Erdo, your reply is long, polished, and ultimately evasive.
Whats evasive about my replies? I have my opinion and you have yours. If we disagree, thats fine. All we are doing is having a conversation
I made a clear argument: battlefield conditions are changing fast, and platforms like the Booker need to be judged by modern cost-effectiveness, not legacy sentiment. You didn’t engage with that—you just leaned harder into outdated doctrine
I didn’t disagree with you at all about battlefield conditions are fast changing, rather I wanted to point out that no matter how quickly conditions change the thing that does not change is wars are won or lost by the ability of the solider to take and hold ground. With this in mind I really don’t see a reason to engage any other way. You may see this as outdated doctrine but until you can demonstrate how drones can take and hold ground, and win wars, they will always remain just a tool.
When I point to historical examples, it’s to reveal what the future might hold. Every weapon system devised will eventually encounter it’s anti-weapon. Drones will be no different and we could also surmise based on history that someday drones will become obsolete.. Something else will come along that will exceed the drone, and military strategists will have to deal with them.
No, what’s folly is underestimating them after they’ve already reshaped warfare. Drones are neutralizing armor, shredding artillery, and exposing command posts at a scale never seen before. You claim to be a realist, yet dismiss actual battlefield outcomes as irrelevant.
Perhaps if you happen to be a Russian solider who must cross a field in a 60 yr old tank without infantry or artillery support, or your own anti-drone, drones. What’s relevant about this war is, once you strip away the technology, you will see that this is nothing more than attrition warfare.
Sure. But how they do it is evolving. Pretending drones are “just another tool” is like calling the machine gun a better rifle. This isn’t about toys—it’s about autonomous, networked ISR-strike platforms that force even infantry to rethink movement and concealment. You’re quoting doctrine like it hasn’t been under siege since 2022.
No one is saying that the infantry isn’t evolving, but I still stand by the fact that drones are nothing more than tools, tools that yes, autonomous, networked etc, but nonetheless still tools
It does—and one of the clearest lessons of history is that clinging to the last war’s logic is a fast track to defeat. Every military that failed to adapt in time paid the price. You cite WWI and WWII to support your view, …..
I cited WW1 and 2 not because I cling to the logic of the last wars. I cite them to reveal the lessons we can learn and apply what we’ve learned to the future.
That’s simply false.
They’ve changed survivability rates, tempo, and the viability of maneuver for both sides.
But the fact is Ukraine lost the battle in the Kursk region. Sure, you can argue that drones changed the tempo, survivability, etc, but they couldn’t change the inevitable defeat. Remember, when you strip away the technology of this war, this is still a war of attrition and right now it favors Russia.
And btw before anyone accuses me of supporting the Russians, for this point of view, I care less. I have no dog in this fight and want no part of it.
You say that like it happens automatically.
I say it like we don’t like taking losses for nothing.
If the U.S. military was great at proactive adaptation, we wouldn’t be 10 years late to loitering munitions and drone swarms. Look at the Booker: a system conceived in a pre-drone threat environment, now scrambling to justify its value against $400 kamikaze drones. That’s not adaptation. That’s inertia.
Except that the Booker wasn’t cancelled because of kamikaze drones. It was cancelled due to budgetary reasons.
No one disputes the role of infantry. The question is how best to support them. Is it with a 38-ton light tank at $12 million per unit, or a swarm of ISR drones, loitering munitions, and EW assets that can dominate a battlespace at a fraction of the cost?
Thats the million dollar question isn’t it. Perhaps it’s both. We know drones cannot take and hold ground. A tank on the other hand can. Then there is the cost. Sure, tanks are expensive. Its the main reason why the Booker was cancelled. If the government and military can successfully eliminate waste and fraud, it’s conceivable to believe that we could have an effective light tank in support of airborne troops that costs a fraction of the cost. At the same time lets not forget that drone technology isn’t getting cheaper. The more tech and more capability we load onto a drone is going to increase it’s cost, then multiply that by the hundreds or thousands of units you need for combat and it’s going to add up in a hurry. There is no panacea here
This isn’t about whether tanks disappear. It’s about whether we’re spending limited resources wisely in the face of evolving threats. You responded to a strategic argument with comfort phrases and historic parallels that don’t hold up.
Yet your argument seems to be one over the other. Maybe the real answer is you absolutely need both. You might want drones in your combined arms team, deployable by either infantry, tanks and artillery. You may want anti-drone drones to deal with enemy drones attempting to defeat your infantry, tanks or artillery units.
I respect that many here have firsthand experience that I don’t, and I’m coming at this from a data and doctrine perspective, not from the turret or the field. That said, I’ve laid out the argument as clearly and objectively as I can, grounded in current battlefield developments. If that still doesn’t resonate, that’s okay—but I don’t think there’s much value in going in circles when we’re clearly approaching this from different angles.
The beauty of such conversations regardless of how heated or how much disagreement, it’s still an opportunity to teach and learn. None of us can see the future, the only thing we can do is learn from the past. Thats not saying we hold to outdated doctrines or fight the next war using the strategies of the past. It is to make comparisons between then and now and learn from it.
Edro
