Infantry closes with and destroys the enemy in order to get the enemy running. If the infantry focuses on being a low-level air force in the "brown skies" just above the ground, who does close combat?
The Army and Marines are embracing small suicide drones:
The Marine Corps was the first to go on drone offensive earlier this year, announcing the formation of its Attack Drone Team, a nine-Marine crew tasked with figuring out how to integrate first-person view weaponized drones into infantry formations. ...
The Army, which also contracted last year to buy Switchblades for dismounted infantry units, released a “call for solutions” on the government’s contracting website this month, announcing it was looking to quickly prototype what it’s calling “Low Altitude Stalking and Striking Ordnance.” or LASSO.
On the one hand, good. Even as counter-measures are fielded to fill the void cheap drones fill, drones will have a role in combined arms combat. So I hope that this is in a separate weapons platoon in a company rather than being a basic weapon in a squad. But even with that I worry that company tactics will revolve around maximizing the drone use. Sure, it's a vital start, especially when static warfare stares us in the face. But it isn't the entire battlefield problem.
I worried about infantry getting distracted by drone defense, which is why I called for fighter drones in this Army article. But now it isn't just defense--its offensive drone warfare in the infantry. Who closes with and destroys the enemy when everyone is a Billy Mitchell wannabe?
NOTE: TDR Winter War of 2022 coverage continues here.
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NOTE: Photo from the article.
