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The Unmanned Air Force
Posted by
samzenpus
on Wed Jan 14, 2009 08:10 PM
from the fly-the-robotic-skies dept.
from the fly-the-robotic-skies dept.
coondoggie writes "How important have unmanned aircraft become to the US military? Well how's this: the Air Force says next year it will acquire more unmanned aircraft than manned. Air Force Lt. Gen. Norman Seip this week said the service is 'all in' when it comes to developing unmanned systems and aircraft. 'Next year, the Air Force will procure more unmanned aircraft than manned aircraft,' the general said. 'I think that makes a very pointed statement about our commitment to the future of [unmanned aircraft] and what it brings to the fight in meeting the requirements of combatant commanders.'"
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Hardware: Predator C Avenger Makes First Flights 304 comments
stoolpigeon writes "General Atomics' new unmanned combat aerial vehicle, the Predator C Avenger, has been making test flights. This new Predator has a stealthy design, 20-hour endurance, is jet powered and has an internal weapons bay. A number of photos have just become available. 'The aircraft was designed so the wings can be folded for storage in hangars or aircraft carrier operations if a naval customer is found. Cassidy, a retired admiral, has talked about a possible Navy role for Predator C since 2002. The Navy was interested in the Predator B's capabilities, but didn't want to introduce any new propeller-driven aircraft onto carrier decks. The UAV also comes with a tailhook, suggesting that carrier-related trials are planned. The inner section of the cranked wing is deep, providing structural strength for carrier landings and generous fuel volume while maintaining a dry, folding outer wing. Right now, the US Air Force and Royal Air Force are considered the most likely users.'"
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Not surprising (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't have the numbers handy but I'm betting that they can get many unmanned aircraft for the cost of a single manned one.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm curious as to what the costs of training a single pilot are, and even more to see a comparison of the average pilot skills vs an AI pilot.
However, this sure screws my plans to corrupt the air force pilots to get them to bomb random sites I generally dislike.. hmm after reflection maybe a virus for this AI would be easier!
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Not surprising (Score:5, Insightful)
Do you even need AI if you can do low-latency remote control?
You do if your opponent has some sort of communications jamming technology.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Right. But I'd imagine that's why we have the incredibly expensive stealth bombers: once the enemy air defences are down, it would really be much more cost effective to run the drones. The drones should cost less to run and would be cheaper to replace.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
One hell of a jamming technology to block the laser to satellite communication of a high-altitude plane.
Re:Not surprising (Score:5, Insightful)
One hell of a jamming technology to block the laser to satellite communication of a high-altitude plane.
1) Satellite communications are not generally referred to as "low-latency" which the OP suggested were required.
2) Two way Laser links are extremely difficult to maintain outside of your idealized scenario. Two rapidly moving endpoints, one of which might be engaged in combat.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
1) Satellite communications are not generally referred to as "low-latency" which the OP suggested were required.
Geosync? Yes. Very high latency. LEO? (Iridium) Tolerable. I know only because I've integrated systems with Iridium. Expensive as hell, but imagine being able to control something from damn near anywhere.
Re:Not surprising (Score:5, Funny)
One hell of a jamming technology to block the laser to satellite communication of a high-altitude plane.
Yes, the level of technology required would be ridiculous. [wikipedia.org]
Parent
Re:Not surprising (Score:4, Informative)
That depends on the cloud. Warm, low-altitude clouds are almost transparent to infrared. Cold, high-altitude clouds—the kind you'd find between a plane and satellite—are extremely opaque to infrared. Even clouds that are nearly transparent to visible light can block infrared light.
On the other hand, I'm not convinced a laser system would even be necessary; militaries already rely on a great deal of battlefield radio communication; if it was easy to jam those signals, people would be doing it already. Jamming a spread-spectrum transmission from one directional antenna to another is very hard.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I'd imagine you'd jam that system just like you jam radio: by sending a stronger signal -- in this case, by shining brighter lasers on the receivers on both ends (the satellite and the UAV).
Or by simply interrupting line-of-sight.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Not surprising (Score:4, Interesting)
Do you even need AI if you can do low-latency remote control?
Yes. I say this because of the high number of Predator crashes that are always blamed on "pilot" error. Compare that to Global Hawk which has one crash (which was in a very early stage of the aircraft -- late 90s I think), which has a totally autonomous flight control. None of the deployed GHs have crashed. I don't know how many Predators have crashed but for awhile it seemed like I was hearing about them once every 2-3 months.
Parent
Re:Not surprising (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Not surprising (Score:4, Interesting)
I say this because of the high number of Predator crashes
Don't forget a number of these planes were actually downed from small arms fire. Even with full size aircraft, human error is often attributed to crashes when it really isn't a factor at all.
Example: A small, single engine plane on short final (low to the ground and slow airspeed) encounters wind sheer which forces it into the ground. Cause of crash may be, "Human error. Failure to maintain positive control of craft and while close to the ground. Failure to initiate a go-around." I'm not kidding, stuff like this is actually recorded in NTSB and/or FAA crash records. Of course it ignores the fact that it is impossible for some craft to escape wind sheer. And in fact, it has caused the crash of large, commercial jets before. The problem is serious enough commercial jets now have wind sheer detection systems on board and large airports now detect and report the condition.
Additionally, as many as a half dozen commericial jet crashes which were originally attributed to human error have since been determined to be attributed to humans actually doing things properly. In fact, in these cases, the cause of the crash was actually failed hydraulic valves causing the rudder to operate in reverse direction; meaning correct corrective action by humans actually cause the problem to become worse. Yet it's still dubbed, "Human error."
Long story short, don't get too caught up believing in "pilot error" claims.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Not surprising (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:Not surprising (Score:5, Insightful)
It's even better than that. The pilot is really only needed on take-off, landing, and to carry out the mission over the target.
20 pilots can take-off 200 UCAVs, direct them to loiter over the target, and then bring them down in groups of 20 over the target. Finally, they can land the remaining UCAVs at the base.
While those 200 are en-route, the 20 pilots can be launching or recovering 200 more planes.
Or, even better, you can set up an assembly line of pilotage. 20 dedicated launchers, 20 dedicated recoverers, 20 dedicated mission specialists. And maybe 5 guys to monitor in-flight information. You could rain constant fire on a target for 24/7*365 with 300 pilots or so.
And all the pilots would be able to go home at the end of the day.
Parent
Re:Not surprising (Score:5, Insightful)
No UAV is capable of fighting a mannned air craft and winning.
Except for all of the air-to-air missiles, which are UAVs of a sort.
-jcr
Parent
Re:Not surprising (Score:5, Insightful)
No UAV is capable of fighting a mannned air craft and winning.
On a one to one basis, maybe no. But what about a ten to one basis? UAVs are a lot cheaper, and a lot more expendable.
If you can occupy the enemy's airforce with some UAVs, while others bombard the airstrips, you win.
Parent
Re:Not surprising (Score:5, Insightful)
UAVs are a lot cheaper, and a lot more expendable.
Exactly. UAVs will require a complete reevaluation of how we fight an air war. Much like tanks, machine guns, manned aircraft, and ICBMs before them, UAVs won't fulfill their promise until our military doctrine catches up.
Parent
Here's the key (Score:3, Interesting)
If they can make UAV's cheaper than the missles to shoot them down, then it changes air warfare completely.
UAV's vs. Manned Fighters (Score:5, Informative)
No UAV is capable of fighting a mannned air craft and winning.
On a one to one basis, maybe no. But what about a ten to one basis? UAVs are a lot cheaper, and a lot more expendable.
If you can occupy the enemy's airforce with some UAVs, while others bombard the airstrips, you win.
Well, considering that computers can think and react faster than any human (if properly programmed), it's very feasible that one day, UAV's will have the software and AI to absolutely dominate manned fighters. Not only that, but UAV's don't have the same limitations as human pilots do... think of things like G-forces, and the requirement to carry life-support equipment. Without things like oxygen tanks and ejections seats and cockpits, you can free up a lot of space... for fuel, or to simply make the aircraft lighter and smaller. You also don't have to worry about things like blacking out in high-G turns. All equipment has limitations, but today, the major impediment to performance is the human factor. Our current planes, not to mention our future ones, are limited more by the limitations of their pilots than by their physical structures.
There was a cheesy movie in the early 80's called Deal of the Century [wikipedia.org], a remarkably silly diatribe against arms dealing... but considering that it was made 25 years ago, it was prescient in one of its features: a UAV called the Peacemaker [streetsedge.com] that could out-fight and out-fly any manned fighter, at one point literally flying circles around Gregory Hines in his state-of-the-art manned fighter. The Peacemaker is only defeated when Chevy Chase disables it by attacking its remote control pilot back at the airfield. The Peacemaker was smaller than manned fighters, and could be launched from the back of a trailer.
Considering the advance of lightweight materials, CPU's, and software, it's only a matter of time before we can build an unmanned fighter that, like the fictitious Peacemaker, can fly rings around F-22's.
Parent
Re:UAV's vs. Manned Fighters (Score:5, Insightful)
You're making something of a ridiculous comparison.
Nobody is planning on attacking an F-22 with Predator. That's not the purpose of the Predator, or of any other current UAV. It's not what they're designed for, and it makes no sense. Criticizing them on that basis is like arguing that you can't shoot and disable a tank with a handgun; very true, but only an idiot would try. It doesn't really say anything about the fundamental design of the handgun, or whether bigger guns operating on the same principles might not be useful against the tank.
The F-22 is the pinnacle of more than 100 years of manned flight experience, and it represents an investment of trillions of dollars over the course of decades by the U.S. alone (for it and its antecedents, which it builds off of). It's a stunning machine.
Current UAVs are the very bleeding edge of an emerging technology that wasn't realistically possible until perhaps a decade ago. Someday they'll probably be regarded as the Sopwith Camels of unmanned aviation (and perhaps only then if someone is speaking kindly).
Given that manned aviation is starting to run into some fundamental limitations (amount of force the human body can bear, minimum size of an adult human, need for oxygen and sleep), plus it has political concerns (risk of dead or captured pilots and resulting changes in public support for military action), which UAVs simply do not have, it seems very likely that an increasing amount of resources will be spent on unmanned platforms rather than manned.
A great many of the advantages currently enjoyed by manned aircraft will probably be transferred to UAVs (there's no reason why you can't build a UAV with a low radar cross-section, for example), and it seems arguable at best that the one difference they will always have -- the presence of a human operator in the manned one -- will always translate into combat superiority. There seem to be many situations where that could be a serious liability rather than an advantage.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
My Aerospace Engineering Degree + Industry Experience > Your Arm-Chair Slashdot Posts.
You're assuming a UAV is a small, flimsy device. Perhaps you haven't met the Global Hawk. Note that if I take the F-22 airframe and avionics, and dump in UAV intelligence, it's now a UAV. All the benefits of not having a human onboard, with the only negative being situational awareness (or lack thereof). It's only a matter of time before the software becomes faster at judging a situation from it's data and acting on it
Re:Not surprising (Score:5, Insightful)
No UAV is capable of fighting a mannned air craft and winning yet.
there, fixed that for you
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Yet. Have you noticed that no UAV has been designed for dogfighting yet?
the manned aircraft can turn their head and see the planes over their shoulder
A data acquisition/display issue.
And no human can withstand as much turning acceleration as a UAV can.
rj
Wait a second... (Score:5, Interesting)
lets see
1 $400 million dollar F-22
10 $40 million dollar F-35
or
Where are you getting those figures? Your larger point... UAV's are cheap compared to manned fighters... still stands, but your figures for the manned fighters are off significantly. Your F-22 price is waaay to high, and ironically, the price for the F-35 is too low. No one really knows for sure, as Lockheed Martin and the Air Force fudges their financial figures on this, but the most credible figures for an F-22 is between $120 and $140 million a copy (flyaway cost), and at around $87 million per copy for an F-35A.
Both are wayyy to expensive, but at least the F-22 will do what it promises... dominate air-to-air battles. The F-35 is beginning to look like an expensive pig in a poke. If UAV's can become more and more capable (and stay cheap), you're right in that the trend of replacing some manned missions with unmanned planes will only accelerate.
Parent
Re:Not surprising (Score:5, Informative)
lets see
1 $400 million dollar F-22
10 $40 million dollar F-35
or
100 $4 million dollar UAV's
yea the math speaks volumes. UAV's can target and back up ground troops but no UAV has done air to air combat. No UAV is capable of fighting a mannned air craft and winning. If not for local ECM(jammers in other aircraft) screwing up the flight controls, then the simple fact that the manned aircraft can turn their head and see the planes over their shoulder let alone behind them.
From someone who used to fly them... There is something called a UCAV (Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicle).
As a matter of *FACT*, the X45A shot down the top pilots over and over from the Airforce's topgun school in games of lasertag. The UCAV can pull a 12G turn in a dogfight. Most humans can't stay conscious in 8Gs and the human limit before passing out is 10G.
A UCAV vs a manned F22 is like shooting fish in a barrel with a shotgun.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unmanned_Combat_Air_Vehicle
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
War No 81-Q (Score:3, Funny)
So have we got to the stage yet where we can just have our unmanned vehicles fight their unmanned vehicles over an empty patch of ocean and declare a winner?
No, thought not, but I'm sure that's where we're headed. /mark elf... //I hope someone gets the references
Assymentrical warfare (Score:5, Insightful)
The whole point of UAVs is that they are great in assymetrical warfare — such as what we and our allies (like Israel) are engaged in now and for the foreseeable future. A really strong military facing weak opponents, who carefully exploit not military strength (which they do not have), but their blending among civilians, terrorism, and some legal tricks too.
It does not work the other way — against comparable or stronger military. When Georgians tried, earlier this year, to use UAVs to monitor their rebel territories from the air, the rebel-supporting Russia quickly blasted the UAV out of the sky with a manned fighter.
Should we come to the unfortunate point of facing a comparably-equipped military once again, Air Force's spending priorities will change again.
Parent
Among insiders this is a well-known phenomenon. (Score:4, Funny)
However, there is still an old guard of macho "Top Gun" guys in the upper ranks who will have to die off before the Air Force becomes completely comfortable with the idea.
An un-manned plane can out-accelerate and out-turn any plane with a human in it, so before long a manned plane will be at a distinct disadvantage. Give it 10 years or so and manned fighters will be gone. We'll still use pilots for AWACS and the like, though.
Re:Among insiders this is a well-known phenomenon. (Score:5, Insightful)
*Reaction time for the remote pilot must equal or exceed that of an in-the-air pilot.
*Data the remote pilot has access to must equal or exceed that of an in-the-air pilot.
*Counter-counter measures must ensure that the remote pilot is always in control of the craft.
In order for self-guided robotic aircraft to replace live pilots the following must happen:
*Reaction speed must equal or exceed that of human pilots.
*Appropriateness of reaction must equal or exceed that of human pilots.
*Counter-counter measures must ensure that the robot cannot act against its creator body (IE, it can neither be subverted, nor rebel).
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Or, you know, be able to put 3 unmanned airborne weapon platforms in the air for the same cost as a single manned jet-fighter and develop sophisticated enough auto-pilot that a human controller is only required during tactical maneuvers and blow the hell out of any human pilot opponents because:
1) You outnumber them
2) Your cost of casualties is far less because a single lost plane is 1/3 the price and no human casualties as a result
3) Your ability to maneuver is much greater because you don't have to worry
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I have to disagree. Wholeheartedly.
During WWII the cost was so much higher than what Iraq and Afghanistan is today. It was a cost we could actually *feel* and experience everyday. There were rations. War Bonds. Women in fact
About time. (Score:5, Insightful)
For decades now, the limit to fighter aircraft performance has been human endurance.
-jcr
Re:About time. (Score:5, Insightful)
For years, "fighters" really haven't been doing A2A combat. Most (all?) of these are employed as bombers. And fighter/bombers are limited by airframe, not the pilot.
And when it comes to bombing, unmanned aircraft are just better. One can orbit at high altitude and lase targets while others come in lower and drop GBUs all over the target. If a few get shot down, no big deal.
Set up an INS with a gyroscope and trigger that to the proposed flight path and set the bomb to detonate if the plane veers off course. If a few blow up in the air, no big deal. Better than having one go "unguided" and hit whatever.
Forget calling in air strikes for CAS roles. The soldiers on the front can launch their own RPVs for some stuff. And for other missions, it'll be cost effective to have a wing of escorts accompany the troops. If they are attacked, the UCAVs can come down in seconds and drop munitions.
Forget the traditional role of air dominance. We can just send hundreds of UCAVs for every piloted vehicle the enemy has. He can't possibly shoot them all down. And in the opening days of the war, we'll blanket all the enemy runways with thousands of UCAVs anyway. Bomb the shit out of the runways and then loiter to take out any combat engineers trying to fix it.
The greatest thing is the manpower use. One pilot can update the INS for hundreds of UCAVs. Then, they just fly themselves. Once over the target, one pilot can take a single UCAV out of loiter and hit targets all night. Or, 20 pilots can be re-directed to engage in "shock and awe" while their former flights loiter.
Pilots will be working 8-hour shifts with 15 minute breaks every hour. They will even be able to take lunch. They can do their job from Utah or Maryland or Colorado without every having to deploy to Iraq. They won't have to be in perfect physical shape to fly. Bum knee on a great pilot; no problem.
Parent
Misleading number (Score:3, Insightful)
affirmative action (Score:4, Funny)
'Next year, the Air Force will procure more unmanned aircraft than manned aircraft,'
Nice to see the air force finally getting behind affirmative action.
Very Very Dangerous Ground We Tread Upon (Score:5, Interesting)
This is about as dangerous as Shinsheki's push for the lighter more mobile Army which was torn to shreds by IED's in Iraq and Afganistan.
If too much focus is put towards UAV's we'll end up with a manned Air Force that begins to put A2A combat second to UAV combat. What happens when we end up fighting a real war?
Capitalistic principles have no room in our military, if we cut corners we will someday pay for it.
Re:Very Very Dangerous Ground We Tread Upon (Score:4, Insightful)
If and when we end up fighting a "real" war, by which I assume you mean a war against a superpower with near-comparable strength to the United States, there are a couple of factors to keep in mind:
1) Each power is unilaterally capable of assuring mutual destruction of the other, should the conflict escalate to atomic-biological-chemical (ABC) levels.
2) Should the loser be pushed to hard by losing, they will escalate the conflict. See 1) above.
3) This means that at best, any such conflict will consist of minor skirmishes, preferably through third parties, such as Iraq.
4) Please refer to this hypothetical situation [wikipedia.org] which simulates what a "real" war might be like.
Parent
Jamming the communication system (Score:3, Informative)
It is probably a spread spectrum [wikipedia.org] solution that is difficult to jam. If you do manage to transmit powerfully enough to jam it, you advertise your location and something else (artillery or manned bomber) will pay you a short visit.
Re:Jamming the communication system (Score:4, Interesting)
Two things:
1 - the control station is only announcing its presence loudly if we assume non line-of-sight radio use. The CIA and USAF have been rapidly moving to LoS radio and laser communication (satellite bounced) for their UAVs. The control station may be in-theater or:
2 - there is no reason to park your control station anywhere near the battlefield. The USA is very capable of controlling their UAVs from the continental US, where no opponent outside Russia could likely strike.
That combined with the fact that the UAV software is quickly progressing to the point where you can "park" one over a target site and it can operate autonomously for long periods, only requesting human intervention when a "key event" is detected and there is little reason one pilot can not control an entire squadron.
Parent
Launching space tractors. (Score:3, Insightful)
"Command economies and totalitarian ideologies seem to be good at the brute-force, metal-bashing, rule-of-thumb kind of engineering, but not stuff requiring higher levels of precision."
Like say launching rockets into orbit.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Like say launching rockets into orbit.
Which they did, basically, by brute force, metal bashing, and rule of thumb. And killed a hell of a lot of people doing it. I'm a big fan of Soviet-era space technology, actually -- the stuff that has lasted is cheap and reliable -- but the process of developing it was something that would have been completely unacceptable to Americans, and rightly so.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Except that Nazi Germany basically invented all the technologies used in modern warfare
1) Long endurance diesel electric submarines (type XXI, Elektroboote)
2) Long range ballistic missiles (A4/V2)
3) Jet propelled aircraft (both fighters, bombers and recon, notably ME-262)
4) Cruise missiles (V1/FGZ-76)
5) Smart bombs (Fritz-X and HS-293 glider bombs)
6) Inertial navigation (A4/V2)
Systems under development/not deployed
1) Nuclear bomb / nuclear power
2) Guided surface to air missiles (Wasserfall)
3) Guided Air to
Re:Remote or AI? (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah damn those evil TV stations, evil UN safe houses, evil electricity sub-stations and evil 'bad guy' bridges. The 'bad guys' (grow up) should know better than to have those things in built up areas.
If *you* can simply dismiss the innocent being killed because you want to wage war against a tiny fragment of their neighbours as 'collateral damage', then by that exact same logic, all of the dead on 9/11 can simply be dismissed as collateral damage too.
But then logic nor emotion enters the world of the chick
Re:Sad to hear it (Score:5, Funny)
No no - it's appropriate. Somewhere in a village, a midget is looking at a military UAV and going "da plane! Boss, da plane!"
And beside him, someone else is looking at that same UAV and saying "From Hell's heart, I stab at thee. For hate's sake, I spit my last breath at thee."
And miles away, some pasty-faced joystick jock is sitting in his fine corinthian-leather chair humming "Volare" and saying "Can we change the channel on this thing. All I'm getting is really bad remakes!"
Parent