Defending the UK

[uk 75]

With the increased availability of drones and missiles of various types should the UK look again at its air defence requirements?
We are fortunate in that we are at some distance from potential threats but this might change.

 

[RyanMidds]

Define potential threats?

 

[zen]

The longer the range, the larger the drone.
The larger the drone, the easier it is to see it and from further away.
Also the larger the aircraft, the greater the temptation to add more to it.....making it larger and more valuable.
The more valuable it is, the less you risk it.

Unless a hostile force is going to send ships loaded with drones, park it off the coast and let rampage over the UK......

But ships is something we can handle, and it's hard to operate your drone fleet if you are sinking

 

[A Tentative Fleet Plan]

A special operations team might cause some damage to RAF aircraft with FPV drones for example, the solution to this is fairly simple, just build more Hardened Aircraft Shelters, especially given how comparatively cheap they are to the aircraft they protect, or they might try to fly an FPV into the Sampson Radar of a Type 45 whilst it's tied up in harbour (will need active defenses, either soft-kill and/or hard-kill for this)

I think the small drone to the mainland UK is otherwise relatively minor, anything else is just conventional air defence.

 

[Hanz2k]

The longer the range, the larger the drone.
The larger the drone, the easier it is to see it and from further away.
Also the larger the aircraft, the greater the temptation to add more to it.....making it larger and more valuable.
The more valuable it is, the less you risk it.

Unless a hostile force is going to send ships loaded with drones, park it off the coast and let rampage over the UK......

But ships is something we can handle, and it's hard to operate your drone fleet if you are sinking

Except you need much more sofisticated radar network to detect and asses this type of dangers. I bet nobody in NATO is now ready to handle this type of low level attacks. You need to lower speed gates, make low level coverage and use software to handle much more data from radars. Basically SAGE ver. 2.

 

[A Tentative Fleet Plan]

Except you need much more sofisticated radar network to detect and asses this type of dangers. I bet nobody in NATO is now ready to handle this type of low level attacks. You need to lower speed gates, make low level coverage and use software to handle much more data from radars. Basically SAGE ver. 2.

Don't need SAGE for that, a 1950s style system architecture of central computers and radars (even making use of modern technology) would be very poorly suited for this threat.

The best solution would be to put plenty of hard-kill (missiles, autocannons firing PABM rounds, lasers and High-Powered Microwaves) and soft-kill defences cued by Ka or Ku-Band radars and staring-IR systems around vulnerable targets (wide-area defence would consume too much resources).

Wide-area warning will require multi-static radars, something which is now viable.

Much of the

 

[JohnCitizen]

Would seem to me the "new" threat to the UK homeland would be cruise missiles. Ballistic missiles is a threat we've been dealing with since the 1940s. Drones, as pointed out, would not realistically fly the huge distances from Russia or the Middle East undetected, especially as they would have to be relatively large physically. We're seeing live in the ME the use of drones for shorter range attacks against shipping & Israel proper, while ballistic missiles are being used for long range attacks on Israel (by the Houthis and, of course, unsuccessfully).

Of course, Hamas & Hizbollah also have plenty of ballistic missiles & rockets for short range attacks, too.

But the wild card, I'd say, in any strategy to attack a nation-state's home turf would be cruise missiles. Especially submarine-launched. The UK and US have used just that method with near impunity against Serbia, Libya, Iraq, Sudan, etc.

I do love the idea (well, fear the idea) of SOF teams conducting what amounts to sabotage of UK air defenses in conjunction with any UK-proper strike. But in defending against that, of course, we're no longer talking about air defense. It would also be a very difficult task for Russia to pull off (and who else could do it unless we're considering some alternative geopolitical future where, say, France is now truly an enemy )

 

[zen]

Except you need much more sofisticated radar network to detect and asses this type of dangers. I bet nobody in NATO is now ready to handle this type of low level attacks. You need to lower speed gates, make low level coverage and use software to handle much more data from radars. Basically SAGE ver. 2.

What you need is GCHQ, and the full spectrum listening systems backed by large scale server farms that can pick out of the radio spectrum signals you're looking for and locate them. Maybe even sharing time of the satellite eavesdropping network.

Then you just cue the Army to jam that and the Navy and RAF to sink the source.

But then if you have that, you probably saw the threatbeing loaded up on the ship and your HUMINT was passing you the plans before they'd built the drones and practiced with them.

"Oh did your ship have an accident?"
"Did Gerneralissimo Muhammad get sick for some reason?"
"What do you mean the drone's batteries are all faulty?"
"How sad, I guess your genius scheme to wreak terror on the UK will have to wait"
"Wait you ran out if money as well? Something went wrong with your financial system?"
"Supreme Leader asking questions about you?"

 

[uk 75]

Probably the greatest risk posed to a peaceful and open country in Europe is the use of AI and other means to generate "fake news" casting doubt on election procedures or necessary health or security measures.
People are easily frightened by such measures which in turn undermines the country's willingness to deal with actual threats.

 

[A Tentative Fleet Plan]

I do love the idea (well, fear the idea) of SOF teams conducting what amounts to sabotage of UK air defenses in conjunction with any UK-proper strike. But in defending against that, of course, we're no longer talking about air defense. It would also be a very difficult task for Russia to pull off (and who else could do it unless we're considering some alternative geopolitical future where, say, France is now truly an enemy )

I was reading about UK 1980s preparations for a Third World War, and the fears of attacks Spetsnaz on certain installations, and the idea occured to me, especially given how small and brittle today's armed forces are.

I definitely don't think it would be a mass attack aimed at disabling everything in inventory, more a number of limited attacks aimed at particularly vulnerable points, partly to divert resources towards home defence, and partly to damage and thus delay deployment of platforms that are vital but exist in very limited numbers (e.g. Type 45s, knocking out a Sampson Radar on one potentially delays the deployment of an entire CVBG until the damage can be repaired or another ship can be diverted from another task).

 

[zen]

Probably the greatest risk posed to a peaceful and open country in Europe is the use of AI and other means to generate "fake news" casting doubt on election procedures or necessary health or security measures.
People are easily frightened by such measures which in turn undermines the country's willingness to deal with actual threats.

The enemy of self correction in a civilisation is censorship.
Only in the light and in exposure to argument can truth be revealed.

That is our greatest threat.
And this is a threat directly at Western Civilisation itself.

But it's not a military one specifically, though obviously it's corrupting effect undermines military power.

Denial of problems doesn't make them go away. Say such as corrupt officers selling off military tyres for cheap copies, ticking off the check sheet that everything is OK....

Or selling the ration packs online and leaving expired packs in the APC, on the theory no one would ever actually use it in war....

Or say certain injections given for fear of chemical weapons supposedly having long term effects on health....I know ex-soldiers who have things to say on that.

Denial of basic truths doesn't disappear because 'we say'. Such as the need for ammunition in bulk, being denied for Just In Time production concepts.
Better old ammo you have than new ammo you don't....because they haven't made it yet!

Or that a rifle meets criteria, when in reality the criteria were relaxed in order to get it into production. Just to pretend the company was viable with a in service product, so it could be privatised.

But such does get people killed in the end. Whether through faulty rifles, lack of ammo, tyres that shred or food poisoning.
Or you name it.
Corruption loves censorship.

 

[Dilandu]

But ships is something we can handle, and it's hard to operate your drone fleet if you are sinking

Assuming that the control facility is on the same ship, and not somehwere else. And assuming that drones aren't autonomous enough to find pre-set targets themselves. And considering advances in sattelite communications - with Starlink testing the first direct sat-phone connection - it seems reasonable that in 10+ years a relatively small drone would be able to be directly controlled right through low-orbit civilian network. Maybe not as online video stream, but surely as series of pictures from onboard camera; pretty enough for distant operator to recognize the target and lock drone pattern-tracking program on it.