
ISIS Drone Dropping Bomblet on Abrams Tank Is a Sign of What’s to Come - nradov
http://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/7155/isis-drone-dropping-bomblet-on-abrams-tank-is-a-sign-of-whats-to-come
======
ralfd
Video:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7X2ORSlPJ10](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7X2ORSlPJ10)

I guess this was inevitable as quadcopters and drones got cheap/mainstream,
but still unsettling to see the high quality video recordings. And how does
one defend against that? Suicide bombings of marketplaces or a shooting spree
are bad enough, but at least the terrorists have themselves a deadly cost.
Cheap 3D-printed drones dropping explosives from above are something else.

[http://www.popularmechanics.com/military/weapons/a24056/iraq...](http://www.popularmechanics.com/military/weapons/a24056/iraqi-
officials-isis-drones-mosul/)

> "The bombs have hand-painted numbers on them, and some of the components
> show a honeycomb structure which could mean they were 3D printed. If so,
> then insurgents may be able to share their designs over the internet and
> newcomers can print their own guided bomb without any experience."

~~~
ams6110
> how does one defend against that

With one's own drones, programmed to crash into the attacking drones kamakaze
style, or maybe armed with mini gattling guns or other weapons to shoot down
enemy drones in flight. Might also have the assistance of other drones flying
higher in surveillance mode, like AWACS. All kinds of possibilities.

~~~
andromeduck
Directed energy weapons

~~~
cyberferret
Except they aren't _that_ narrow of a beam. If that drone was hovering 20ft
over that tank and you aimed an EMP blast at it, you will likely disable some
of the tank's systems too.

~~~
Declanomous
Chemical Laser is probably a better option than an EMP.

~~~
grogenaut
Or you know a shotgun. Been killing birds real good for over a hundred years.
All the links pretty much worked out.

~~~
andromeduck
shotguns have terrible range

~~~
dTal
Compared to the blast radius of something you can fit on a drone?

------
fernly
The scariest, science-fiction-coming-to-pass quote from this article:

"in the future, these cheap, highly available tool/toys turned into weapons
will be used in greater numbers and, eventually, will feature autonomous
flight coordination, also known as swarm technology."

Just picture a swarm of 50 or 100 drones suddenly emerging over a building and
coming at you (or your tank) like a flock of killer bees. Note that they would
NOT need conventional radio control from an observer station -- the kind of
radio that currently you try to jam in order to disable a drone. All they need
is to communicate between themselves, which could be done in a variety of
ways, even optical (blinking IR light on the leader, etc).

This level of swarm AI could be implemented in a RPi right now.

~~~
RangerScience
Look up "Kill Decision" by Daniel Suarez

------
cyberferret
Just need a squadron of wedge tailed eagles to form a counter drone strike
force. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hr-
xBtVU4lg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hr-xBtVU4lg)

~~~
autokad
trained eagles, i love it!

------
yakult
One thing we might see more of in the future is drone-placed IEDs. Steal an
Amazon delivery drone, mix up some home explosives and you're practically
there. Drones remove one of the largest barriers to IED use, which is that
people get shot when placing them. Drone + sniper rifle, sneakily deployed on
tall buildings, would be effective for similar reasons.

Lastly, you know what suddenly becomes a lot more effective when you don't
have to worry about getting killed by your own payload? Chemical weapons.

~~~
maxerickson
Are drone delivered chemical weapons all that different tactically than
remotely or timer triggered chemical weapons?

~~~
yakult
It's mobile, for one. You can cover and threaten a big area with a drone,
which means a tiny amount of chemicals go a long way, and that solves the
other main issue with chemical weapons.

Main goal would be to sap morale: a few grenade-sized bombing runs and you
force everybody to wear chemsuits under the desert sun.

~~~
vacri
Chemical weapons are particularly difficult to use en masse outside of
enclosed places like a subway.

~~~
yakult
Conventional chemical weapons are not cost-effective, because you have to hit
a big area and cause big effects for it to be worthwhile, since both delivery
and payload are expensive. With drones you can shoot/drop grenade-sized
payloads that hits just a few people, barely more effective than an actual
grenade. The goal is to sap morale and force lopsided reactions (such as
forcing the opfor to wear chemsuits, or invest in cleanup teams).

------
ridgeguy
This is a real problem for critical infrastructure. As only one example, this
makes it very cheap to damage thousands of power substations. These are
usually above ground and unhardened.

Substitute your own favorite critical infrastructure, including freeways at
rush hour.

------
lukeman
These videos are presented as real but look completely fake and staged.

First we see a winged glider being launched, but then we somehow switch to
quadcopters dropping bombs with remarkable accuracy. I mean, they've even gone
to the trouble of adding video game overlays at various points.

Please use as much skepticism with ISIS propaganda videos as you would with
the next leaked video from Magic Leap.

~~~
autokad
like many video pieces, they often collage things together. however and
unfortunately that tank one looked pretty real. not sure where the'd get a
spare m1 to film that

~~~
lukeman
They're known to have captured many of them from the Iraqis. Here's one such
report: [http://www.military.com/daily-news/2015/05/20/isis-
captures-...](http://www.military.com/daily-news/2015/05/20/isis-captures-
hundreds-of-us-vehicles-and-tanks-in-ramadi-from-i.html)

------
gozur88
I'm skeptical you could get a hobbyist-size RC airplane to fly with a big
enough bomb to take a tank out of action.

~~~
cyberferret
As a psychological weapon, this has changed the rules dramatically. You can
imagine that combatants in the firing zone now have an added thing to think
about.

Not just watching buildings for snipers and scouring the road ahead and beside
them for IEDs, they now have to have attention aloft to see/hear drone
activity as well.

Spreading (the) enemy attention is highly effective. And don't discount low
power explosives. A couple of friends of mine who are in the army have said
that most weaponry is designed to maim rather than kill. They explained that
if you kill a soldier, you take one man out of the battle (and make his
comrades angry & vengeful to boot). If you wound him badly - you take two men
out - the wounded soldier, PLUS the guy who has to stop what he is doing to
care for and patch him up.

~~~
anigbrowl
Very true. Plus don't underestimate the disastrous effect on morale of having
'your' weapons turned against you, and finding yourself in a victim position
that you have indirectly imposed upon others on many occasions. Once American
soldiers start coming under drone fire regularly, they will be massively
demoralized by the realization that much of the world considers the US to the
be The Bad Guys.

~~~
cyberferret
I agree with your assessment here. However, I didn't want to voice it because
it would lead to a less that savoury place, like other drone threads have.

But I do appreciate the irony that a weapon when wielded from one side is an
effective platform for swift and immediate justice & retribution, but when
eventually wielded by the opposing side, is suddenly an evil, sneaky and
underhanded thing indeed.

~~~
anigbrowl
I've got very conflicted feelings about it myself. On the one hand, precision
drone bombing is preferable to the older approaches of using bombers or
conventional ICBMs. The ideal would be to simply stop bombing people, of
course, but that would only last until such time as there were a substantial
terrorist attack on American soil. As long as military engagement remains a
political reality, I prefer it come in as low a cost in human life as
possible. But it's arguable that the second-order costs end up being higher.
At the same time I think it's inevitable given the available technology.

~~~
gozur88
The US Army has a project they're calling " Autonomous Rotorcraft Sniper
System" that's designed to kill just the person they're after. It's
essentially a tiny remote controlled helicopter with high-precision sensors
and a stabilized rifle.

They started flying a prototype in 2009, but I can't tell from public sources
if they ever got it to work.

------
Mao_Zedang
This is the turning point many have been talking about with drones, this will
reduce the personal cost of terrorist attacks in the west, chilling.

------
haser_au
Some of the counter-measures shown seem to rely on the aircraft needing
connectivity with the remote control in order to operate. For example, some of
the videos show that by blocking RF, the aircraft slowly descends to the
ground.

I see this as a problem, because many drones/UAVs can be configured with
waypoints and "loss of connectivity" logic. You can configure drones to fly a
set of waypoints and continue doing that, even if connectivity is lost.

This is really concerning, and I think the article points this out saying that
countermeasures are way behind the attack vectors.

------
kchoudhu
How hard would it be to electrically "sanitize" an area with EMP before going
in?

~~~
sfifs
do you have a viable EMP design that's not a nuclear weapon? Better patent it
quick - you'll reap billions.

~~~
Terr_
They already exist.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Explosively_pumped_flux_comp...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Explosively_pumped_flux_compression_generator)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counter-
electronics_High_Power...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counter-
electronics_High_Power_Microwave_Advanced_Missile_Project)

~~~
sfifs
interesting! didn't know such are being developed! TIL

------
pizza
Quadcopter bomber drones might be new, but isn't this like the maker-
simulacrum of extant predator drones?

[https://www.versobooks.com/books/2294-buda-s-
wagon](https://www.versobooks.com/books/2294-buda-s-wagon) <\- this book for
more discussion on "poor man's air force"

------
jonmc12
Seems like some drone radar and trained eagles might be effective vs
quadcopters -
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kAYVyj6vf3Y](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kAYVyj6vf3Y).

------
cavisne
Scott Adams (dilbert creator) called this in 2004
[https://www.amazon.com/Religion-War-Scott-
Adams/dp/074074788...](https://www.amazon.com/Religion-War-Scott-
Adams/dp/0740747886/ref=pd_sbs_14_t_2?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=ECBA9W7HSN0S9R3BAFGT)

~~~
haser_au
Here's the appropriate Dilbert strip:

[http://dilbert.com/strip/2014-01-28](http://dilbert.com/strip/2014-01-28)

------
employee8000
This seems like propaganda but I can't figure out if it's US propaganda or
ISIS propaganda.

~~~
mindslight
Does it matter? They have the exact same aim.

------
int_19h
Both sides have been actively using cheap off-the-shelf drones in Ukraine as
well, although it seems to be mostly used for recon and sniper spotting there
- I haven't heard about any cases like in this video.

------
lettergram
I feel like there are quite a few ways to counter drones better than lasers.
Even nets, ropes, or guns work better than lasers...

Soon we will have counter drones buzzing around I'm sure.

~~~
nradov
Launching nets or ropes can only work at very short ranges. The projectiles
are too slow to hit a small, agile target.

~~~
germinalphrase
Small plane that quickly strafes drones with silly string-like incapacitating
weapon? Wouldn't need to sustain aim, just pass near by.

~~~
anigbrowl
That's a bit like using a tank to hunt rats - it would work in theory, but the
rats are a lot more agile than the tank. What are you gonna do, blanket whole
neighborhoods in silly string? How are you gonna tell the difference between
birds and droves while also flying the plane and avoiding ground fire from
people who don't like you? Any anti-drone countermeasures are likely to
involves more drones.

~~~
germinalphrase
I was actually thinking more along he lines of an RC plane. Something
launchable by a soldier but that would be quicker linearly than a drone.

~~~
anigbrowl
Oh I see - I had misunderstood you to mean something like a crop duster. I'm
sure we'll see a rapid evolution/arms race involving everything from machine
learning to rapid prototyping to autonomous swarming behaviors, and more.

------
FrancoDiaz
Hah, I'm sure those M-80s that ISIS is dropping really messed up that Abrams.

~~~
flukus
The Abrams can be replaced easy enough, The Tanker takes years of training.

------
notpc
It will only become easier and easier to do great harm to many people. And so
there is no number of terrorists that is an acceptable risk.

We can't allow these savages to keep developing their capabilities, growing
their numbers, and inspiring sympathizers around the world. The only option is
to eradicate ISIS and similar groups from the face of the Earth. We must
strike fear deep into the hearts of any who would think to do us harm.

~~~
Taek
That's more or less how we got here in the first place. The tech isn't going
away, and genocide is not a great way to make friends.

~~~
notpc
"It is better to be feared than to be loved, if you cannot be both."

Muslims are the primary victims of terrorists groups. They would be very happy
to be rid of the likes of ISIS and Al Qaeda.

> _That 's more or less how we got here in the first place._

I don't agree. We got here because Western institutions and ideas were causing
dramatic and rapid social change in the Muslim world, and inspired a violent
counter-reaction.

~~~
john312
They are also the primary denizens of these groups.

How much money does Saudi Arabia etc spend on combatting these groups again?

~~~
Wildgoose
How much money does Saudi Arabia spend on SUPPORTING these groups again?

------
msimpson
Wait, does this mean B&H is an arms dealer?

------
hellbanner
America military industrial complex doesn't want a clean win. If they did,
then they'd have to start another war to keep the hellmachine churning.

~~~
jMyles
I suspect you are being downvoted not because you are wrong (I happen to think
you are right), but because your comment usurps this fairly specific article
to discuss a fairly general qualm.

Is there something specific about this happening that you think advances your
point?

~~~
hellbanner
This part of the article:

"Yet the hard truth is that the Department of Defense has had plenty of time
and warning to do just that. In fact, they spent many millions of dollars
looking at the problem, but no hard action was really taken to develop
countermeasures, which makes their scramble for countermeasures now all that
more frustrating. "

If they wanted a clean win, then countermeasures would have been researched
already.

Instead, in 2017 we get articles about how "drone warfare is just the
beginning of things to come". Instead it should have been "Opponents attempt
drone warfare, subverted by 10 years of defensive research revealed today".

