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Re:Battleships: a ridiculous but awesome idea by akdubya on Wednesday June 01, 2011 @01:50PM (#2608414)
Any battle tech that's an order-of-magnitude cheaper to kill than to produce is destined for obsolescence. You can see this happening now with main battle tanks, which are easily knocked out by IEDs and increasingly sophisticated man-portable missiles. It will be interesting to see what happens to the manned air superiority fighter over the next couple of decades now that unmanned drones are being deployed on a wide scale.
Re:Battleships: a ridiculous but awesome idea by smallblacksun on Wednesday June 01, 2011 @03:42PM (#2608984)
Few M1s have been destroyed or badly damaged by insurgents in Iraq. Their use has declined since the invasion not because they are too vulnerable, but because they are less useful without enemy tanks to engage and using them against infantry in urban environments risks heavy civilian casualties.
Re:Battleships: a ridiculous but awesome idea by akdubya on Wednesday June 01, 2011 @06:02PM (#2609572)
I was thinking less about the conflict in Iraq than the conflict in and around Israel, where small groups of insurgents have over the past decade mounted increasingly sophisticated attacks on Israeli armor in the open. The deterrent factor here is just as important as the ability to blow stuff up.
Re:Battleships: a ridiculous but awesome idea by philwelch on Wednesday June 01, 2011 @04:39PM (#2609235)
Also, they're harder to fit on the streets.
Re:Battleships: a ridiculous but awesome idea by hollerith on Thursday June 02, 2011 @12:41AM (#2610731)
And they ruin streets.
Re:Battleships: a ridiculous but awesome idea by gaius on Wednesday June 01, 2011 @02:32PM (#2608638)
Probably nothing. Remember that unmanned drones were used in combat in Vietnam. They were quite short ranged of course, and could only be used for one mission: Sidewinders.