Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

Short-range drone attacks using low-cost hardware and software. Could we use this stuff for other things?

During 2025, most of the world was amazed by a couple of military actions that involved drones. Urkaine destroyed Russian military facilities deep inside Russia. Israel destroyed Iranian facilities deep inside Iran. Both of these operations involved drones that didn’t have the flying range necessary. Someone drove a truck deep into forbidden territory, walked away, and the drones few the last mile.

These attacks used inexpensive hardware and software. Most of the software was 20 years old and open-source. Daring, dangerous, and successful.

I wrote a short story in 2014 about such drone attacks. Was I some sort of genius to foresee this? Nope. Just about anyone who gave this a moment’s thought could do the same.

Here’s a question: if someone can send cause cheap drones to deliver explosives to a tiny target in hostile territory thousands of miles away, can someone deliver medicine into an open window at the home of an infirmed person?

The answer must be, “Yes.” And the next question is, “Why aren’t we doing it?” Come on scientists, engineers, technologies, managers, billionaire$. Let’s do some good things for just plain folks.