Attack Helicopters as Interceptors

I did a more in-depth breakdown why this thinking was wrong previously (see link in first comment), including the role of anti-missile cruisers, destroyers, 5inch guns and even proximity based chain guns for point defense. But I realized yesterday there’s a platform most may be overlooking when they think “intercepts” amidst Patriots, Thaads, naval destroyers and jet aircraft.

Attack helicopters.

I was being a bit tongue in cheek when I mentioned interception rockets that go fsswwsssh bang! But I was thinking of the workhorse of attack helicopters for a generation or two – the 70mm rocket. For example, the Hydra70 is a 70mm rocket designed to be fired for attack helicopters. Range is several kilometers and it flies more than fast enough to catch up to any Shahed it’s launched at.

They’re small and ready made to fit on weapons pods for modern attack helicopters like the Apache, Wildcat and even some “reconnaissance” military helicopters- I think the Apache can carry 74 of them at a time.

Now an unguided 70mm rocket launched from a helicopter is not going to be that accurate. Traditionally, these were more like the helicopter version of rocksalt – aim over there and see what sticks. But these days you can fit a rocket version of a JDAM, giving a Hydra 70 at least basic laser guidance. The upgrade package costs ~$20-$25k. So call it $30k all in versus a $20k-$50k estimated Shahed 131/136 cost. That’s a price ratio that’s much easier to sustain and there are millions of these rockets in global inventories.

Some limitations. Even with laser guidance that’s still going to be a tough shot to hit a moving Shahed from a potentially moving helicopter, but heck, you have 70+ of them. Fire a few. And if the attack helicopters get close enough, most of them have chain guns networked to pilot helmets – look at the drone, shoot at the drone. Helicopters probably wouldn’t be great at taking on 100+ drone swarms. But Iran’s mosaic warfare approach means that they’re not concentrating drone swarms of 100+ by design. They’re firing smaller salvos of 1-10 drones at a time so they can avoid getting detected, and killed, either just before or just after the launch.

There’s other tradeoffs. A helicopter can’t travel as fast or reach as far as a counter-air missile or jet aircraft dispatched on intercept on afterburner. So you’re going to locate them around cities, key installations or sensitive sites. But once there, their low speed actually makes them a *better* drone hunter. A fighter jet aircraft is going to be flying at near-stall speed to pace a drone and set up the shot, which makes everything more difficult and dangerous. But a helicopter, especially when routed on an intercept course, has enough speed to close distance to a drone in its area and take it out with Hydra rockets, or some 70mm variant, and guns. The main question at that point is what are you over – and is the risk of errant shots and falling debris higher than the risk of allowing the drone to continue and hitting it later.

Most of the gulf states, well they don’t call them “gulf” because they have no bodies of water nearby. Most of the helicopter strikes I’m seeing are over water, even if it just off shore to reduce collateral damage. (The image I’m including is a screengrab from a video released by UAE of an AH64 Apache taking out a Shahed with its chain gun).) Then there’s a band of dense populations near the coasts that you probably don’t want to be shotoing over. But then often broad swaths of uninhabited land, then communities and cities further inland in other bands. So there’s plenty of opportunities to hit, depending on how far in the drone is targeting.

But most of the GCC member states each has two, sometimes three dozen, of these kinds of attack helicopters. And the global invenotry of 70mm rockets is huge. Also it’s not an ‘ultra-cheap’ system that can take out many many drones – like a US variant Merops of Ukranian drone killers, or the pew pew laser systems which (though pricey) could theoretically take out dozens.

Maintaining and operating attack helicopters is notoriously expensive and difficult, now add a high temperature (so reduced load) and sandy environment and they’re even trickier.

But as an additional layer of “cheap” protection, especially against sensitive areas, attack helicopters can do the job. I think in Ukraine at one point they were responsible for 40% of drone kills.