[packagingguy]

Question.

In the age of drone warfare, can a slew of inexpensive drones take out a tank that costs orders of magnitude more?

Are tanks the battleships of WWII, IOW the last of their kind before obsolescence?

IDK, that’s why I’m asking.

[Mariner]

I think it’s the advanced man portable anti tank missiles that put tanks at risk in the modern era.

A couple of guys in a Humvee should be able to carry a dozen and therefore take out a dozen.

[EvilCapitalist]

Until a swordfish torpedo plane took out the rudder, the Bismarck was the most feared Battleship of WWII, and hardly obsolete.

[Fiji Hill]

Battleships were never really obsolete other than for ship-to-ship combat. We used battleships in Korea, Vietnam and in the Middle East for shelling land-based targets. The long range of their guns and their thick armor made them ideal for that mission.

[Brian Griffin]

Instead of a huge armored shell, protect the crew members individually and have their armored shells mounted on metal supports that will bend or rotate upon a direct hit.

Unit cost might be around $250K.

[Svartalfiar]

In the age of drone warfare, can a slew of inexpensive drones take out a tank that costs orders of magnitude more?

Are tanks the battleships of WWII, IOW the last of their kind before obsolescence?

IDK, that’s why I’m asking.

It takes a decent amount of firepower to knock a tank out, much less destroy it. You need a decently solid drone to have the capability to take out a tank, not some rinky one from radio shack like most people think of drones as. The US drones are BIG. Reapers have a 66ft wingspan. Predators have a 50ft wingspan. And to take out a tank, they need to carry a decent size explosive, and have the range to get to the tank. Likely need an impact/land to ensure a hit, and actual damage, as a near-miss will do nothing at the size munition a drone swarm can carry. And, all these sizeable drones (and explosives) need to be transported close enough to the tank to have the range to get there. A squad of guys isn't gonna be able to do more than maybe one or two drones, and be mostly otherwise combat-ineffective. And countries that can afford the big drones are using high-flying drones with precision bombs/missiles, they don't need a cheap swarm carrying blocks of C4. _

Decent tankers will use cover, making them harder to find and target. Smoke, trees, camo net, etc will help hide them, and as above, the drones need to practically land on them to actually do some damage. (Again, ignoring big drones with guided munitions.) Tanks will likely have other protection too - small anti-air weapons, or something similar to the Duke antennas. Those blocked cell signals to prevent IEDs from being cell-phone activated, but set the system (or similar system) to jam known/detected UAV freqs. No comm/control, no drones attacking.

So yes, drones are definitely a danger, but they can be countered and aren't the easy complete-tank-destroyer that the media makes them out to be. At least, not the small drone swarm type anyway.

[crz]

Drop a vacuum bomb over the top of them and the tank might survive, but the crew will have their brains splattered all over the inside.
..or their guts sucked right out of them.