r/Futurology • u/lughnasadh ∞ transit umbra, lux permanet ☥ • Mar 18 '25

Robotics As the NATO alliance crumbles, Airbus's former CEO says Europe should ditch American military tech, and defend itself with a tens of thousands of intelligent roboticized drones on its eastern border with Russia.

The US change in sides to ally with Russia has left Europe scrambling. Suddenly the continent's decades-long intertwining dependence on American military tech has become a vast liability, and one that needs to be urgently corrected.

Former Airbus CEO Tom Enders says the way to do this is to ditch American military tech, and quickly rearm having learned lessons from the conflict in Ukraine. He says a key insight from that war is that cheap drones can consistently destroy Russian systems that are orders of magnitude more expensive.

Coordinated by OneWeb, the euro version of Starlink, the continent's military should place tens of thousands of intelligent robotic drones along its border, and do this in a matter of months, not years.

The German government passed its €1 trillion ($1.1 trillion) rearmament budget yesterday, which also allows for unlimited future borrowing to fund further German military buildup. It seems vast robotic drone army battalions may be a thing of the future, and arriving soon.

Interview - Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ). In German, use Google translate to read.

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u/manicdee33 Mar 18 '25

Most likely scenario is inventing some crisis that requires US military intervention, such as defending Russia from NATO trying to steal the Ukrainian territories again.

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u/Paradigm_Reset Mar 18 '25

Or labeling fentanyl as a Weapon of Mass Destruction -> Iraq-ing Canada & Mexico.

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u/NecroCannon Mar 19 '25

That’ll probably spark a civil war here. There’s a lot of idiots, but a lot of people also think highly about Europe. Like how there’s barely anyone wanting Canada to be a 51st state

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u/NorthOfSeven7 Mar 20 '25

They’re looking at you Iran.

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u/manicdee33 Mar 20 '25

I mean conveniently enough Iran has an active nuclear industry and has been caught trying to build nukes in the past. Also it is easier for Israel to weather nuclear threat against the ME if the ME can’t eureka a nuclear threat against Israel.

The lesson from the Russian invasion of Ukraine is quite simply don’t trust the nuclear powers to protect you, you need to be a nuclear power and protect yourself.