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Hacker News
there's a better way for 100% savings
just completely exit like Afghanistan
and remember all this military hardware eventually ends up in the hands of police departments domestically, next decade is going to be wild
$21 TRILLION spent on militarization 2001-2021
* https://ips-dc.org/report-state-of-insecurity-cost-militariz...
imagine how much by 2031, at least double
ps. they are still executing fishermen without trial off Venezuela at a million dollars a pop
by ck2
Ok, all the negatives aside, focused on silver linings. I am musing how it's good that the US is finding this out now, and not in a really big conflict on it's own home territory in which it cannot get out of (ie an invasion).
Yes, the world seeing her weakness could increase the chances of someone trying (or wanting to). But I think this will help spur on a defense startup and spending spree.
by maerF0x0
Makes sense, drone technology has come an insane distance since these were developed.
Probably the biggest learning from the Ukraine war alone is the effectiveness of cheap drones. It was suspected for years but hadn't been put to the test yet.
The defense industry has spent the last 40+ years grooming the DoD into thinking it costs $30mil/unit to produce missiles and drones. They should have rejected any of the bids, but being fueled by massively excessive taxes in the USA, they don't have to answer to any sort of efficiency or profitability.
These things should cost less than a Toyota Camry.
by exabrial
I’m no military expert by any means but US appears to be obsessed with destroying some super important target to win, like they did with killing Iran leaders only to find out that new leader replace the perished.
The same with the other stuff, they have super important radar and super important ships that need to be defended and a failure creates irreplaceable loses. Iran on the other hand, just like with their super important leaders lost all its “super weapons” like destroyers and the drone ships and yet again brought USA to its knees.
Maybe USA has more fundamental problems, not just drones. Maybe the problem is the obsession of wonderweapons for destroying wondertargets.
It is fascinating that there are so many movies revolving around the US president, as if he has some ability that no one has and you can’t simply elect a new one if the enemy gets him.
Maybe the desire for concentration of power and seeing everything through that lens is the issue?
by mrtksn
> The Defense Innovation Unit notice called for drones capable of carrying many different sensor and weapons payloads up to 2,800 pounds and flying with a combat radius of at least 2,300 nautical miles—or 8,000 nautical miles on a one-way strike mission—while executing the same missions that the MQ-9A Reaper drone currently performs for the US military
I feel like they might be taking the wrong lesson from this. The Reaper costs $30-50 million precisely because its mission profile is to deliver 3,500 pounds of payload over 1,000 nautical mile radius.
The cheap Iranian and Ukrainian drones these are increasingly competing with are only delivering 50-100kg of payload - which is plenty to blow shit up, and doesn't require a big, expensive, reusable airframe.
by swiftcoder
There are ~350,000,000 of us. When I read we spent $1B, I think about how I'm responsible for $3 of that. It doesn't matter considering the ~$117,550 of the national debt I'm responsible for. It palls compared to the $3,000 a year in interest towards the national debt I'm responsible for.
What boggles my mind is that I make coffee at home because I'm frugal. I guess it is good the government and DoD are seeking cheaper alternatives also.
My favorite interview question: If I gave you a swarm of autonomous drones, what would you do with them?
There is a group in South Florida who stand watch over turtle nests on the beach to ensure the hatchlings make it to the ocean instead of instinctively moving towards the street lamps or the bright hotels. I would use drones to hover over the nests to detect if the turtles hatch so people don't have to stand there.
What would you do?
by dataviz1000
I worked on the control systems for Predators and Reapers back in the mid and late 00s, and the inefficiencies around process were enormous. Safety is extremely important, so you expect some slowness as a result, but it got pretty extreme. I remember one time having to do 6 weeks of testing around a one-line code change because a "helpful" dev fixed a small bug that had no practical impact. Yet because it changed the release build hash, we had to go through a full acceptance test. As you can imagine that incentivized only fixing important bugs, and even those we had to consider whether it was worth it or not. As a result there were a hole pile of bugs that we (and customers) ended up just living with.
On a separate note, I'm curious as to whether AI is making an inroads in that space. I would imagine very minimal, if at all, but very curious.
by freedomben
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- Hacker News
- there's a better way for 100% savings
just completely exit like Afghanistan
and remember all this military hardware eventually ends up in the hands of police departments domestically, next decade is going to be wild
$21 TRILLION spent on militarization 2001-2021
* https://ips-dc.org/report-state-of-insecurity-cost-militariz...
imagine how much by 2031, at least double
ps. they are still executing fishermen without trial off Venezuela at a million dollars a pop
by ck2 - Ok, all the negatives aside, focused on silver linings. I am musing how it's good that the US is finding this out now, and not in a really big conflict on it's own home territory in which it cannot get out of (ie an invasion).
Yes, the world seeing her weakness could increase the chances of someone trying (or wanting to). But I think this will help spur on a defense startup and spending spree.
by maerF0x0 - Makes sense, drone technology has come an insane distance since these were developed.
Probably the biggest learning from the Ukraine war alone is the effectiveness of cheap drones. It was suspected for years but hadn't been put to the test yet.
- The defense industry has spent the last 40+ years grooming the DoD into thinking it costs $30mil/unit to produce missiles and drones. They should have rejected any of the bids, but being fueled by massively excessive taxes in the USA, they don't have to answer to any sort of efficiency or profitability.
These things should cost less than a Toyota Camry.
by exabrial - I’m no military expert by any means but US appears to be obsessed with destroying some super important target to win, like they did with killing Iran leaders only to find out that new leader replace the perished.
The same with the other stuff, they have super important radar and super important ships that need to be defended and a failure creates irreplaceable loses. Iran on the other hand, just like with their super important leaders lost all its “super weapons” like destroyers and the drone ships and yet again brought USA to its knees.
Maybe USA has more fundamental problems, not just drones. Maybe the problem is the obsession of wonderweapons for destroying wondertargets.
It is fascinating that there are so many movies revolving around the US president, as if he has some ability that no one has and you can’t simply elect a new one if the enemy gets him.
Maybe the desire for concentration of power and seeing everything through that lens is the issue?
by mrtksn - > The Defense Innovation Unit notice called for drones capable of carrying many different sensor and weapons payloads up to 2,800 pounds and flying with a combat radius of at least 2,300 nautical miles—or 8,000 nautical miles on a one-way strike mission—while executing the same missions that the MQ-9A Reaper drone currently performs for the US military
I feel like they might be taking the wrong lesson from this. The Reaper costs $30-50 million precisely because its mission profile is to deliver 3,500 pounds of payload over 1,000 nautical mile radius.
The cheap Iranian and Ukrainian drones these are increasingly competing with are only delivering 50-100kg of payload - which is plenty to blow shit up, and doesn't require a big, expensive, reusable airframe.
by swiftcoder - There are ~350,000,000 of us. When I read we spent $1B, I think about how I'm responsible for $3 of that. It doesn't matter considering the ~$117,550 of the national debt I'm responsible for. It palls compared to the $3,000 a year in interest towards the national debt I'm responsible for.
What boggles my mind is that I make coffee at home because I'm frugal. I guess it is good the government and DoD are seeking cheaper alternatives also.
My favorite interview question: If I gave you a swarm of autonomous drones, what would you do with them?
There is a group in South Florida who stand watch over turtle nests on the beach to ensure the hatchlings make it to the ocean instead of instinctively moving towards the street lamps or the bright hotels. I would use drones to hover over the nests to detect if the turtles hatch so people don't have to stand there.
What would you do?
by dataviz1000 - I worked on the control systems for Predators and Reapers back in the mid and late 00s, and the inefficiencies around process were enormous. Safety is extremely important, so you expect some slowness as a result, but it got pretty extreme. I remember one time having to do 6 weeks of testing around a one-line code change because a "helpful" dev fixed a small bug that had no practical impact. Yet because it changed the release build hash, we had to go through a full acceptance test. As you can imagine that incentivized only fixing important bugs, and even those we had to consider whether it was worth it or not. As a result there were a hole pile of bugs that we (and customers) ended up just living with.
On a separate note, I'm curious as to whether AI is making an inroads in that space. I would imagine very minimal, if at all, but very curious.
by freedomben