I first noticed it in the early days of the Russia/Ukraine war. Both sides were using basic drones to fly over troops or tanks and drop grenades or bombs. Now both sides are using FPV kamikaze drones to take out targets. A $400 drone built with parts sourced from China and the internet is now capable of taking out a $2 million dollar tank. The scariest part I noticed? There doesn’t seem to be any effective defense against them. They’re too fast, have no heat signature, and realistically too small and nimble for a missile to shoot them down.

The next time I thought about it was when the Oct 7 massacre happened. Hamas used drones to knock out Israeli sensors, which enabled them to cross the border walls. When the IDF launched their counteroffensive, I noticed all their tanks and vehicles now have cope cages installed. These are cages that sit above the vehicle to prevent a drone-born explosive from detonating directly on the vehicle, lessening its potential damage.

And then today I saw this brief video. It’s worth the ten second watch and then scroll through some of the comments. It’s mind blowing. I wasn’t aware of racing drones and how freaking fast they are. Turns out there’s an actual drone racing league that’s televised. The main point though is that a drone like this equipped with a small explosive charge would be near impossible to defend against.

Which makes me wonder, while we spent twenty years in the desert conducting conventional warfare against goat herders… what were we doing to develop drone offensive/defensive strategies? I suspect we’ve been caught with our pants down. I sure hope we have some secret project in the works, although I doubt it. If we had something I’m sure we would have seen it in action in Ukraine.

So here’s the future of warfare – spotter drones flying over the battlefield reporting back enemy action and providing GPS coordinates. Autonomous kamikaze drones flying at nearly 200 mph to take out targets marked by the spotter drones. Or, giant swarms of automated drones to take out targets. And don’t forget, these swarms of drones could be underwater as well to take out ships.

How are we going to defend our troops against that? Signal jamming? Fry everything in area with directed radiation/energy blasts? Lasers? I don’t think we’re ready. I pray I’m wrong.

The robot wars may be coming sooner than we thought. Might want to buy stock in Cyberdyne Systems while you can.