follow in terms of drone ddefence. I believe the Chinese have revived it, or something similar.
Taurus will prove just as ineffective as the previous "wunderwaffe" that have utterly failed to alter the course of the conflict toward it's inevitable conclusion. No single weapon system can do so, certainly not a measly 150 projectiles operating under GPS spoofing and jamming conditions.
Well on the post you shared on Ukraine about Indian media.
They are still living in cold war hangover,they still think Russia is a reliable partner and should not be angered. Moreover I have a believe that Indian government want to have a strategic neutrality and this conflict is hardly discussed in Indian media.
This false impression has resulted in the perception that Russia might be a good guy in this conflict.
But a lion share of people believe that Russia is a China vassal state.
Saw that interview.. I have skipped his part the moment he started praising Musk.100% he is a Muskarat , talking about star link, zelensky is a dictator and Ukraine is terrorizing citizens these are straight out of Musk dictionary.
Excellent question. IMHO it is because of his coalition with the SPD. Big parts of the party (SPD) don't want to deliver Taurus to Ukraine. Rember all those feet dragging and lip service starting with the war?
This is the political price März has to pay to be chancellor with the help of the SPD. For changing the law regarding additional national debt with the old parliament he had to help Baerbock to get to the UN0.
This is part of the endemic political corruption in Germany.
Thanks Don and Tom. A special request from me: anti drone drones. E.g. Wild Hornets' "Shark" - right now its a FPV human piloted system, apparently AI targeting is being developed for it. My questions: Could and should it be made into an IADS capability? With integrated radar and interaction between command system and drones? If yes, what models/technologies would this involve? What would its capabilities be and are there any technological hurdles to overcome (current capability gaps), or is the development pathway straightforward- i.e. just requires will and resources to achieve? If implemented en masse, what effect on the air war would it have?
This Sky Sentinel is exactly facepalm concept I was mentioning. AI optical-radar driven heavy machine gun, for Shahed and small drones too 🙈
Make 40mm AGL with air burst for small drones, similar to HnK/Valhalla Midgard, with 500 m range. And 40 mm autocanon with airburst for anything large, fast, whatever, with 10 km range. All same optics and AI. Maybe a little bit less precision required as airbust will create a 1 to 1.5 meter killzone cloud.
Ahem!
You wrote " They [drones] can be easily fought by even cheaper means then they are. "
These Sky Sentinels cost $150,000 each and that is before you buy the munitions to shoot down $30K Shaheds.
https://www.csis.org/analysis/calculating-cost-effectiveness-russias-drone-strikes
Ski Sentinels will not work. They would abandon it after tests. Heavy machine gun would heat up and lose precision. Effective distance would be max 500 metres, really 200. The expenditure of ammo per one hit would be significant. As I said elsewhere -- 40mm AGL air burst as a most universal means, both anti drones and anti infantry, same 200 to 500 m range, but much higher effectiveness, and less strict requirements to precision. As for Shaheds, they are mostly now cruising at 2000m. While recon wings 3-4 kilometres. For those you still need to develop 40mm autocannon airburst. Those 2 are most versatile solutions to most of the current battle situations.
Armors can be easily protected with small shrapnel charges (hundreds of them could be placed at very small cost) at the perimeter.
Another way to tackle this. Imagine a very simplified drone, that is sitting on your armor surface. It does not have motors, propeller, or big cumulative charge, of throttle control unit (ECU), of very large capacity battery. But has instead only a camera, termal camera, microphone (or 4) and 4 front directed shrapnel charges. And it has a simple program that, if camera AI "sees" drone closer then 2 meters, it would blow one of the shrapnel charges, depends on which direction incoming drone is located. If it is out of its zone of control it will do nothing. And then simply cover the armor with such modules all over. You can connect them into Bluetooth network to coordinate.
Each block would be half the price of the attacking drone. And would be able to hit up to 4 incoming drones.
Like any such APS, it introduces a new danger to personnel and equipment in the vicinity, and probably couldn't act fast enough to intercept with a 2 meter window, given the high speed of current drones.
True, but debatable. If you bring infantry on top of your armor then of course. So mode of operation needs to change.
One Israeli system uses combustible casing and no shrapnel to minimize risks. Blast is enough to ruin propelled drone.
And this is more for a tank, APC should have an AGL with air burst as main weapon turret. With low recoil it can be installed virtually on any vehicle.
Regarding range 2 m is trigger range, simple camera would recognise such threat 20-30 meters away. Speed is relatively slow, say 30 meters per second. 100 ms (3 m) reaction time is more then enough for system that does not have moving parts.
I don't buy it..yesterday's tech. China's revitalization of the Australian "metalstorm" prototype is the way forward, I think, for it's ability to kinetically intercept at a greater (safer) distance and fire multiple volleys in any direction.
I am not selling. This solution is too far stretched, with no clear benefit. It does not have a benefits of reusing existing technologies, procedures and universality of air burst. But up to you.
What about lasers mounted on tanks? Aren't the UK looking into this?
Ukraine has such a weapon (https://youtube.com/shorts/-Dk_vu3W5OQ), it was tested in the field. Maybe effective even against artillery shells, under certain circumstances. But: expensive, bulky, power-hungry, unreliable in terms of weather. So best used for stationary, well powered positions, like cities defence. But neither British nor Ukrainian device is fully even there for cities defence.
No different than current offerings from Oerlikon, Bofors, etc.
Yes, and other providers, like Nammo. But this a kind of million dollar technology at the moment. But there is nothing so obscure about it. It is simply a programed timer detonator. More simple then currently used magnetic detonators Magyar birds unit using in their 70$ mines. It needs to be simplified and put on mass production since its versatile.
China seemed quite happy to sell weapons to both sides, and I suspect they only cracked down on Ukrainian sales and cozied up further to Russia because they were afraid of Trump engineering a reverse Sino-Soviet split. Luckily for China, Trump is a moron.
Why shouldn't the PRC be happy?
While Dumpf is imposing his tarifs, they're establishing themselves in new markets, growing market shares - and earning handsomely.
Even more so because the Russians are really paying 10-20 times more than they usually would.
...and they can say: it's nothing personal. You taught us to be capitalists...
No, I agree with you that they're happy. If Trump had two brain cells to rub together he could absolutely separate the Russia and China "alliance."
Isn't it too late for that (without huge effort and skill)?
On the contrary no, I think Putin was *very* receptive of the idea of reaching some sort of mutual understanding with Trump's USA to not piss in each other's soup.
Russia wouldn't outright oppose China because that would be dumb (China is their neighbor, while the USA is not). But they would probably agree to do the same for China as China did for them, which is absolutely nothing.
Trump actually managed to fumble the Russia-China ball much harder than I expected, though I can't say I'm *surprised*.
Neither Russia or China "fears" anything about Trump or his schemes. Both are well aware of US intentions to belatedly attempt to drive a wedge between Russia and China, and unlikely to fall for any US gambits under Trump or the next cretin to follow him.
China can sit back and watch trump dismantle the government, military, alliances, and they’re not even having to pay him.
Thanks for the report. Do you have any info regarding the Link 16, as I've seen on Ukrainian aviation-centric telegram channels, that Ukraine got license on the CRS System Interface, that according to the, includes the Link 16.
Secondly, do you have any info about Ukrainian claim about shot down plain on 31 of May?
Intending to do so for days already... sorry if the SBU, India-Pakistan, Drapaty etc. are keeping me/us busy... ;-)
Excellent write up. I really hope the UA Ground Forces Commander's resignation is rejected and instead they tell him to fire any 10 people he wants to on the spot and then let him keep going. At this point, you need to put a nasty asshole in charge of this effort to root out the bad habits and back him to the hilt.
Thank you. Second that.
Australia's defunct "metalstorm" project of some 15-20 years ago would seem to be a fruitful path to follow in terms of drone ddefence. I believe the Chinese have revived it, or something similar.
Taurus will prove just as ineffective as the previous "wunderwaffe" that have utterly failed to alter the course of the conflict toward it's inevitable conclusion. No single weapon system can do so, certainly not a measly 150 projectiles operating under GPS spoofing and jamming conditions.
I think Germany et al are aware of that; its more about raising pressure militarily and politically; yes there is no Wunderwaffe
Well on the post you shared on Ukraine about Indian media.
They are still living in cold war hangover,they still think Russia is a reliable partner and should not be angered. Moreover I have a believe that Indian government want to have a strategic neutrality and this conflict is hardly discussed in Indian media.
This false impression has resulted in the perception that Russia might be a good guy in this conflict.
But a lion share of people believe that Russia is a China vassal state.
Saw that interview.. I have skipped his part the moment he started praising Musk.100% he is a Muskarat , talking about star link, zelensky is a dictator and Ukraine is terrorizing citizens these are straight out of Musk dictionary.
I doubt that Ukraine will get Taurus in the near future, maybe not even at all.
Yeah, I agree that this is the signal being sent from Germany. But what's up with that?
You mean why I metioned it? Because in this part there was a picture about possible targets for Taurus missiles.
I mean why does Germany still hesitate to give Taurus?
Excellent question. IMHO it is because of his coalition with the SPD. Big parts of the party (SPD) don't want to deliver Taurus to Ukraine. Rember all those feet dragging and lip service starting with the war?
This is the political price März has to pay to be chancellor with the help of the SPD. For changing the law regarding additional national debt with the old parliament he had to help Baerbock to get to the UN0.
This is part of the endemic political corruption in Germany.
Thanks Don and Tom. A special request from me: anti drone drones. E.g. Wild Hornets' "Shark" - right now its a FPV human piloted system, apparently AI targeting is being developed for it. My questions: Could and should it be made into an IADS capability? With integrated radar and interaction between command system and drones? If yes, what models/technologies would this involve? What would its capabilities be and are there any technological hurdles to overcome (current capability gaps), or is the development pathway straightforward- i.e. just requires will and resources to achieve? If implemented en masse, what effect on the air war would it have?
Alas, my word swapping brain! I meant Sting drone:
https://greydynamics.com/sting-ukraines-shahed-drone-hunter/
https://english.nv.ua/russian-war/ukraine-uses-sting-drones-to-shoot-down-russian-shaheds-during-mass-attacks-50517210.html#goog_rewarded