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Comment by patcheudor | Hacker News Reader

I recently built an acrobatic FPV hexacopter and given its abilities to carry a payload as well as quick flight in close quarters it stuck me as the perfect weapon. Even without cellular or satellite communication to it, the thing has a 1.5 km line of sight range. Why spend billions on the F-35 when you could drop a swarm of these on some insurgents, each with a few grams of explosive. Have a pilot direct the swarm then once close enough to the target(s) have other pilots pick-up quadrants or even individual drones. Get close to the target(s) and trigger the explosives on the drone. It's likely possible to get the component cost easily below $1000 each. Even at $10,000 or $100,000 each, it would be a cheaper alternative to programs like the F-35.

If the US isn't developing them, then others will. The thing that is quite scary is that this technology is available and here today with all the components necessary shipped from China.

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I'm constantly reminded of "Kill decision" by Daniel Suarez that I read last year based on a recommendation here.

It plays these ideas (cheap, autonomous) out for some quite interesting reading, only it is the bad guys who are in control.

"Bad guys" is based on perspective anyway

Hardly. "Enemy" is a matter of perspective, but there are actual "bad guys", regardless of what side I'm on.

As a simple illustration, if you were a holocaust victim at Auschwitz, the Nazi regime is your enemy, even if you're passive in your resistance, as many were. The Nazis are also the bad guys. Even though you are the Nazis' enemy, you are not the bad guy. The bad guys are the ones murdering millions.

Often in conflicts, both sides are bad guys (for example, warring criminal gangs). The term "bad guys" doesn't necessarily mean there are "good guys" opposing them.

> The Nazis are also the bad guys. Even though you are the Nazis' enemy, you are not the bad guy. The bad guys are the ones murdering millions.

The Nazi perspective was that Jews were destroying their race and stealing their birthright.

From our perspective, that is, of course, idiotic. But idiots don't see it that way.

As DannoHung said, a lot of the nazis genuinely believed they were the good guys. Obviously what they did was horrible, but the point is that you have to assess the actions of a group like that keeping in mind that it's just composed of a bunch of individual people. And people can be persuadable, stupid, and not very far along in their ethical development (especially the very young people who are enlisted to fight).

When you consider how malleable the human mind is it's hard to take terms like "good guys" and "bad guys" seriously. Everyone grows up in their own environment, with their own perspective and traumatizing experiences. There are many people around the world who see the US as the bad guys, even though I think our intentions are noble and we obviously don't go around systematically murdering millions of people as efficiently as possible because of what they look like.

If you just mean "bad guys" to describe a group of people doing unethical things, then I agree with you but I disagree with the phrase. It just makes me think of little boys playing cowboys and indians. It's not a very thoughtful phrase.

> warring criminal gangs

Why are criminal gangs assumed to be the bad guys here? Do you know the varied history of different gangs in the US? You might be surprised at what you find.

I Googled "warring criminal gangs", here's the first result. It's a great example of the kind of evil-fighting-evil I was describing.

http://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2015/10/05/44538223...

artursapek, DannoHung:

Thanks for your thoughtful replies. Notice though, that you've both affirmed that the Nazis did in fact do (really) bad things. You've also affirmed that the bad things they did comported with their general ideology. It was not the case that they were characteristically decent folks with a few bad apples in the bunch. It is for these reasons that I described them as "bad guys".

I think you've both missed a subtle distinction, however, and that is that there are bad things regardless of what I think about them. For example, if I were a rapist (I'm not), and if I thought rape was wonderful (I don't), what would you say to someone who said, "well he likes rape and that's just his perspective"? My guess is you would (correctly) say something akin to "yes, that is his perspective. But his perspective is wrong. Rape is wrong, he's wrong for doing it, he's wrong for liking it, and his belief that it's fine is incorrect, like believing in a flat earth." And like a belief in a flat earth, simply believing the wrong thing doesn't tell us that there is no correct view. It only tells us the person is wrong in the view he holds.

If there is no real standard of right and wrong as a distinct, discoverable feature of reality, we can never be opposed to anything on moral grounds. The most we could ever say about slavery, racism, rape, the holocaust, and anything else we know to be bad is "I don't like it, but that's just my perspective". Taken to its logical conclusion, this only leaves us with a might-makes-right world but not a moral one.

artursapek, I completely agree that "bad guys" is a term that is often used carelessly. Maybe this is even a good reason to avoid it conversationally. But when discussed in a thoughtful, precise manner I do think it stands on its own merit.

A good recommendation, thanks for passing it along.

There's really no driving force or threat for the military to innovate in these small counterinsurgency wars. The military has established a status quo and is very comfortable with its current operations. When you start utilizing F-22s to conduct ISIS strikes just to demo the efficacy(inefficiency) of the platform it shows "winning" the war perhaps isn't the top priority.

You hit a part of the military that really upsets me and I feel garners virtually no discussion. As a former F-18 pilot, I saw this first hand, as the military spent $billions on using jets to target insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan when Super Tacanos [1] would have been 10 times cheaper and more effective. Super Tacanos were requested by the Special Ops community but big Navy/AirForce/MarineCorps shut the program down. The military (and government in general) will spend every penny in the budget and then ask for more even if cheaper, more effective alternatives exist. The military-industrial complex needs curtailing and Americans need to ask why no government agency ever comes in under budget.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embraer_EMB_314_Super_Tucano

To answer your last question, it is simply that there is no incentive for them to do so. If they don't use all their budget, it will be reduced the next year.

What makes the weapon you described any better than something like this[0]? Even if we decided to use hexacopters like you described, you still need a vehicle to deliver them, you aren't going to be flying from the US to Syria or wherever on a 3S LiPo.

[0] http://www.raytheon.co.uk/capabilities/products/sdbii/

I don't use 3s LiPos so I wouldn't expect the military to in a weapons system. The self-guided cluster bombs are still mostly dumb weapons at the end of the day. Multi-rotors allow for much more precise targeting, especially in close quarters urban fighting which is common today. In terms of delivery, there are many options, including delivery just like the cluster bombs. They are very flexible in that regard. From a deployment and final "mile" perspective, my hex as an example has up to an eight to one power to weight ratio with a 4s and the battery will last up to 30 minutes if I don't mind destroying the battery. Most of us that fly between the 5-10 minute mark do so to keep our batteries from going much under 80% to extend their total lifetime to avoid blowing $32 every flight.

Honestly, for just about every modern warfare scenario the US gets engaged in I have a tough time not envisioning a multi-rotor being the soldier of choice when it comes to fighting. It's also interesting to consider that if you are a nation who's thinking about entering the military game to fight terrorism, this is the way to go. It's fairly inexpensive and as a bonus would be highly demoralizing to your enemy.

> Honestly, for just about every modern warfare scenario the US gets engaged in I have a tough time not envisioning a multi-rotor being the soldier of choice when it comes to fighting.

I'm sorry but you're just kinda off the deep end here. Multicopters are great and all as an aid, but they are not a replacement. There is _no_ way they can do the vast majority of missions people do. You can't talk with locals build relationships to gather intelligence with copters, but you can with a couple soldiers walking on patrol. There 1000's of other examples.

Carefully chosen language on my part:

"soldier of choice when it comes to fighting."

Once you've got your intel, know where your target generally resides and are going to strike, instead of cluster bombing, send in some multi-rotors.

>There is _no_ way they can do the vast majority of missions people do. You can't talk with locals build relationships to gather intelligence with copters, but you can with a couple soldiers walking on patrol. There 1000's of other examples.

You are right, predator drones are so much better at these things than hexacopters could ever be!

Even without purpose built weapons attached, a 400g UAV with 3200g max thrust potential can do some serious damage at top speed! Multirotors are fun, but "flying lawnmower" is not an uncharitable description!

Email in profile if you ever want to chat about building, flying or racing.

Oh you don't use 3S you use 4S, I see. ;) Seriously though, I don't know, I see multirotors as being a reconnaissance tool if anything, modern missiles are pretty much mini jet planes, and in my mind they'd beat a rotorcraft every time for stuff like ground attack.

And nothing is inexpensive when its for military use, some of the drones they currently use are basically foamie RC planes with some smart features, and the unit cost is still well into tens of thousands of dollars[0]!

Also, the reason I mentioned delivery is because you said "Why spend billions on the F-35" - evidently the multirotor idea requires a solid aerial platform that keeps the pilot safe just as much as the guided bombs currently do. Although in the future I could imagine this being done from larger drones similar to the Predator/Reaper.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AeroVironment_RQ-11_Raven

The F35 isn't being developed solely to combat insurgents, though it'll likely fill that role at some point.

The also plan a urban warfare module for the F35? At least the vertical take off module would make some sense then.

Is a couple of grams of even a high-explosive anything more dramatic than a firework?

Yes. 100g of additional weight really doesn't impact my multi-rotor in a significant way that would make it less effective as a weapon. 100g of Semtex is far more dramatic than a firework.

Poisonous stings instead of explosives

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