> All weapon systems that consist of an expensive vehicle and an expensive-to-train crew are being re-evaluated against drones right now.
I don’t think that drones are necessarily the only answer to the “expensive weapons with expensive to train crews” problem.
Expensive weapons lead to cost boondoggles and economic asymmetry, eg $10k in modified COTS drones can defeat $MM in conventional armored vehicles.
We should be re-evaluating our weapons systems economically as well as doctrinally.
For example, would our Navy be more effective with thousands of relatively inexpensive small platforms that could do commerce raiding, interdiction, air defense and so forth (destroyer type jobs) than with our expensive and rare large surface combatants?
> For example, would our Navy be more effective with thousands of relatively inexpensive small platforms that could do commerce raiding, interdiction, air defense and so forth (destroyer type jobs) than with our expensive and rare large surface combatants?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeune_%C3%89cole was all about this... In the 19th century, when a couple of innovations (torpedoes, explosive shells) made it look like smaller ships could do enough damage that big ships were just a waste of money. In their case, they were wrong and their ideas were surpassed by further technological advancements (aircraft carriers).
Small ships with missiles and drones and unmanned submarines could be a decently powerful combination. You can't project power with those though, and around half the idea behind the US' carrier fleet is power projection.
And then a cheaper APS round disables your $10K drone, while a direct energy weapon for dollars of electricity can destroy swarms in one go. The car and mouse nature of weapons technology has always existed. Even at the advent of tanks there were anti tank weapons. That didn’t mean they were useless.
the Navy already has a problem with command and control (training, corruption, scandals, collisions, accountability - from delivering ships on time to the starlink wifi situation)
adding more things to control will cause more problems .... especially in peace time
I don’t think that drones are necessarily the only answer to the “expensive weapons with expensive to train crews” problem.
Expensive weapons lead to cost boondoggles and economic asymmetry, eg $10k in modified COTS drones can defeat $MM in conventional armored vehicles.
We should be re-evaluating our weapons systems economically as well as doctrinally.
For example, would our Navy be more effective with thousands of relatively inexpensive small platforms that could do commerce raiding, interdiction, air defense and so forth (destroyer type jobs) than with our expensive and rare large surface combatants?