DJI has almost everything locked down aside from military. Parrot and Skydio try to compete backed by heavy subsidies/large guaranteed contracts but in terms of volume, revenue, R&D spend etc they're irrelevant on the global market. Even in the US market they're only relevant in government - the only difference between them and niche providers like AeroVironment is scale and the attempt to market to consumers.
The US has a decent military drone industry, extremely expensive compared to international competitors with not as much dynamism/variety, but good volumes and reliability. China has good prices, is the global leader in dynamism/variety, and also global leader in volume; they're the biggest exporter. Turkey and Iran are both way above their weight class specifically in drone production, too, as is Israel. Turkey is even to the point where they're competing with China, which is really impressive for a middle power.
Parent is suggesting we'll see war or terrorism in the US with drones. It was in response to a comment about Ukraine, where DJI drones are heavily (maybe as many as 50k [0]a month by the Ukrainians) to drop hand grenades in trenches.
No. DJI is a Chinese company. If it happens, the next world changing conflict after ww2 is war with China. You can bet your ass China will weaponize those drones if that happens, and that's a really big IF.
Id be terrified of a war with china. a typical dji pocket drone would be a effective miliary tool in the right hands and they don't even consider that miliary grade. I can only wonder what the "good stuff" looks like.
A typical dji drone is more advanced and cheaper then all other drones of the same size and caliber. dji is pretty much the best at it right now.
As for the good stuff like the F-35, the US still dominates. The overall problem is that it's like 100000x the cost. Take this, if the US lost it's entire navy in an instant it would take the US over a decade to rebuild. If the same thing happened to China they can rebuild that Navy in a year.
It's not "more" tech. It's different tech. Lockheed makes the f-35.
If Lockheed were to try to make a drone equivalent to the best that DJI has to offer they would make that drone more expensive and actually much worse in performance, size and technology then the Chinese counter part.
One isn't more advanced then the other but each respective country is more advanced then the other in both of these technologies.
China can't even get itself out of its obvious demographic crisis with a more unified political group. A big reason why russia went to war with ukrane now was it being at its do or die demographic crisis point.
Wait 5 or 10 years and they wouldn't have enough young people to do it. The USA is doing much better on the reproduction & immigration front than China, so China probably cannot afford to wait in such a war of attrition.
Also thinking about the USA culturally, nobody would speak mandarin even if China was dominate, mostly for the same reasons why most of latin america only speaks their native language.
No, it's not clear at all. The latest forecasts are not even clear about China surpassing US in nominal GDP. China's demographics look pretty horrible in the long term, US on the other hand is quite healthy. China doesn't really have allies like the US has.
China already dominates manufacturing without a regime change. They have surpassed "western levels". There's only a few remaining areas that the US still dominates. Those areas include aviation, and JavaScript. The US has basically moved up the stack while China has taken over the entire bottom of the stack.
Maybe the Boeing issues are related to the use of JavaScript in Aviation?
Not really arguing about China being a manufacturing power house but I don't think that was the point that was being made. That part might be compatible with their regime (though arguably not the current regime any more). What would be the top 10 tech/science areas, other than aviation and JavaScript where China has demonstrable leadership over the west?
During Covid we saw mRNA vaccines coming quickly from the west. Including their manufacturing. Semi-conductor manufacturing technology is still led by the west (all the way up and down the stack). Tesla is manufacturing in the west fairly successfully (ofcourse with lots of Chinese parts). In the compute world I can't think of a single technology where China clearly leads. They might be manufacturing a lot of components but they're not the ones innovating/designing. Manufacturing is about cost/scale/momentum and they're still carrying a lot of the investment forward but I don't think the derivative of that is as steep as it was 5-10 years ago.
You know, for years people said the same thing in Ukraine about Russia. Sadly, an authoritarian regime (anything not democratic, mafia state, even a good old fashioned kingdom, or dictatorship) is always a threat for not just neighbours enjoying freedom and prosperity, but any such country around the world. Especially now that media and Internet can counter any state propaganda showing how great a paradise North Korea, China, Iran, or Russia is.
Why did Russia absolutely have to attack Ukraine? Because it's very existence in peace with the west, eventual economic prosperity (like Poland, Czech Rep. etc), eventual diminishing of corruption as the country implements new laws are an example what Russia could be. Why is Poland the most hated country by ordinary state TV watching Russians? Because it's a medium sized country that achieved success being a part "of the West". The typical part of the Russian imperial (designed to enslave others) narrative is: Every strong partner will exploit a weaker one. Democracy is a lie. All you do by becoming democratic is you hide the corruption and you switch one ruler for another. China uses the same narrative, but internally. That's why these countries will do absolutely everything to poison the society in the US and any democratic country. When they are prevented of doing so (and they will, because people will learn what is the truth) and their regimes inevitably collapse economically (as China is starting right now) war is the only way these people can stay in power. So yes, a war between autocracies and free countries is inevitable unless free countries are strong enough militarily to be able to win it in few months tops. A prolonged war, like what we're seeing in Ukraine is actually a huge benefit for autocracies, because it removes the only thing they fear the most, their own people uprising.
As someone who was born and spend half of my adult life in this country I can tell you an average Polish person didn't "hate Russians" in general before the recent intensification of the war in Ukraine. Despite the 50+ year occupation of our country and everything that happened during it an average Polish person didn't consider "the Russians" an enemy. No, we considered them mostly victims of their own mafia state regime. Also the common belief was most of Russians go along with the regime because they don't want trouble and only maybe up to 15% are real believers in the idea of imperial/communist(funny how both result in the same thing for the neighbours) Russia and even them were seen as sort of victims of their upbringing/propaganda. In short, no, before Feb 2022 most Polish people didn't "hate Russians". Even shortly after the start of the war this didn't really change much. There was an outpouring of support for Ukraine (despite our own mutual hate - look up Wolyn massacres and Ukrainian collaboration with Nazis) because people saw this war as an obvious parallel between how Russia invaded Poland in September 1939 taking advantage of a 2 week earlier Hitler's attack (in reality there was a secret pact, look up ribbentrop-molotov pact). But still, everyone thought this was what states sometimes do(mostly authoritarian countries, but it happens to democracies too), so just a fact a war happened wasn't enough. But then things changed, when news(and millions of refugees with their own recording on their own personal phones) showed us the atrocities "average Russian" drafted from general population does when given a gun and no law to stop him. Suddenly people in Poland realised of our "grandma's tales" of horrible atrocities done for fun by Russian soldiers 50 years ago weren't exaggerated. They were what happened back then and what happens now. This was very enlightening to the state of mind of an average Russian. If a normal country engages in war like in Iraq and Afghanistan for example rapes and arbitrary killing of civilians is the exception, it's a crime, when Russia engages at war it is policy, it is a gift for soldiers to "have fun" for a week before they go to the front as they are expected to die. Then there are all the mothers, the flies and everyone else in Russia. We expected people would see after few months their sons are dying for nothing, nope, they are all getting good (for Russian standard) money and they support it. A recorder and authenticated phone conversation was recorded between a young soldier and his new wife in Russia (he got drafted after the wedding). In this call she told him how she is "fine with him raping Ukrainians, because rape is not a betrayal, also she hates all of them, and when will all the appliances they looted (microwaves, flat screen TVs, washer) be arriving (they have essentially a courier service between the front and Russia for all of the loot). It is calls like that, and contacts with rare Russian that happens to be in Poland for business or driving a truck trough that made an average Pole hate an ordinary Russian. Not 400 years of attempted conquest (this is what nations do), but what they do when they succeed.
The final choice for starting a war is basically in the hands of the US. By not joining the fight for Ukraine and by not joining the fight between Israel and Hamas it shows that the US doesn't typically join foreign wars that aren't it's business.
The West will not be "choosing to defend Taiwan" because the West doesn't actually truly care about Taiwan, Ukraine, gaza or Israel.
The West cares about being the number one power and to this end it will be the US "choosing" to engage in war with china.
I'm Taiwanese, china isn't being coy with words here. They will invade Taiwan to force reunification in the same way the north forced reunification in the US civil war. They truly believe this.
This is entirely different from how the US is hiding behind the "defense of Taiwan". No the Taiwanese know the US doesn't care about Taiwan. They care about staying number one economically and they will may use the "defense of Taiwan" as an excuse to use war to stop Chinas economic advancement.
It's really hard to say. I think saying "the west doesn't truly care" isn't 100% accurate. Some people in the "free world" do truly care about these things. Some are more internally focused- it's a mix. It is not impossible that the US will defend Taiwan against a Chinese invasion. It depends on who is president, who their advisors are, what are they thinking about. "Caring" about Taiwan or Taiwanese might be some part of that calculation. For one thing the US having declared that it will do so increases the chances that they actually will, and their presence in the region also increases the probability. Do they have a variety of other considerations? Sure. Are they acting out of self interest, also sure. But the interests appear to somewhat align (i.e. it is in the US's interest that Taiwan remains in the western sphere of influence and it's also what Taiwan seems to want, and it's what China doesn't want).
If it was clear that the US would stay out of it then perhaps China would have already retaken Taiwan. Arguably some of the other conflicts are really part of the same power struggle. Russia's half-failure in Ukraine is maybe causing China to take a pause.
Ukraine and Israel are a little different. Israel has the capability to defend itself. Ukraine is arguably less strategically important. A direct confrontation with Russia has perhaps a higher risk of turning into a nuclear war.
Every country wants to have power, so in the end acts in its own intrest.
We as civilians have to choose if we want to live in a democracy or serve a dictator. It's clear dictators like to invade democracies, as is the case with both Russia and China.
Economic advancement of a dictatorship is asking for problems.
No not at the moment. The actual risk is low but it is still in the realm of possibility. It is also one of highest cost potential conflicts still in the realm of possibility.
Both countries would strike the other down in a heart beat if there wasn't a huge economic cost associated with war.
The entire propaganda apparatus and the entire political class has been drumming up war with china for nearly a decade. So yes. There is a geniune concern. But it's not an immediate fear of war but a looming sense that there will be a war with china sometime in the future.
Take this article. It really has nothing to do with war or even china. But propagandists or people influenced by propaganda always insert that narrative. Try it with anything remotely china related. Someone or some bot or something always inserts a war narrative or anti-china narrative in it. It's clearly intentional and not organic. There is a coordinated effort to fearmonger war with china.
Edit: Interesting. Downvote brigaded. Wonder if it was this comment or the comment about ukraine...
Surprised it actually still needs a pilot, although they do mention it can save previously flown routes, not sure how much that automates flying the same route over and over again?
Thanks. The boat prop offers some efficiency gains in mid-range speeds and better hole shot acceleration, but I guess the benefits don't carry to smaller scales and less viscous surroundings.
Recently discovered Sharrow boat props. Apparently the guy who invented them first developed the the concept for reducing noise from drones filming orchestras. I'm surprised we aren't seeing more widespread availability yet of "tipless" drone propellers.
There may have been new attempts, but when I last looked into these types of drone propellers, nobody seems to have been successfully able to demonstrate they actually offer significant improvements (either noise or efficiency) over traditional designs.
To be fair, the limiting factor might be manufacturing capabilities, given most attempts were using 3d printed propellers which results in terrible surface finish, compared to injection molding.
They've got the vast majority of their business in 'traditional' quads, it's their core competency. This is a bit of a lark which could be very cool, but making the investment in a new platform that's very different specifically for it is probably not worth the cost and complexity.
Even with the large drone manufacturer, why the cost of drone is so high? We have reached a point where we can build high performance single board computer under 100 dollars because we can automate the build process.
The cheapest drones come in at $8, with free shipping.
They have accelerometer, gyro, full 4 channel control - basically a stripped down version of everything in a big drone (no optical flow based stabilization tho)
probably motors and power electronics, requisite precision as well as durability requiring more materials, or perhaps due to lack of cost saving pressure - the (whichever)government will pay, will appreciate extra reliability, and extraneous cost is just extra cash flow for the company and genuinely positive for economy too; there's no need or even tangible benefit to meeting goals at slightly south of theoretical minimum cost in the way it has to happen at microscopic scale(at home)
The 20th century is finally over and we're reverting to pre-Napoleonic model of military and technology - military technology as a meme and synonym for future civilian high-tech is no more; the flow of technologies reverses and increasingly more will become dual-role technologies with military applications because civilian versions will simply be milestones ahead of military head commits, and this will have implications on...
I was letting my old friend rubber-duck on me with these topics, I think 5 < x < 10 years ago. I don't know who he was quoting, sounds kind of right in retrospective.
> I assume this is what it was like in the World War I & II era watching tanks being developed.
A better analogy would be the airplane as it had dual civilian-military uses like the drone. Whereas a tank is solely a military use vehicle.
But the drone definitely has the ability to change war like the airplane did. Especially drone swarms backed by AI. You could buy 100,000 drones for the price of a single jet fighter. Imagine millions or even billions of drones fighting to take control over a city.
Exactly this, an important part of the origin of the tank was the tractor made by the Holt company, which today is Caterpillar. The first German and French tanks in WWI were modified Holt tractors, and the unmodified machines saw widespread use for pulling artillery guns.
The reason for Caterpillar pivoting towards construction equipment after WWI is that they had essentially only made military equipment during the war, so their equipment gradually shifted towards larger and heavier machines. When peace came, their products were too heavy to be used as farm equipment, but perfect for construction.
It's so much cheaper than tanks though, as long you can get a satellite connection. Which means Elon is ideally positioned to compete with nation states if he wants to. I mean more than he already is. Scary dude.
According to recent reports, at least Russia is launching glide bombs from airplanes on a daily basis. They don’t do it over frontlines though, so not much footage available.
It's sad that the West doesn't at least set up a few new production lines for air defense rockets and help Ukraine eliminate the Russian drones (at least the big ones), missiles, helicopters and airplanes.
They should be designing a bolt-on guidance package and a booster stage for Hydra rockets using abundant cheap RISC-V processors and leveraging Ardupilot - not so ironically
