It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s a superweapon: How drones are reshaping modern warfare

The sophistication of drone attacks escalated dramatically throughout 2023 and 2024. Hezbollah's arsenal expanded from simple surveillance drones to complex attack platforms capable of carrying significant payloads. Americans want answers on possible drone sightings

0
10
Photo From All Israel Nedws. Then-Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi visits a new drone called "Mohajer 10" with a range of 2,000 km, in Tehran, Iran, August 22, 2023. (Photo:Iran's Presidency/WANA/Handout via REUTERS)

Tolik Piflaks

All Israel News Reports

For decades, Israel had prepared for every conceivable threat. The Iron Dome, a technological marvel costing billions of dollars, could track and destroy incoming rockets with pinpoint accuracy. Arrow missiles could intercept ballistic threats from thousands of kilometers away. David’s Sling could handle everything in between. Israeli generals slept soundly, knowing they had built one of the world’s most sophisticated missile defense networks.

Then October 7 happened. In a devastating surprise attack, Hamas terrorists employed drones to disable crucial Israeli observation posts along the Gaza border, helping their forces infiltrate Israeli territory undetected. The attack, which combined drone warfare with paragliders and other unconventional methods, caught Israel’s sophisticated defense systems off guard. The military establishment that had prided itself on anticipating every threat now faced a stark new reality.

But this was just the beginning. On a crisp morning in late 2023, at a military base near Tel Aviv, radar operators watched helplessly as a small, commercially available drone – worth perhaps a few hundred dollars – evaded millions of dollars worth of air defense systems. The drone, barely larger than a dinner plate, zigzagged through the sky at low altitude, its plastic frame barely registering on radar.

Fighter jets scrambled to intercept it but couldn’t fly slow enough to engage. Surface-to-air missiles designed for much larger targets struggled to lock on. The drone eventually crashed into an empty field, but the message was clear: Israel’s mighty defense umbrella had a hole in it, and its enemies had found it.

This scene would repeat itself countless times as Israel found itself at the forefront of a new kind of war.

From Lebanon’s southern border, Hezbollah launched increasingly sophisticated drone swarms that could penetrate advanced air defenses. More Here

‘I don’t buy it’: Americans want answers on possible drone sightings

High-tech radar used in Ukraine-Russia war to be deployed to crack Northeast drone mystery

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.