asymetric warfare

"Fred J. McCall" wrote in message
...
"Damo" wrote:

:
:" :If they can be mass-produced for $10,000 each, then a $1 bn
: rocurement -- and the sort of countries we're talking about
: :typically sign bigger weapons contracts than that -- would buy
: :100,000 missiles.
:
: I think you need to go look at this again. Hell, why not assume they
: cost $1 each and can be made by kindergardeners?
:
:A civilian is making a cruise missile in his garage in New Zealand for
less
:then 5000 dollars.

I'll believe it when he gets it done, it has a usable warhead
fraction, and it works after being bounced around on roads (and off)
in the back of a truck for six months. And if it passes that, then
we'll talk about flight profiles, RCS, accuracy under GPS-jammed
conditions, etc.

Get back to me.

I wasnt pretending this was military grade weapon (the GPS component rules
that out straight away) but if someone told you this 10 years ago you would
write it off completely. With todays technology it is at least possible, and
for terrorists it doesnt have to meet your guidelines above - just hit
something in a city will do it.

Damo


--
"Millions for defense, but not one cent for tribute."
-- Charles Pinckney

On Mon, 22 Dec 2003 23:08:58 -0800, pervect
wrote:


I'm really not sure how quickly you can count on taking out a spread
spectrum transmitter. Especially when it's put on a low duty cycle
transmit mode rather than a continuous transmit mode.

I'm going to throw some numbers at this problem.

The shannon-hartley capacity of the communication channel should be

B(log2(1+S/N)), where S/N is the signal/noise ratio (measured at the
receiver), and B is the bandwidth.

Let's say our goal is to have the same channel capacity as a 25khz
channel with a 10 db S/N. That would be about 86khz. Round it up to
100khz, this is just a BOTE calculation.

Now lets suppose our spread spectrum channel is about 10Ghz wide.

log2(1+S/N)= 10^-5

S/N=.69e-5 (needed at the receiver)

Assuming inverse square law propagation, we'll have to be about
1/sqrt(.69e-5) = 400x closer to the source than the receiver is to get
a S/N of 1. So if the reciever was 40km away from the transmitter,
we'd have to be within about 100m of the source to have a S/N of 1.

With long enough integration times from a fixed site, we can probably
get some sort of bearing with a S/N 1, but I doubt that any sort of
rapidly moving radiation seeking missile is going to be able to lock
on unless the signal is at least as strong as the noise. It should
also be pretty easy to setup false antennas transmitting low levels of
broadband noise to make any such missile's job very difficult unless
the attacker doesn't mind launching a bunch of them and also doesn't
care what they might hit (collateral damage).

Penta wrote:

:On Sun, 21 Dec 2003 15:46:29 GMT, Fred J. McCall
wrote:
:
:"Pete" wrote:
:
::
::"phil hunt" wrote
::
:: I imagine the missiles could
:: be programmed for a mission by sticking a computer with an Ethernet
:: cable into a slot on the missile.
::
::Here ya go. Code to this explanation, and you're all set.
::
::http://www.techblvd.com/Rvideo/Guidance.wav
::
::Easy.
:
:What's really spooky is that this isn't all that bad a description of
:how ProNav works. :-)
:
:what's ProNav?

Proportional Navigation. It's how virtually all GPS-guided weapons
fly.

[GPS-guided weapons is something of a misnomer, just by the way.
They're all really GPS-aided strapdown inertial.]

--
"Millions for defense, but not one cent for tribute."
-- Charles Pinckney

pervect wrote:

:On Tue, 23 Dec 2003 05:29:52 GMT, Fred J. McCall
wrote:
:
:pervect wrote:
:
::Actually there's something I forgot to mention - using similar spread
::spectrum techniques as, for instance, GPS, it will in general be
::fairly hard to tell that a high tech wide bandwidth low power
::transmitter is "up" at all.
:
:So we've established the following so far in this discussion:
:
:1) Tanks can't kill anything, since it can dodge.
:
:2) ECM doesn't work.
:
:There was another equally silly one, but I forget what it was. No
:matter.
:
:Even trolls should know more about their subject than we're seeing
:demonstrated here.
:
:If you think tanks can't kill anything, you might want to explain how
:you came to that conclusion, it isn't very apparent to me.

Oh, *I* don't think that. However, 'your' side has made the argument
that tank-killing SUVs are practically because tanks can't hit them,
as "all they have to do is dodge by half their vehicle width".

:For extra credit, you might try explaining how the issue of whether or
:not "tanks can kill anything" has anything to do with what I actually
:said about the difficulty of detecting spread spectrum signals.

It doesn't. It's merely another silly contention coming from 'your'
side of the argument. Yours is "ECM can't work".

--
"Millions for defense, but not one cent for tribute."
-- Charles Pinckney

pervect wrote:

:On Tue, 23 Dec 2003 01:30:25 GMT, Fred J. McCall
wrote:
:
::Spread spectrum tecniques are really crucial to making this system
::have the level of security it actually does.
:
:Ok, view it that way if you like. I'm really not going to talk about
:it other than what I've already said.
:
:OK, if you don't want to explain yourself, I can't force you to.

That's right, you can't. Have your security department send my
security department your clearance and then call me on a STUIII.

--
"Rule Number One for Slayers - Don't die."
-- Buffy, the Vampire Slayer

"Keith Willshaw" wrote:

:"phil hunt" wrote in message
...
: On Mon, 22 Dec 2003 08:01:52 -0000, Keith Willshaw
wrote:
:
: He wants to use lisp for real time software !
:
: No, he merely thinks Lisp's macro system has advantages, when trying
: to solve hard problems.
:
:And some nasty disadvantages which is why it has somewhat
:fallen out of favour.

And if he likes LISP's ability to redefine the world, he'll LOVE
FORTH....

--
"Some people get lost in thought because it's such unfamiliar
territory."
--G. Behn

"Damo" wrote:

:"Fred J. McCall" wrote in message
.. .
: "Damo" wrote:
:
: :A civilian is making a cruise missile in his garage in New Zealand for less
: :then 5000 dollars.
:
: I'll believe it when he gets it done, it has a usable warhead
: fraction, and it works after being bounced around on roads (and off)
: in the back of a truck for six months. And if it passes that, then
: we'll talk about flight profiles, RCS, accuracy under GPS-jammed
: conditions, etc.
:
: Get back to me.
:
:I wasnt pretending this was military grade weapon (the GPS component rules
:that out straight away) but if someone told you this 10 years ago you would
:write it off completely.

Really? I find that quite odd, since I remember George talking about
how to build a rocket much more cheaply than we are STILL building
them and didn't "write it off completely". I'm pretty sure that was
more than 10 years ago. I do find the price tag pretty ludicrous,
given that you can't buy a car for that kind of money.

:With todays technology it is at least possible, and
:for terrorists it doesnt have to meet your guidelines above - just hit
:something in a city will do it.

Using mortars off the shelf is easier and cheaper if your only goal is
to lob some explosives into a city.

--
"Death is my gift." -- Buffy, the Vampire Slayer

"Peter Stickney" wrote...

Actually, John, you don't seem to have much of an understanding of how
tanks work, or what the typical engangement ranges are.
Five miles is right out.

I can only go by what I read. On sedcond thoughts, that does sound a bit far
though....

Also consider that your millimeter-wave emitting SUV is ligking itself
up like a neon sign in a part of the radio spectrum that nothing else
is on. A couple of sinple horn antannae on the turret sides (Sort of
like the old coincidence rangefinder ears) for DFing, and an
omnidirectional antenna up with the Wind Sensor on the turret roof for
general detection, and you won't, say, be able to hide your
Tank-Killer SUV in Madman Morris's SUV Dealership's parking lot.

On the other hand five miles is about the right range for AT-missiles. So if
your tanks want to get to point blank range they'll still need to drive
through a kill-zone. At 40mph that'll take seven and a half minutes. How
many tanks will die in that time before they even get off a single shot?

Of course helicopters would be sent first, but you can buy 100 SUVs for the
cost of a single tank. The helicopters may simply run out of missiles.
Unlike tanks the SUVs may well be able to see as well as they can. And
unlike tanks, the SUVs can fire-back.


Time of Flight of IRBM, 30 minutes. Speed of CVBG, 25 kts. Detection
of launch, instantaneous. DSP Sats, y'know. Radius of circle that
could contain the target - 12.5 Nautical Miles.

35 knots (let's be generous) and half an hour means a ship or convoy could
get 32410m away from the target point. This gives an area of
3,299,954,370m2. UK trident-II missiles can 8 475kT warheads which will
start fires at 9km, meaning they'll make the fuel onboard a carrier explode
within an area of 254,469,005m2. So you need a total of 12 warheads (or two
missiles) to kill the convoy. This assumes the US has perfect reaction
times, and can instantly guess the target at the moment of launch, which it
can't. As I said, nuclear buckshot will kill most things.


Time of arrival of U.S. ICBM ('cause we're Nice Guys, and aren't going
to unleacsh somethig on the order of 10 Trident MIRVs on your country,
and only take out single targets, roughtly 1.0-1.5 hours after launch.
Your Command Centers and missile bases, or Missile Sub ports don't
move, and you made the mistake of going Nuclear first.

Attacking a military convoy (particularly of an agressor) is very different
from attacking a civilian or semi-civilian target. Particularly when the
fall-out will drift over large parts of europe, who will not exactly thank
you in exchange. Again, there is no international law that says, "Thou shalt
not attack the US." The US would also *not* launch against the british
islands without making damn sure they'd knocked out our ballistic submarines
first. Otherwise a single sub can destroy america. MAD remember?

Besiodes which we have no silos or command centers! Have you seen the state
of London traffic? There's be no way the PM could get out in time! ^.^

ANTIcarrot.

"Peter Stickney" wrote in message
...
In article ,
"John" writes:
"Duke of URL" macbenahATkdsiDOTnet wrote

John's cutesy-pie combat methods were interesting, slightly, but
suited to a 1930's Boys' Book of How to Have a War.

Everything after the SUV/otto-76 was a bit tongue in cheek though.

Peter did a fine job of dismissing them all.

In the case of the SUVs Peter didn't.. To dodge a tank round all you
need do
is side-step half the width of your vehicle. Claiming that the tanks
will
close to ploint blank range is stupid when they are facing concentrated
AT
fire. I'm also not sure he understood the potential of the Otto-76 to
shoot
down smart munitions.

Actually, John, you don't seem to have much of an understanding of how
tanks work, or what the typical engangement ranges are.
Five miles is right out.
The longest range kill achieved by a tank to date is a 3,000m (roughlt
1.5 Statute Mile shot by a British Challenger II vs. an Iraqi T72 in
the 1990-91 Gulf War.

This doesn't match previous descriptions of the Record breaking shot i've
seen, All previous accounts describe the Target as a T-55, the range I've
seen variously quoted as 5000m, 5000yds and 5 miles, 3000m is the lowest
range figure by far

It certainly was NOT a Challenger II, The II didn't exist in 1991, all the
British Tanks deployed in Desert Storm were Chalenger I's

In article ,
Fred J. McCall wrote:

1) Tanks can't kill anything, since it can dodge.

2) ECM doesn't work.

There was another equally silly one, but I forget what it was. No
matter.

3) Everything can be (easily) done in software.

-dms