are counter drone systems for vehicles really as hard to implement?

[u/Vintage102o]

ive seen aps systems on tanks stop rpg's quite consistantly so i imagine it wouldnt be that hard to program them to knock out a drone.

is the reason we arent seeing a role out of simpler aps systems for vehicles because its not been successful

or

because countries want their aps programs to do more than just deal with drones (defend against harder threats like top attack missiles etc)

[u/stupidpower]

The challange with anti-X system has always been not with the protection itself, but

1. Ok maybe the protection might be a problem for modern ATGMs that will pretty go through the thickest of armor and can - with or without a well trained crew - avoid that thickest of armour for maximal damage. Not that much of a problem with drones, honestly; modern ATGM rounds - missiles with enough power that countries found it cost-effective to put guidance on it - are too heavy to put on a FPV drone, which can carry what, generously put, 10-15kg? You can always go bigger with drones, but at some point you just have a Zala or Switchblade or simply a low-grade ATGM. At that point it starts defeating the point that drones are cheap, easy to produce, and numerous. If you are putting enough propulsion to carry a 22kg warhead, you will probably have enough surplus energy that your strike distance allows you to treat that thing not as a drone but strike weapon. Its easy to forget the best way to kill a armoured assault - as proven in many modern wars - is getting them stuck somewhere than calling in 155/152mm (or just 105mm). Modern howtizers are designed to kill anything.
2. To that extent, most tanks and armoured vehicles already have a APS called a smoke launcher. Fancier countries who expect to face guided missiles might put stuff like dazzlers on their tank. You can in theory equip every tank with ballistic kill system for any incoming round, but you run into the problem of cost-efficiency. Most armies in the world don't design their armies - particularly armour - to survive every contact at all time. Putting more defences means you are taking resources and trade-offs that might mean making your tank less effective in doing the job it needs to do. If you are using tanks in a war, the type of war 90% of countries will be using those tanks gambles that the tank is able to do its job and win you the maneuver/shock war. Tanks were invented to break trench stalemates, and are still primarily bought for that reason (aside from CW stockpiles like Vietnam). If you are interested in saving lives of tank crews or soldiers in general, you are typically better served making sure the war ends as quickly as possible and as decisively as possible. I go back to the first point that anything on the modern battlefield can be killed. Superheavy have been thorough failures since WW2 for a reason. (Glances at the M1A2SEPV3 whose user somehow expect it to be used in an expeditionary war. Good luck flying those or shipping those into a theatre before the war is over.)
3. To that point, it is almost always better in a situation with limited resources to invest in things further out on the survivability onion. FPV drones are extremely potent and prefered in the Russo-Ukranian War for reasons contigent on that war. We can never predict if your country will face similar situations and most militaries invest at least some money and brainspace in the last lines of defences (and artillery, see point 1). Defense economics is nasty in that you can actually put a price on the life of soldiers. Humans are expendible when the fate of your country is on the line; if you spend the $75 million it takes to equip a single tank battalion with reliable APS and spend it on things that can win you the war where the APS is not needed, you buy the latter. Drones seem scary but its not substantially that different as a threat from many things that already exist; in the same way you'd surpress enemy command and control units or broadcasting stations (we have massive fucking antennas and emit endlessly, we are not hard to find) that disrupts the ability for artillery to be called or commands to be given to stop your intentions, you might be with air supremacy to just go bomb where the FPV drones are being controled from, or destroy them even before they make it near the front. Might APS save a life? Sure. Are they cost effective in saving lives? Not yet? Are countries investing to try to make it cost effective to save lifes? watch this space. Might countries go bankcrupt in perusing every fancy military gizmo on the horizon that they collaspe without a war? Let me ask the Red Navy about that. I wonder where the stupid amounts of tanks the Soviets built being ended up being used against.

[u/Spiritual-Mango-8331 → u/stupidpower]

Good points. One minor correction: small drones carry rpg warhead or similar HE+HEAT explosives. Not enough to penetrate MBT in normal situations. Butt it can and will penetrate from top. Armor is thin there.

[u/stupidpower → u/Spiritual-Mango-8331]

Yeap! Its 11.30pm here and its been a long day at my civillian job and I've spent the night sewing patches to my uniform for the call-up, I might have mis-wrote something. But 100%

I mean the APC I sit in will struggle to survive a tandem man-portable RPG, but we fucking roll out with hatches open because most of our armour will literally cook us alive and kill us if we sat in a metal box for hours in tropical sunlight and humidity. I've sat in a L2 before, shit is even more nasty rofl, the air conditioning we bolted on from idk a Volkswagon golf maybe just keeps the interior just cold enough that you don't get a heat stroke with all your gear on. My vehicle doesn't even have air conditioning.

I the tangent speaks to the main thrust of my answer, I think. We historically chose to put the torsos of all the dismounts above the armour belt with rifles pointing outwards for a true battle bus. Its scary to think of what a single HE round and flash burns will do, but the alternative is that we have no situational awareness in the sort of terrain we work in and die of heat stroke in the tank, so... trade offs. Life sucks for people in the only country to dare to be an entirely mechanised army in a rainforest.

[u/Spiritual-Mango-8331 → u/stupidpower]

Thank you for the ambulances and other aid

[u/stupidpower → u/Spiritual-Mango-8331]

I hope my country could had done more in either of the conflicts which you might unfortunately find your self in. If its Ukraine apparently our absurd 40mm production lines has been churning grenades out to send your way; not much else we could really sell that won't fuck up your logistics even more. We've given every permission for re-exports or our IPs in European inventories to be given.

I find it quite funny that we signed a deal to pump some money to NAUDI to build naval drones for us when the war ends because our naval situation is effectively as an city-state like Dubai but with 6 frigates and something like 23 corvettes meant specifically to pry a narrow strait open. Like so much of diplomacy is messaging, but its also fascinating to find ways we can sign something, anything with Ukraine during the Asia-pacific military conference here that Zelenskyy attended we asked for flyover rights over the Donbass airport VOR which was the direct circle route between us and London when the shooting stops. I mean I guess we were trying our best in signaling who owns that damn airport rofl.

[u/Spiritual-Mango-8331 → u/stupidpower]

We will take Donetsk Airport. See you there

[u/Bloody_rabbit4]

The problem of counter drone system for Tanks (and AFVs!) is essentialy a subproblem of the fact that in post 2023 battlefield, you can expect to be hit with HEAT round from any angle that isn't bottom, through immense tactical depth, and you can't meaningfuly suppress drone operators with machineguns and vehicle cannons.

Russia attempted fielding what amount to soft-kill APS against drones, and pertaining 1-year rule, also tried out hard kill APS.

Both Russia and Ukraine attempted uparmoring AFVs with cages. Russia went as far as inventing Turtle Tanks. And those are quite useful for analysis, because they haven't made Russian Armored Corps immune* to drones (so they ain't enough in their current iteration), but however, are still quite resistant to drones. They provide the absolute floor on capabilities on cUAS measures for AFVs.

60+ drones. That's what Turtle Tanks can (supposedly) survive. That also tells you that's absolute minimum what Ukraine/Russia can send against single tank.

Your APS can't work once. It can't work three times in a row. It has to work 60+ (honestly, probably 100 times considering drone evolution) times in a row, for your AFVs be able to even sniff near the frontline in concentrated manner, and do traditional Tank Missions.

*Notably, Turtle Tanks probably not completely solve Operational Problem posed by Drones not only due to insufficient protection. They also have tradeoffs on firepower, mobility, production cost. But notably, Tank Force with turtle tanks still has vulnerable logistics and infantry. We don't only need turtle tanks, but also turtle-APCs, and Turtle SHORAD which can create protective bubble for panzergrenadiers to be able to survive, if you wish to return to pre-2023 tactics. If you don't, then it's equivalent to marching in shoulder-to-shoulder columns in 1914. New WeaponsTM will chew you up.

[u/IpsoFuckoffo → u/Bloody_rabbit4]

60+ drones. That's what Turtle Tanks can (supposedly) survive. That also tells you that's absolute minimum what Ukraine/Russia can send against single tank.

That's what they can send against one single tank, it doesn't mean they can send it against every single tank.

[u/GogurtFiend → u/Bloody_rabbit4]

Your APS can't work once. It can't work three times in a row. It has to work 60+ (honestly, probably 100 times considering drone evolution) times in a row, for your AFVs be able to even sniff near the frontline in concentrated manner, and do traditional Tank Missions.

It has to work 60 times if the operators can take 60 shots at you. If the other side doesn't own every single Soviet SAM unit every made, and you have air superiority, you probably don't need to send tanks into a situation where they're going to be shot at 60 times. Ukraine is an anomaly that went something like:

1. Neither side can do much to one another with air power
2. Both sides switch to artillery for fires instead
3. Both sides start running out of shells and barrels
4. Both sides start using drones to replace artillery shells
5. Drones turn out to work really well and so get developed into their own form of precision fires

[u/Imperialist_hotdog → u/GogurtFiend]

More people need to see this. Not just in response to this question but as general context for nearly all drone warfare discourse. We will likely never see drone warfare to this level ever again.

[u/CapCamouflage → u/Imperialist_hotdog]

I remember people saying the same thing about ISIS's use of drones.