WE Branch Fanatic
A fascinating array of opinions...taking them from the top,
An air-superiority UAV would not necessarily be controlled
directly - I can imagine a vehicle which would be given the
mission to down any unfriendly aircraft it encounters in a
nominated 'live zone'. It could receive targeting and data
feeds from friendly resources but would have its own sensor
set and sufficient processing resources to engage enemy
aircraft independently.
Just because software has bugs, it doesn't mean that it
cannot accomplish a given task - yes one-off happenings like
space shots and prototype aircraft have a high probability
of failure because of the difficulty of testing unique events.
However our modern world works because most of the time
software actually functions correctly. For every instance of
crashes related to airborne software I can give you
twenty down to human error...
In the case of your ground support mission, do the pilots actually
see the aiming-point or are they lob-bombing a ground
laser-designated target or GPS coordinate.
-- Andrew