DARPA Shows Concepts for the Future of VTOL Uncrewed Aerial Systems | Hacker News Reader

DARPA Shows Concepts for the Future of VTOL Uncrewed Aerial Systems

darpa.mil

79 pointsjdmark54 comments

It's interesting to see the US still investing billions in maintaining their military supremacy, while its adversaries have been fighting a much cheaper and more effective warfare of information for decades now. The effects are becoming increasingly apparent in the political and social instability we're seeing in western countries.

All the fancy planes and bombs can't save you from your society and government collapsing from the inside out, amid the confusion of not knowing who the real enemy is. The crazy thing is that the US built the perfect weapons (social media) and made them available to its enemies to use as they please, and it still can't figure out ways to stop it.

American society is not “collapsing.” Compared to the civil rights era, the past few decades have been a blip.

What you’re seeing is American society dealing with the fallout of a new gilded age and a minor political realignment - something that has happened before, and will happen again.

We’re still spending money on military supremacy because at the end of the day, only boots on the ground can control territory and every one of our adversaries knows it. That’s why they’re using the information warfare tactics to begin with.

A looming Christofascist dictatorship is not what I’d consider a minor political realignment, but potato potato, I guess

Idk, it's looking better than the ziopsycho control we are under now.

Just so we’re clear and you can be on record with it: you support fascism?

What is "ziopsycho"? There's one hit in DDG, and it's no more illustrative than your comment!

> Compared to the civil rights era, the past few decades have been a blip.

The difference is that in no moment in history have foreign agents been able to influence the psychology of US citizens as much as in the past 20 years. Considering the effectiveness of information warfare, the link between the appearance of these weapons and the effects we would expect to see, and are indeed seeing now, a generation later, is pretty clear to an outsider.

While you are still in disbelief that anything nefarious is happening, and can be in outright denial and even label those who mention this possibility as xenophobic, you will continue to see the progressive destabilization of your system. This is the way information warfare works.

Boots on the ground won't protect you from an invisible enemy.

Here’s an overt example for anyone who doesn’t think this is happening

https://thehill.com/policy/technology/4516261-tiktok-urges-u....

It strikes me that US DARPA has a weird position where the more military advantage can come from concentrated high investments then the US+allies/beneficiaries win. (Ie fewer expensive toys should win against many cheap toys)

If Mil technology is too cheap then US advantage is much lower.

So part of that is just keeping SOTA moving quickly. But also centrally-deployed tech having outsized longevity (things like satellite deployment or AI or the anti-missile battery-type stuff).

For this launching from a larger vessel maybe.

> If Mil technology is too cheap then US advantage is much lower.

Very true. I played with submitting grants for DARPA funding in the late 1990's. C4I and Network-Centric Warfare were big things. I predicted (almost) everything I've seen being used in Ukraine. I stopped when I realized they only wanted things that gave them a competitive advantage with a moat. (That's they way we phrase it in 2024, not what I would have said at the time.) They wanted things that were extremely expensive to make that would be impossible of extremely difficult for our adversaries to counter or replicate. My designs for cheap weapons anyone could build with parts from eBay and hobby stores were not anything they wanted anyone building.

I had DARPA funding for my Phd in the 90s.

While I knew people getting funding for submarine detection and other similar military specific techs, I was funded for pure networking research. They fund a lot of areas, often very much in the pure science (particularly computer science) end of the spectrum.

It's interesting to me how the article mentions the large payload requirement, then the only example of what that payload _could_ be is reconnaissance.

I always find it interesting how and when people or groups emphasize or de-emphasize the "death and destruction" aspect of military equipment

Reconnaissance is a prominent role but is hardly the only thing that these could be used for. What exactly is possible is going to vary a lot between designs but with the right design you can do electronic warfare, acting as a communications node, submarine hunting with sonobuoys, light strike using small precision munitions, light logistics for when someone needs literally 1 or 2 specific parts right this instant, and many other things.

Anduril is not on the list, but presumably wants to compete in the space?

Propeller-driven tail-sitters were ready to be the next generation of military carrier-based aircraft after WW2, but no pilot could safely land them. UAVs do not need pilots to land them; their sensors can point any direction.

The MIC is surprisingly fragile when it comes to longterm stress to the economic system keeping it alive. So important is not how "advanced" a drone is, but how cheap and easy it can be assembled and supplied long after all supply chains collapse. He whos garbage air force circles the wasteland long after all opposition perished we shall crown victor.

Why focus on these huge planes vs lots of tiny autonomous drones? Drones seem to be the future given Ukraine and Iran fighting…

Someone at DARPA is a fan of Ann Leckie's novels

unmanned machines on the land or in the air, that can decide to kill a human, are one of the legitimate existential fears around AI advances right now. source: G7 white robe guy this week

We already have dogs.

Not a very good analogy, we spent thousands of years creating dogs that are very unlikely to attack people. Just imagine the world in which all dogs turn into wolves overnight.

I had a buddy in 2004 from the sister lab (doing strong AI), who was acquired by one of the big military contractors to implement "ATAK" (automatic target acquire kill). The task was mostly solved, as far as the US was concerned, as collateral (civilian) damage wasn't considered important for the deployment scenarios. (Think: total war.)

It’s certainly much easier to build an AI to recognize and eliminate any human vs building an AI that can tell friend from foe

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