Five Russian jets have been blown up by Ukraine in the past three days, as Britain said drone attacks on targets within Russia were being launched from inside its own territory.
With respect to grenades from drones… you might be right if the Russian tankers didn’t have the turret hatch open practically all the time because of how little air circulation they get.
They’re so uncomfortable in their tanks they’re dying from a weapon they should be nearly immune to.
I mean, it has already happened. Definitely unmanned (there are articles), I want to say out of combat (I vaguely recall hearing about a video of that), and maybe even in combat.
But it is well worth catching that I Did a Thing video where he drops sharp metal spikes on a car from a drone… if only because a lot of the Ukrainian drones look EERILY similar to that setup (I don’t think Alex has spoken to his analytics the past year). Dropping from even a dozen meters in the air is REALLY hard to aim. Let alone high up enough that people wouldn’t hear the quad rotors.
Which is the reality. Just sealing them up in the depot when people aren’t inside more or less negates the ability to attack them there. Hell, putting a canopy over the tanks already gets you a lot of the way there (and is something you would generally want to do for surveillance reasons anyway). As for getting armor in convoys on the way to a battle? After a while you get used to having people listen (and competent countries can use electronics for that) and everyone buttons up the MOMENT anyone hears or sees a drone coming in low enough to aim a grenade or a brick of C4. Taking out trucks is a lot more effective at that point (and likely still delays the convoy to prevent it from being effective).
As for in combat? My understanding is that driving with the hatch open is less about poor ventilation (although, they have that) and more about the doctrine being that a tank commander needs to be able to see all around them. Which is similarly negated with modern technology and cameras. Maybe you can damage the cameras and sensors but those are already placed in a way to have high survivability if the tank gets hit with an RPG anyway.
Which gets back to what I was saying. A tank on city streets is fucked. Even people with grenades are deadly at that point. But a tank on a ridge or even in an open field supporting an attack (or just shelling a town for daring to protect Josh Peck) will have enough open ground and alert troops supporting it that the drone won’t have any chance of threading the needle and taking out the armor with a grenade or even a brick of C4 taped to it.
The reason that aircraft are particularly vulnerable is… they are particularly vulnerable. Even an A-10 is not meant to stand up to sustained small arms fire and grenades. So you don’t need a direct hit through an open hatch anymore and just dropping even two or three grenades from twenty meters up is probably going to take a plane or chopper out of commission for a few days.
I think you’re underestimating just how loud a tank is, you aren’t likely to hear a drone over it, and during combat operations you probably aren’t shutting down the tank when you could be fired on at any time.
Crew comfort, keeping the tank sealed and the crew inside the tank has historically been an issue. Famously its the reason that the British Challenger tanks have tea pots inside… the crews kept hopping out to have a cuppa.
Grenade like munitions get the job done and Ukrainian’s have proven on the battlefield that they’re vastly more accurate than artillery.
You don’t need to trust me on this, there are dozens of videos of drones taking out Russian tanks by dropping explosives through the top hatch on combat footage subs.
Russia is uniquely incompetent and were not at all prepared for a “near peer” war.
But drones are incredibly easy to detect, once you put the effort in. Yes, tanks are loud. But a high pitched drone rotor is still going to make noise. And microphones connected to a raspberry pi that can run a few filters can extract that noise. At which point someone on support yells “Button up” and everyone closes their hatches… and the troops around the tanks become mush. And, as time goes on (and people realize this threat), that gets integrated into the senor suite of the armor themselves.
Similarly, Western tanks have a lot more climate control so that they may even want to stay buttoned up while part of a convoy and the like. But, if not, that is where the sensors come into play.
At the end of the day? There is likely at least one example of someone an Abrams out of combat by going full Matthew McConoughey with a metal pole into the… turbine. The reality is that this is so unlikely as to not be a factor and is largely avoided through other practices (because if you are close enough to leap out of a helicopter and drive a spike into something… you are close enough to throw anti-tank grenades or fire a shit ton of RPGs).
It is just that russia continue to not employ even decent practices.
Also, just as an aside. No, a grenade dropped by a drone is not more accurate/precise than artillery. Again, dropping shit from a dozen meters in the air (likely closer to two dozen if you don’t want to be immediately spotted) is not precise in the slightest. Whereas modern artillery tend to have very advanced ti-83 calculators coupled with electronics in the fins (!) to help guide them down.
Where drone mounted grenades do have the advantage is that the pilot is usually very close by (assuming consumer drone and not a military drone where they are in Vegas) and can potentially respond to direct feedback from the boots on the ground. And they are likely part of said boots’ unit to the degree that there is very little delay between wanting a grenade and getting a grenade.
We’ve seen quadcopter drones destroy Abrams tanks operated by the Iraqi army. The truth is that any shaped charge explosive designed to destroy armor is going to go right through the top armor of any armored vehicle, from the leopard one to an Abrams to a t90. They only have a couple of inches on top.
With respect to grenades from drones… you might be right if the Russian tankers didn’t have the turret hatch open practically all the time because of how little air circulation they get.
They’re so uncomfortable in their tanks they’re dying from a weapon they should be nearly immune to.
I mean, it has already happened. Definitely unmanned (there are articles), I want to say out of combat (I vaguely recall hearing about a video of that), and maybe even in combat.
But it is well worth catching that I Did a Thing video where he drops sharp metal spikes on a car from a drone… if only because a lot of the Ukrainian drones look EERILY similar to that setup (I don’t think Alex has spoken to his analytics the past year). Dropping from even a dozen meters in the air is REALLY hard to aim. Let alone high up enough that people wouldn’t hear the quad rotors.
Which is the reality. Just sealing them up in the depot when people aren’t inside more or less negates the ability to attack them there. Hell, putting a canopy over the tanks already gets you a lot of the way there (and is something you would generally want to do for surveillance reasons anyway). As for getting armor in convoys on the way to a battle? After a while you get used to having people listen (and competent countries can use electronics for that) and everyone buttons up the MOMENT anyone hears or sees a drone coming in low enough to aim a grenade or a brick of C4. Taking out trucks is a lot more effective at that point (and likely still delays the convoy to prevent it from being effective).
As for in combat? My understanding is that driving with the hatch open is less about poor ventilation (although, they have that) and more about the doctrine being that a tank commander needs to be able to see all around them. Which is similarly negated with modern technology and cameras. Maybe you can damage the cameras and sensors but those are already placed in a way to have high survivability if the tank gets hit with an RPG anyway.
Which gets back to what I was saying. A tank on city streets is fucked. Even people with grenades are deadly at that point. But a tank on a ridge or even in an open field supporting an attack (or just shelling a town for daring to protect Josh Peck) will have enough open ground and alert troops supporting it that the drone won’t have any chance of threading the needle and taking out the armor with a grenade or even a brick of C4 taped to it.
The reason that aircraft are particularly vulnerable is… they are particularly vulnerable. Even an A-10 is not meant to stand up to sustained small arms fire and grenades. So you don’t need a direct hit through an open hatch anymore and just dropping even two or three grenades from twenty meters up is probably going to take a plane or chopper out of commission for a few days.
I think you’re underestimating just how loud a tank is, you aren’t likely to hear a drone over it, and during combat operations you probably aren’t shutting down the tank when you could be fired on at any time.
Crew comfort, keeping the tank sealed and the crew inside the tank has historically been an issue. Famously its the reason that the British Challenger tanks have tea pots inside… the crews kept hopping out to have a cuppa.
Grenade like munitions get the job done and Ukrainian’s have proven on the battlefield that they’re vastly more accurate than artillery.
You don’t need to trust me on this, there are dozens of videos of drones taking out Russian tanks by dropping explosives through the top hatch on combat footage subs.
Russia is uniquely incompetent and were not at all prepared for a “near peer” war.
But drones are incredibly easy to detect, once you put the effort in. Yes, tanks are loud. But a high pitched drone rotor is still going to make noise. And microphones connected to a raspberry pi that can run a few filters can extract that noise. At which point someone on support yells “Button up” and everyone closes their hatches… and the troops around the tanks become mush. And, as time goes on (and people realize this threat), that gets integrated into the senor suite of the armor themselves.
Similarly, Western tanks have a lot more climate control so that they may even want to stay buttoned up while part of a convoy and the like. But, if not, that is where the sensors come into play.
At the end of the day? There is likely at least one example of someone an Abrams out of combat by going full Matthew McConoughey with a metal pole into the… turbine. The reality is that this is so unlikely as to not be a factor and is largely avoided through other practices (because if you are close enough to leap out of a helicopter and drive a spike into something… you are close enough to throw anti-tank grenades or fire a shit ton of RPGs).
It is just that russia continue to not employ even decent practices.
Also, just as an aside. No, a grenade dropped by a drone is not more accurate/precise than artillery. Again, dropping shit from a dozen meters in the air (likely closer to two dozen if you don’t want to be immediately spotted) is not precise in the slightest. Whereas modern artillery tend to have very advanced ti-83 calculators coupled with electronics in the fins (!) to help guide them down.
Where drone mounted grenades do have the advantage is that the pilot is usually very close by (assuming consumer drone and not a military drone where they are in Vegas) and can potentially respond to direct feedback from the boots on the ground. And they are likely part of said boots’ unit to the degree that there is very little delay between wanting a grenade and getting a grenade.
The main reason for tank crews(at least the commander) to open their hatches is not for ventilation, but for visibility and situational awareness.
We’ve seen quadcopter drones destroy Abrams tanks operated by the Iraqi army. The truth is that any shaped charge explosive designed to destroy armor is going to go right through the top armor of any armored vehicle, from the leopard one to an Abrams to a t90. They only have a couple of inches on top.