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by lumost 1528 days ago
What we're seeing is that low cost precision guided munitions can engage tanks from beyond their direct fire range. Within direct fire range they can be engaged by even lower cost munitions fielded by light infantry and light vehicles. The tank also suffers from requiring large amounts of fuel, making supply line strikes more dangerous to armored advances.

The first point is the big one, the future of ground forces may not be built around gunned vehicles. Drone swarms can threaten entrenched infantry, ATGMs can destroy tanks from a distance. A "dumb" artillery round costs $1,000 and is accurate to 20 meters, recent "smart" artillery rounds cost $140,000, a switchblade costs $6000.

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Then the drone swarm meets this and one or the other survives: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pb5_F4_Eod8 (As an aside, it always fascinates me that arms manufacturers not only create ads and brochures but that they're often done rather well.)

A lot of the breathless enthusiasm for drones seems premature. SAMs didn't make aircraft obsolete, air to ground missiles from aircraft and helicopters didn't make tanks and other vehicles obsolete, and there's doesn't seem to be any reason to believe that adjustments won't be made by the various militaries to provide protection against drones.

Armies will start deploying jamming effectively, cutting off the ability to control the drones. For some reason, the Russian army (which had a reputation for excellence in ECM/ECCM) has been completely ineffective in this area during it's invasion of Ukraine.