Robot Aircraft Carrier Drone on FutureWeapons (Part 2 of 2)

[owazio]

I can see that it works on windows, anytime soon for the Mac?

[v1p3rk1ll]

if i can make an EMP i be a billionaire lol

[leexuanyitym]

skynet is really close

[kiraa12]

skynet is here the machines whr da fuk is conor

[DreamAboutSpace]

Wait is it all computer flown? Like no pilot on the ground flying it ?

[ddnguyen278]

Problem with drones is that they are computers, find the right codes or hack the right systems and you can turn them back on the attackers. If armies go full automation, then the battle will just shift from the grunt to the hacker. It's not how advance your drones are but who controls them. If any nation thinks their networks are 100% secure they are in for a rude awakening hehe..

[rasmasyean]

@ddnguyen278 Maybe, but note that those scenarios are really not that easy to accomplish. Hollywood always shows some 16 y/o taking over all the computers this way. If this were really that easy, the firms that hold all your money, data, and sell you stuff, would not work. BoA, Google, Amazon, would not exist because of hackers. And I'm sure the military is much more secure than these jokers who many started in a basement. Also something to think about when the terminator is born! Oh no! ;)

[SuperRegisteredUser]

@rasmasyean The taliban have managed to intercept the video feed of some UAVs. A country like China could probably easily do signal interception and take over a UAV. If anything it's naive to think you could remotely control anything without there being a huge risk of someone else remotely controlling it.

[rasmasyean]

@SuperRegisteredUser If everyone thought that computers and wireless were so dangerously insecure that it's not worth doing anything with it if there's not a 100% guarantee of a breach, then there would be no wireless business that exists. There will always be hackers and defectors in the military...much like there are in major corporations that hold some of the smartest ppl...who get payed a lot more than government employess.

[SuperRegisteredUser]

@rasmasyean All other countries work with manual backup systems because they expect a high degree of electronic warfare in any major conflict. USA seek to get air superiority, electronic warfare superiority, sea superiority (carrier battle groups). Eventually it will fail (as technology gets cheaper) and you won't have full control. Even some US UAVs have some backup, they return to base automatically if they lose the signal.

[rasmasyean]

@SuperRegisteredUser Tomahawk cruise missles are early "UAVs" that kamakazee. There's no "manual backup system". Those worked fine and so will bombers if you want to get rid of the "manual backup" if you're scared of losing control. And you're telling me that in the just simple scenario that a UAV operator makes a password that only he and perhaps his "co-operator" knows for the mission, you can break that password in those couple of hours without kidnapping one of them?

[SuperRegisteredUser]

@rasmasyean Obviously you don't know anything about electronic warfare. You don't have to kidnap the controls of the UAV, you only need to transmit a stronger signal on the same frequency and the UAV will lose contact with the operator and crash. Tomahawk has it's decision making happening inside the missile by a computer, thus cannot be brought down the same way. continues.

[SuperRegisteredUser]

@rasmasyean The only way to prevent this, and to get live feed back and forth to the UAV, is to use swaying frequencies, that is, you transmit over several shifting frequencies. Swaying frequencies can be intercepted though, since there is always a pattern in the selection of frequencies (computers can't produce true random numbers).

[rasmasyean]

@SuperRegisteredUser AND to get the "pattern", you need the "password"...which is prolly multi-level encrypted too! If you want to jam the UAV you have to do it from the top in it's "mobile DTV antenna thing".  The US def industries aren't idiots, they build the atom bomb. You need satelite, likely with a directional antenna to jam it. But even if you have one, you can't target the stealth so... The best bet is to jam a potential comm sat and hope its in line enough...(cont)

[rasmasyean]

@rasmasyean ...so you need many secret jamming stations all over the place. And what happens when you turn on the jammer? It becomes a hot target for ECCM warfare planes to detect it and destroy the station. Since what YOU know about electronic warfare is from games, I'll make an analogy for you. In WoW you use multiplae players filling different roles to accomplish a raid. You can't go in with all the same classes or else you die real quick!

[SuperRegisteredUser]

@rasmasyean The pattern can be viewed by anyone (with a simple radio receiver) and the radio key can be reconstructed by finding the pattern in the signal. No UAV is 100 % satellite controlled as it would mean they would crash every time it lost contact with the satellite (which is often). Some UAVs have backup, so they return to base automatically if both radio and satellite is out (which happens). continues.

[SuperRegisteredUser]

@rasmasyean one of the basic tenants of electronic warfare is that you can never be 100 % sure your wireless information transfer isn't jammed or intercepted, this is why most armies still have motorcycle messengers (to transfer very important information). It doesn't mean you are an idiot for trying to encrypt. And the US military are most likely aware of the risks, but consider it to be worth it.

[rasmasyean]

@SuperRegisteredUser The only known theoretical way to figure out the encryption in such a short period is by use of a quantum computer (which is only a theoretical device, unless you know something I don't). Therfore you cannot find the "pattern" generated by the key because it won't be periodic like you assume. And if you do, you still have to find the key(s) to the packets. The best you can do is jam it to return home...and give a nice glowing target for a ECCM missle to your jammer.

[SuperRegisteredUser]

@rasmasyean What radio systems have you worked on?

[ratarob]

this is fantastic ...just one little problem with this plane ... how abot a EMP missle .. can the plane handle it?

[rasmasyean]

@ratarob There is no known "EMP missile" for effective use militarily that I'm aware of. The only way to make an decent EMP is to detonate a nuke. But some of the US weapons do have some protection against this. For Example, the B-2 is a nuclear bomber so it would have to survive an EMP by it's own blast because it's pretty slow and wouldn't be able to completely clear the radius all the time.

[sebwilkins]

@rasmasyean It is emp hardened. their is only one emp weapon which is a nuclear detenation

[pinz2022]

@rasmasyean

Dunno about that. I well recall a Popular Mechanics article from a decade ago that went into detail about non-nuclear EMP bombs with a much smaller footprint.

[rasmasyean]

@pinz2022 How small a footprint? Maybe they were thinking of using it to disable something and save some lives by hitting a radar directly or something. If it's that small, you're better off just a huge amount of AAA flak to cover a bigger area to try to hit this plane. Of detonate a shrapnel missle near it. Since this is "stealth" so far, you cannot "target" it. So you would need some huge radius EMP to explode near it...if you think it's arround.

[ratarob]

@rasmasyean look at Non-nuclear electromagnetic pulse  on wikipedia.. I know is not the best source but is a start...

[rasmasyean]

@ratarob I know what you are talking about, but if you have to shoot an emp missle that close to the plane (assuming you can get that close), you might as well used a real missle. The theoretically useful EMP weapon is one that has a large radius or effect. Even if they secretly have one, blowing up an EMP "arround the area" to try to hit that plane above your own soil might not be such a good idea.

[jasonjamaican]

now even the pilots are job-less..they will be putting out dirt cheap unmanned planes like crazy soon, and why are these ppl on here so quick to praise weapons of warfare, theres a chance that the same techo might kill you some day

[westin1985]

Does anybody know of any military or civilian R&D programs that are trying to get a computer to think(analyze) complex situations? I imagine the hardware architecture would drastically change. It be like have a supercomputer on you desktop. Todays single computers can't handle the amount of processing. It would be like having a  1 TB hardrive using all of its data at once and being up dated 100's times per second. Todays pc only acesses a small amount of data at once.

[westin1985]

Can these drones do air to air combat? I doubt it. The thinking capability is not there yet. At some point the drones will fight each other in the air. They will play out a 3D chess game where the only rules are the limitions of the aircraft and its ability to think and adapt to changing conditions. It will be like the dogfights of the old days. 30 planes will talk to each other exchaning info on each planes view of the battlefield. Out of the box thinking will be the only advantage against this

[seberusnet]

so this is what skynet looked like growing up :D

[ClarksonsinUSA]

OUR UNMANNED Stealth Aircraft will be able to pull as many g as the aircraft can stand,much more than a manned aircraft...Stealth and can out turn an manned enemy aircraft....

[legojoe12345]

I dont like these unmaned planes they are going to destroy the honor of actually being a Fighter Pilot. Who actually flys his plane in battle. But the honorable thing of the futer will be siting in a control room and playing a video game.

[Rohan2300]

thing about machines is that they react VERY quickly, and very precisely. a human pilot can make stupid mistakes in the heat of the moment, the uav will not.

additionally, we can make planes manuever WAY WAY beyond what a human pilot could withstand. a UAV can take advantage of that.

in a dogfight, a dedicated UCAV should be able to -destroy- a human pilot with no difficulty at all.

[prjerry7]

the point of this plane is that its much cheaper then manned fighters & it also doesnt have the human fisical limits to worry about. Still i wonder if Russian spyes have already seen the construction grids

[fredsucks777]

2 traitors disliked this and will be listed as federal targets

[roofy2k]

a logitech G15 would be a better choice of keyboard especially with the build in MFD

[TheDegree777]

what they showed in the video wasnt a actual test landing. It was a computer

simulated program on a computer. So my question is when will they test land a real x47b

on real world floating aircraft carrier not some fake look a like video game version

on a computer screen?

[AstroChickenII]

UAVs are crap. They are easier to shoot down, the signal from the controller to aircraft can easily be disrupted, the onboard camera can easily be disabled using a laser, they can be hit by SAMs before they can fire their weapons and they are vulnerable to computer viruses and other types of electric warfare and cyber terrorism. And if an air-to-air combat UAV is ever made, it will get shot down because a pilot that is not on board the plane cannot look around and act as quickly.

UAVs suck!

[rasmasyean]

@AstroChickenII Well, if it's not in automated mode...you have to target it from the top to jam it because they are linked via satelites. It's also stealth so so far there is no known way to detect stealth so you can't target it from the bottom to shoot lasers or SAMS at it. A pilot has to be close and shoot cannons at it, assuming you can find it. But cyber-warefare is the best possibility, as with any computer device.

[robotman715]

@AstroChickenII ((reply to AstroCickenII part 1)) you are wrong on about all of your points UAVs in autonomous have a better reaction time then humans if they have countermeasures programed, humans have a reaction time of about .15s and robots including UAVs have a reaction time of .1s or less, SAMs can't reach most modern aircraft, think about the USA reaction to 9/11 the USAs aircraft were flying so high the pilots were watching the misses from SAMs fall off below them.

[robotman715]

@AstroChickenII ((reply to AstroChickenII part 2)) and the signal to UAVs is intercepted and coming from multiple satellites and even if it is jammed the aircraft has a program so it can fly its self back to an airport or aircraft carrier. and as far as the computer viruses and other types of electric warfare first you would have to find the right satellite, signal, or code for the receiver and hack it which is hard with the military's up-to-date anti hacker software.

[robotman715]

@AstroChickenII ((reply to AstroChickenII part 3)) Also future air-to-air UAVs would be safer and better because a humans reaction time is slow and pilots almost never see there enemies any more.

[apostolisxa]

@robotman715 yeah thats correct robots may become smarter in combat and fearless but they cost alot.

[TheHunter222]

@AstroChickenII Well, its just the beginning. How can u know how such a thing would perform in a dog fight? Maybe a real good artifical intelligence is far superior about any human? Or at least in the future?!

[TheCashistrash]

Computers have no fear biaches no mess with USAF. We can mass produce these puppies like if they are toasters and bomb the shit out of anyone anywhere in the world since computers dont get tired. Get ready for Imperialist america a new war coming to a theater near you.

[apostolisxa]

@TheCashistrash haha rofl usa army sucks they lose every war they go to.even if they go to war with greece.i will shoot down one of these piece of junk myself.

[nevaehswolf]

Yes Uaz31 we do have drones that can do everything the X-47B can do except. Land on a Carrier, have a Very small RCS, and capable to survive navel environmental conditions.

[AMMW77]

I always said termninator would once become a reality rather than movie here it is people. Beware stock up now on weapons youll need em.

[Uaz31]

2018...lol ,,,We already have drones that can do practically what this does and they are operational now.

[mashedfireflys]

thats all we need weapons that think for themselfs

[Dubaifreak]

too much reliance on these can cause..trouble..... soon someone will hack and OVERRIDE the controls....then what????

[CyclonicTuna023]

Well, I'm pretty sure not just anyone can hack the US military battle control system (at leas I hope so). But I agree that soldiers, pilots and operators shouldn't completely disappear

[xero993]

Then it's destroyed.

Seriously though, they'll be hard as hell to hack, you don't send a $60 million+ weaponised robot in their while having it running Windows 95.

[Dubaifreak]

agreed but..tell ... every aspect of no matter HOW HARD the encryption true hackers have always found a way arnd it....after all nothings perfect .....

[LibertyJedi]

Well then we will have a chance at beating the machines before they enslave us all:-(  Terminator is not far behind.... get ready!

[Batu731]

it doesn't fear, it doesn't feel

imagine it 'see' its mother carrier as a target

[b75s]

All you need is a computer and a mouse to control it?

o-0

Too many computer hacker morons out there, mount bombs on that plane and ALL OF HELL WILL BREAK LOOSE.

[bitsoftunes]

there not connected online its not as simple as using your laptop lol

[b75s]

I hope so. LoL

[Entropy56]

2018?  WTF?

[xero993]

What about 2018?

[stuartwogil]

Robots are the future in warfare. Imagine unmanned subs, aircraft carriers and going to war from the comfort of your bunker. Swarms of robots could disable the enemy in hours instead of days. I want one.

[Tyco200]

@stuartwogils I thought that was skynet's job Q_Q

[prjerry7]

@stuartwogil i say we hire a bunch of S. Korean gamer nerds & built the most potent army this worlds ever seen!

[darthspeaks]

@stuartwogil And the citizens who cannot afford those bunkers...

[thisisadebrown]

@stuartwogil Although I love technology ... No on the spot empathic decision making, ie wrong target: a school, No remorse... Great!

[legacyfinancial]

The new Gerald Ford Aircraft Carrier is going to make Nimitz look like a joke...

[by78]

Slap on "Financed by China" logo on this plane.

[durchdiemitte]

The Russians already have special AA to shot down stealth planes.

[CHUUMPASS]

was redest du da fürn scheiss, die russen haben t90 panzer, modernde alte atom uboote in alten ehemaligen soviet miltär häfen und ja nicht zu vergessen, das sagenumwobene AK, :D sonst nichts !! spinner du!

[Entropy56]

Do you have a YouTube video to prove it?

[xero993]

Which is?

[smartass1101]

Can this thing dog fight?

[cracklingvoice]

Not really. The wide design makes aircraft like these turn really wide and really slow, both of which are crucial for a fighter (look at the F-117). But, these will be able to carry AMRAAM and JDAM weapons eventually in internal bays for an offensive capability (see the F-35). I'm looking forward to seeing how it ends up, especially as the Navy is starting the new supercarrier class (the Gerald R. Ford Class).

[111danish111]

Awesome stuff!!! I can imagine an intelligent  future unmanned fighter aircraft capable of dogfighting and since its got no human on board that means it can take a staggering more twists, turns and Gs than a human flown fighter !! May be in 30 to 40 years time ill see this in reality .

[khi021]

can someone say project 'Eagle Eye' lol. "We are Everywhere"

[SpartanNatu]

EDDY

[xero993]

They should paint the demonstrator that orangy colour if they're not doing RCS tests on it. :-D

[SevenMinusOne]

Clone a drone!

[SquareElix]

it has no blood in those quantum veins, it cant blackout ;D

[slikytom01]

yeah, i have heard about special cooling systems that lockheed martin developed for there stealth fighters, and looking at the track record i dont think any of them have been shot down...

however if i was gunna have a go at shooting down a stealth fighter i reckon heat seeking is the best way to go.

maybe they could be satelite detected? i know you americans have some pretty up to date spy sattelites? if you could locate one with that and scramble a pair of fighters with infrared missles?

[rasmasyean]

Not sure what plans they got for this plane...or if it's even real! LOL But I know they have been talking about air-air combat drones too. The idea is that in close dog-fighting, no pilot = more maneuverability You don't have to worry about G's killing the pilot so it can make sharper turns and do loops around a manned plan.

[slikytom01]

nice bit of kit but all it takes is a surface to air missle and you've just lost billions of dollars worth of aircraft.

[rasmasyean]

Actually, those are stealthed. What that means is that it is nearly impossible to track using electronic methods so you can't acquire a lock on them. The best chance you have of destroying one is in the daytime, if you know it's there early enough, you send an interceptor and hope to catch it and gun it down with cannons before it leaves. In the daytime you might be able to see it, but at nighttime, it's really hard and has never been done before to a stealth aircraft.

[slikytom01]

What about a heat seeking stinger missle? I assume it still has a heat signiture large enough for a conventional aa missle to track.

[rasmasyean]

You can look at the stealth bomber, the stealth fighter, and this plane and you can see that the engine exhaust is on top. This reduces the heat signature from the bottom POV. And they have some secret coatings and engine tech that makes it cool.  Maybe you can use an AA missile, but you have to shoot it from the air on top of it if anything...that is, if you already know it's in the area somehow. The sky is a pretty big place so.... Not impossible, but it just has never been done before.

[rasmasyean]

Also, that stinger is pretty old. You just need a tracking system and an IR laser and the "heat-seaker" is confused. They are putting those on commercial aircraft nowadays I think. Not sure if they are going to have it on that future plane though.

[slikytom01]

yeah, well i expect there is a top secret anti stealth missle out there somewhere. I'd be very suprised if the UK defence budget doesnt incorperate the development of a new Anti stealth system.

Also it all depends on how well this drone can deploy counter measures in the correct situation. Assuming it deploys a countermeasure, it becomes fairly visible to any near-by aircraft.

[iiyama74]

slikytom01 if it's UK is going to be BAE systems as it's sadly the only major defence contractor left. But I doubt it. 1) there is no threat at all to the UK from Stealth 2)The Government wont pay for it & it's going to be export restricted so they cannot sell it to anyone. I did hear that a Scandinavian country had an proof of concept anti-stealth system using loads of cheap receivers over a large area to detect the small radar scatter & then triangulate. It worked but wasn't deployed.

[rasmasyean]

Funny thing about your points of no threat and paying for something that can't be exported. That's exactly the opposite philosophy of USA. A huge portion of tax money is spend on threats that "don't exist" (yet...)...and the product can never be sold...until it is so obsolete that new USA stuff can beat it without an effort...at which point it's a loss in both ticket price as well as years of maintenance! lol

[cassius969]

Yah right the uk developing anti stealth to eff themselves up.

[rasmasyean]

Maybe. The 80's had UFO's of black triangles in formation. "Impossible", so must be of non-earth origin. Lesson is that you never know what they got out there.

One got shot down supposedly by predicting the path and "looking" at it, guiding missiles to the area hitting it with shrapnel. They prolly got lucky and it was flying low. The 1st gulf war, they tried to shoot everywhere once they got bombed. Looked like Disney show. In the 2nd...they didn't have enough guns to try again. :P

[xero993]

With Russia developing it's own stealth fighters like the T-50 PAKFA, they may want to work on anti-stealth weapons.

The PAKFA isn't expected to be anywhere as stealthy as an F-22, etc, but it's definitely going to be dangerous.

[ganja420pimpxp]

@slikytom01 if you can see itthough.