General question about drones and missiles

[sksvlad]

What is the difference between drones and missiles? Both are aerial vehicles, both are guided by software, and (I assume) guided missiles have a software mode when their targets can be changed. This question is because of my ignorance.

 

[pzgr40]

I think the best explenation is that a drone can loiter the battlefield, a missle cannot.

 

[glevum]

Some guided missiles can loiter.

Alarm is one example.

I think these days the two terms are interchangeable

 

[sksvlad]

The reason I ask this is that the news keeps on saying that so-and-so launched an attack using 100 missiles and 1000 drones. All of them are designed to explode at the target.

 

[glevum]

Anything that is thrown as a weapon can be called a missile

News reporters are not known for the accuracy of their reporting.

 

[pzgr40]

The reason I ask this is that the news keeps on saying that so-and-so launched an attack using 100 missiles and 1000 drones. All of them are designed to explode at the target.

I think in this case they mean supersonic vehicles with missiles and propellor driven -iranian- vehicles with drones.

 

[glevum]

There is a lot of overlap.

Ukraine is producing turbojet powered drones like the Palianytsia which are much faster than the propellor driven drones.

Conventional Cruise missiles are generally subsonic

 

[sksvlad]

Coyote, Roadrunner Loitering Drone Interceptors To Arm U.S. Navy Destroyers

When the U.S. Navy’s supercarrier USS Gerald R. Ford deploys later this year, its strike group will include Arleigh Burke class destroyers armed with Raytheon Coyote and Anduril Roadrunner-M counter-drone loitering interceptors. Last year, TWZ laid out a detailed case for arming American...

www.yahoo.com

 

[US-Subs]

The definitions get more and more muddied as new developments cross lines and blend technologies. In general, a rocket is a warhead propelled by a motor. A missile is the same, but with the ability to change course, either on its own or through the commands of an operator. Speed and warhead size is not a factor in the definition. A guided bomb would not generally be considered a missile, but a boosted bomb... Same with guided projectiles. The definitions don't always fit.
The biggest difference with a drone is that, unlike all other systems, once launched it does not have to be a one way trip. You can change your mind and (potentially) bring it home. Drones are not new to warfare, we used MQM-34s on high risk targets during the Vietnam war.

 

[AMMOTECHXT]

From the 1960s to the 1980s the UK had AN-USD 501 (automatic-navigated, unmanned surveillance drone), a drone that used a rocket motor to launch, was directed to an area of interest, where it then fired photoflash cartridges and took photos of the ground below. Obviously the photoflash cartridges were not needed in the daytime. On its return the drone then deployed parachutes and an airbag cushioning device and landed on its back to protect the camera and film. I don't remember much else about it except that it was perhaps of Canadian design. High tech at the time but obsolete now.

 

[AMMOTECHXT]

For more info see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadair_CL-89#Description . This states that UK forces used the drone at least until 1991.