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Comment by lutherqueen | Hacker News Reader

How is better communication scary for military? The weapons themselves are

Jam resistant comms are critical for drones, and other precision weapons and their infrastructure. Even if line of sight is interrupted modern drones can return to signal nowadays, relay information, and return to target with corrections. You may not need optical cable anymore

I expect drones will become fire-and-forget in two to three years. They won't be jammable because the pilot is in the drone.

Fire-and-forget drones already exist. They are called missiles.

Missiles generally go from point A and then blow up point b. Are there any missiles that leave base, fly around for a bit trying to identify targets, and if they can't identify any targets then return home?

I said that somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but the line between "drone" and "missile" seems to have gotten pretty blurry with the Ukraine war featuring FPV drones holding a hand grenade that are effectively a human-piloted missile.

Some modern missiles can fly around to identify targets, but they can't return home. They can blow up harmlessly if nothing is a target, though. They can also dodge and weave the way FPV pilots do.

Obviously, "drone" has a much more expansive mission profile than "missile."

Missle is a projectile, propelled by rocket motor. Drone is an aircraft vehicle, capable of transporting explosives or whatever. There is a fat line between drone and a missile, there are different in everything: control, speed, trajectory, weight, flying principles. I don't know how you can say they are even close. Just because both fly and do boom? Then you can say there is a thin line between cow launched from catapult and a missile.

Cruise missiles are missiles without rockets.

A cow launched from a catapult is indeed a missile, if we want to be pedantic.

The term you're looking for is loitering munitions. From Wikipedia: "Some loitering munitions may return and be recovered by the operator if they are unused in an attack and have enough fuel"

You are describing cruise missiles

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