Standing before the ominous-looking scale mockup of Northrop Grummans X-47B Unmanned Combat Air System, the Navys top science and technology official proclaimed the services commitment to unmanned air vehicles and their application for future naval combat.
Sort of.
Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Research, Development and Acquisition Dolores Etter was decidedly cool in her support the UCAS, describing in a very legalistic way as a demonstration and prototype program and an important one … among many, that is.
Northrop Grumman beat out the competition from Boeing last week to build a UCAS demonstrator that will help the Navy figure out how such a combat drone could integrate itself into the carrier air wing.
There are lots of questions we have to answer as to how this system is going to be able to do the carrier operations, Etter said.
This has got to be a blow to hard-core UCAV advocates who make a compelling argument that Navy UCAVs need to be integrated onto the CAG yesterday. The Navys UCAS program manager, Rear Adm. Tim Heely, outlined the profiles the X-47B is scheduled to fly, including approaching a carrier, landing on a carrier, taking off on the carrier, multiple approaches I think its around 40 or 30 approaches and integrating in the air above the carrier and on the carrier. Very critical parts of naval aviation.
Heely did say aerial refueling will be nixed from the test program, however. But Northrop officials argue that part of testing wont be tough to surmount.
The Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments argued last month the Navy is dragging its feet on UCAS for cultural reasons human aviators dont want to share the decks with their robot counterparts. And perhaps Etters leukwarm embrace of the drone standing behind her was an indication of that.
CSBA argued X-47B-like drones would give the Navy nearly unlimited persistence over a target and would allow carrier to launch strikes so far from their target that a ship could send a sortie of drones to North Korea, for example, as it is leaving port in Pearl Harbor.
But the Navys top UAV official argued in a private interview with Defense Tech that drones such as the X-47B and the MQ-8B Fire Scout could overcome the cultural impediments by take boring jobs such as communications relay and aerial ship inspection missions away from human pilots so that flesh-an-bone aviators can concentrate on more important ones like strike and anti-ship missions.
Clearly, however, yesterdays address at the AUVSI flight demo with three white-uniform clad Naval officers and their civilian boss standing before this robotic giant demonstrated the beginnings of a major shift in warfare and in naval aviation culture.
Didn’t the Quadrennal Defense Review say something like in the next 20 years nearly half of the Air Force’s strike capability is supposed to be unmanned?
Well, the Air Force has it easier:
They have a culture/infrastructure of in-air refueling and long-distance flying already.
Given a UCAV that can refuel from a standard aerial tanker, now endurance becomes “How long until the engine needs an oil change or a part fails”.
Also, a pilot adds a minimum of probably 500‑1000 lbs overall necessary weight, which is not a huge amount of weight on a 20,000 lb fighter, but IS huge on a 2000 lb loiterer, and with a materials-stealthy 2000 lb loiterer with 5, 100lb bombs, this is a lot of interesting capability.
Now THIS is a good idea.These UCAVs can totally save the lives of our pilots.They can augment manned fighters & they can do the low level bombing missions that got the A-6s & Tornados shot down during Desert Storm.China is converting old obsolete fighters into UCAVs that can deliver anti-ship missiles & then like a kamikaze,crash into the ships.Thise would be great for the suicide missions that it would be impractical for manned aircraft to do.
As a military enthusiast, the ‘mundane’ should be the opening act — the selling point should be ‘we’ll do the dirty work,’(see Predator…) Capabilities will be noticed, ideas will form, and tests will diversify. Its only a matter of time. A stealthy attack force of UAVs swarming like bees would be unstoppable and of no risk to a sailor, aviator, soldier, or marine. I just hope egos and politics don’t hinder development.
The Navy really does need to get over itself on this one. I know that we need to test out carrier specific issues first, to do otherwise would be putting the cart before the horse. But these problems are mostly software, not hardware. You can start designing and building the aircraft you want to fly and ones you get the software issues figured out you can start rolling out the airwings.
The world we live in now is a lot faster than it was even 15 years ago, the DOD (And the govt as a whole) needs to start thinking of working much more quickly than it had.
Couple of factoids to add to the mix.
Ah military culture. This quote is particularly striking:
“[T]he Navy
The point about pilot attrition is most valid. It takes years to assemble a continuum of pilots in the pipeline and many dollars as well. We used to have a saying: “RPV (later UAV) pilots never made a landing we couldn’t walk away from”.
The cost/risk to pilots must be balanced by the cost of overhead and infrastructure to project force remotely. Predator and Global Hawk missions are child’s play compared to an integrated global strike mission or air campaign. It will be an interesting future.
Here’s some UAV controller trivia. The Human Factors folks at Brooks AFB did a study a couple of years ago that found ‘pilots’ were the most likely to crash a UAV compared to any other group tested. I think there were some apples and oranges compared in the mix, but it reinforced my anecdotal experience. Our group’s trainer used to tell candidates he took them “six mistakes high” on their first flight before turning the controls over to them. If the candidate was already a pilot he would take them “12 mistakes high” because they could do 6 stupid things before he could resume control.
Of course, that was for a system where the controller actually controlled the aircraft instead of hitting a button and waving bye-bye.
A little history for the board, JIC you’re not familiar with it. USN has dabbled in surveillance and attack drones for a long time. If you’re interested, google terms like DASH or QH-50, Project Option, Special Task Air Group (aka, STAG-) 1, or TDR-1.
The USS Boxer launched drone attack missions during Korea using drone Hellcats. JFK’s brother Joe Jr. was killed piloting a drone Navy Liberator to cruise altitude during an attack program called Project APHRODITE.
Of course, those programs were one-way, attack programs: basically, guided missiles. Now we’re talking round trips. That’s very different.
Still, some of this has been a long time coming. Those interested in lessons learned (if only in the previous bureaucratic and funding squabbles) should take a look.
Here is something even more basic to consider: For strike missions why are we even considering aircraft, robotic or otherwise, when a more sophisticated version of the Tomahawk will do the job just as good.
The idea of using unmanned aircraft has the “cool” factor, but why stop there? Take it to the next level and develop completely autonomous vehicles that can deliver payloads to targets and then “expire”? You can effectively double the range of your weapon and not have to worry about what it will to do to your flight deck or personnel if it decides to skip across the wires.
Sure it is not as simplistic as that, there are mission variables to think about, but considering the fact that we still have to bringing an aircraft back home doesn’t really solve the problem of limited force projection and the pilot’s relationship to the aircraft. UCAVs would improve that but why not take it to the next level?
Use unmanned, fire and forget missles that can be built to carry various payloads. I think the Army is experimenting (or maybe even using) THAD right now to do that. Why not use it for all applications?
It makes me wonder what the real reason was for the cancellation of the Arsenal ship program? Because it would have made conventional carriers obsolete.
The Navy does use aerial tankers. Currently Hornets outfitted with extra tanks and refueling probes are sent on station to refuel other Hornets. I believe Vikings and Greyhounds are capable of that as well but I am not sure. currently
Someone mentioned making the drone a throw away deleivery mechanism so we don’t have to worry about it skipping a wire or two on the flight deck and killing someone. I like that idea but let’s take it a step further, Let’s make it a vertical take off and landing vechicle where we would save gas and lives. Plus if this was a throw-away, what price would the American taxpayer pay for a desposible aircraft? 26 million versus 50 million? I’d like some resuse out of it. And if we did make it a throw away, have it do a kamikaze into an enemy base?
this plane is awsome
send me a book of robotics
I am a layman,and pardon my ignorance, but can a robot aircraft abort or delay a mission when something below is not right and robot cameras or sensors cannot “reason” it out or radio back to base telling somebody about it?