Will a UAV make us redundant ?

[The Apprentice]

Will a UAV make us redundant or just safer ?

It would seem that MOD is hell bent on buying a (decent) UAV. There are currently a number of projects studying where and when we would use it, and also which bits we need bolted on.

My question is, as some of them fly themselves there and back but still have the "man in the loop" as a sensor operator. What happens to us ?

Currently Predator pilots are volunteers as they are guaranteed the choice of aircraft at the end of their tour. So I doubt its much fun then ;)

[BEagle]

So who wants to belong to the Royal Aeromodelling Force....??

[The Apprentice]

Having just read SHAR WARS I think someone might need a job :)

[WE Branch Fanatic]

Been reading SHAR WARs eh? Well, I think the Government needs changing.

As for UAVs, I doubt very much that they are something we need to worry about. Remember the demise of manned aircraft was predicted before, by Duncan Sandys in 1957. I consider that UAVs will never have much of a combat role, except on the periphery.

As an Engineer I consider that the problems inherent in controlling those things, particularly if they are heavily armed, will be prohibitive. For example, what happens if you need to do a sortie during a rain shower? If you are depending on RF/Microwave links to the UAV, or satellite links, to communicate with the vehicle, then the loss caused by precipitation would cause the S/N ratio (and hence the bit rate) to fall like a stone dropped off of a cliff. What if the sorties is over several hundred miles or futher?

Then there is the issue of which is in control, the ground station
or the vehicle? Can you reliably ID aircraft or ground targets with what is basically a robot? Do you trust technology enough to put bombs/missiles on a robot without having a human there on the spot controlling things? Will UCAVs be acceptable to the public? After all, I doubt if many people would fly in an unmanned airliner, so why would they be happy seeing these things armed?

Having a pilot in the cockpit has saved the day in many situations which nearly ended up with friendly fire or civillan casaulties. Plus of course getting rid of the pilot will mean introducing much more instrumentation, computers and other stuff. This will make them more expensive than aircraft.

So should pilots worry about UAVs? Not in my opinion.

[Unwell_Raptor]

Yes. Anyone born after 1/1/2050 can forget about a pilot job.

[BEagle]

Some lunatic even considered air-to-air refuelling the damn things from manned ac. Err - no b£oody way!

[flygunz]

No!

[Nopax,thanx]

Not yet a viable threat to friend or foe, if this is to be believed.....


http://defence-data.com/archive/page14225.htm

[Flap62]

Can't believe that webf managed a whole post without launching into why shar was better than uavs in the uav role!

[Megaton]

Flaps62,

Concur. WEBF obviously does his research but I don't fancy going out for a few beers with him! :D

[WE Branch Fanatic]

Did I do my research?

Well, due to spending over ELEVEN years working towards a RN career, including getting a degree in Electronic and Communication Engineering, a brief spell in the defence industry as well and having lifelong interest in both defence and technology, makes these things very apparent to me.

Those are just a few of the reasons that make UCAVs unfeasible.

Incidently, some puritans might point out that its the C/N ratio which rain would degrade. But S/N is dependant on C/N, and its S/N that is mentioned in the Shannon Hartley Law (which says channel capacity = Bandwith X Base 2 Logarithim of [S/N ratio (in numbers, not dB) + 1).

So you don't want to go drinking with me? Fine, be like that

:p

Talking of the SHAR ....... just kidding! But I did read a few years ago that a UAV was being consider to replace the AEW Sea King. That idea seems to have been dropped now. UAVs for reece and possibly ESM, but for actual weapon delivery? Nah, it'll never work.

[Megaton]

WEBF,

Quite happy to debate SNR and Shannon-Hartley Law but hasn't the validity of his channel capacity theories diminshed somewhat with more advanced coding, compression and transmission algorithms? :D

[WE Branch Fanatic]

Well sort off......in that you can send less data.

[Green Bottle]

Methinks writing off UAVs might be a bit premature. The argument that a human operator will stop blue on blue does not always hold water - look at the number of blue on blue that have occurred due to pilots in the cockpit making the wrong decisions and there have been many.

UAVs have been proven in the recce role on operations. It is only a matter of time before we see them as weapons platforms - mark my words. In these days when it is not acceptable to the politicians to lose aircrew, the UAV offers a sound alternative without the risks to aircrew in the cockpit. After all, beyond the horizon munitions - cruise missiles etc don't rely on the operator being close to the target.

Yes there are likely to be a lot of barking ideas about how to use UAVs, but in time, like any emergent technology it will become the norm.

Just my humble opinion.

GB

[andrewc]

I think that we'll see a UAV armed force gain air superiority
over a conventional fighter force in the next twenty years.

And as with all role changes in warfare it will come as a
serious surprise to those with a vested interest in the
status quo.

Remember what cavalry officers used to say about tanks,
battleship commanders about aircraft carriers, phalanxes
about legions, fixed fortifications versus blitzkrieg.

-- Andrew

[WE Branch Fanatic]

Remember what Duncan Sandys said!!

Oh! 45 years on and still no indication that he was right.

Personally I don't think UAVs will ever be as flexible as manned aircraft. That is due to basic facts like the fact the Earth is curved.

[Skylark4]

I would imagine that a UAV would be fairly practical, as has been claimed, in an Afganistan type situation both as a recce vehicle, but subject to the limitations of its sensors, and as a weapons delivery system against fixed targets. Doesn`t matter TOO much if it gets hit by ground launched missiles.I would also imagine that they would be very vulnerable to interception by any manned aircraft that was fast enough to catch it and would be totally useless at intercepting even another UAV let alone a manned aircraft.
Let`s not forget that a Cruise Missile is a UAV.



"Good afternoon Ladies and Gentlemen. Please let me welcome you aboard this, the first passenger flight on a fully automatic aircraft. As you will have noticed, the computers controlling the aircraft have brought us to our cruising altitude of 37,000 feet much more smoothly than any human pilot could have done. Please let me reassure you that this aircraft is perfectly safe as has been proved in many thousands of hours of testing. Every piece of equipment is at least triplicated and absolutely nothing can go wrongongongongongongong.......................

MikeW

[WE Branch Fanatic]

My point exactly Mike.

[andrewc]

Sure, cruise missiles are relatively easy targets for manned
aircraft - they have no external sensors, follow fixed to target
tracks, only real advantage is nap of the earth flying.

Air superiority UAV's will be a different kettle of fish.

I would imagine them being deployed with a pair of AARAM
missiles each under remote guidance from an AWACS - with
enough local processing to operate in battlefield conditions
with severe jamming. They will have smaller radar/i-r x-sections,
better turn rates than human operated vehicles, be cheaper to
deploy - in the final analysis they will act as their own air-to-air
missiles versus appropriate targets.

Moore's Law is driving all of this.

It will happen,

-- Andrew

[Green Bottle]

Yes machines and computers do have faults and do break down, however look at the causes of aircraft accidents (in peacetime particularly). The biggest cause factor is mainly human error, whether that is aircrew or supporting staff.

It will be a long time before people are ready to trust their lives totally to a machine without having a pilot monitoring it with the ability to take some form of control; but look at how automated the systems of the modern airliner have become.

WEBF yes it would appear Duncan Sandys was a little premature in his beliefs but that is hardly an argument against UAVs. A UAV does not have to have full remote control all of the time - it can be programmed to carry out a loss comms procedure.

"Personally I don't think UAVs will ever be as flexible as manned aircraft. That is due to basic facts like the fact the Earth is curved."

The earths curvature is not an insurmountable obstacle - look at the likes of Global Hawk which certainly go considerably beyond horizon.

Yes jamming can also be a problem but again not insurmountable and especially against a low-tech adversarywho doesn't have much if any capability.

"Well sort off......in that you can send less data."

How much data do you need to send to fly a UAV - not much I would wager. And where reduced bandwidth would make real-time recce more difficult again it would not be as difficult for a manned ac?

GB

[UAM]

Unfortunately, I think the end will be in sight for multiple reasons.

Firstly, as a graduating Eng. student at Manchester, we are more or less constantly being fed UAV projects left right and centre. Our final year group design was involved in creating an unmanned recon aircraft.
The MOD are currently working with around 5 top engineering departments with regards design of a stealth UCAV. Apparently, the benefits of removing a significant G limit from the picture (ie the pilot) as well as the benefits gleaned in a stealth environment from removal of a glass cockpit, the picture looks bleak. Plus, think of the extra sensor suites that become available.
Combine that with removal of political problems occuring due to a shoot-down and you have a much improved package.
Fortunately though, by the time Bae or whoever get to build it get it front line, we will all be on our pensions anyway.

[WE Branch Fanatic]

Will it be politically acceptable to arm UAVs?

Another thing, would you want to be a infantryman supported by UAS doing CAS. With piloted aircraft you can (sometimes) talk directly you the pilot. You wouldn't be able to with a UAV.

The situation at the cutting edge may be incorrectly interpreted at control. A ground based controller will never have the same level of situational awareness as a pilot. If say a sensor broke (say an electrical joint failed due to vibration) you might failed to correctly ID a target. Another thread on PPRUNE talks about "friendly fire". These incidently would inevitably be much more common with UAVs.

As the the argument about a reduced need for communication, yes I agree, you could fly them with very little data transfer and they could fly in a "no comms" situation. But target ID and weapon release (particularly in the offensive role or with long range missiles) will not be entrusted to autonomous systems so a human bloke on the ground will have to OK weapon release. A shrewd enemy will seek to interupt communications.

Then there is the issue of infrastructure. A lot of extra infrastructure would be needed. Apart from the cost, these are now new targets for the enemy aircraft, missiles, UAVs, artillery, Special Forces or even terrorists.

Lastly.......On PPRUNE there is a thread relationg to the tragic Chinook crash in 1994. Many people, including myself, think that the most likely cause of this accident was faulty software. There is considerable evidence to support this. Software is almost impossible to test for 100% of all possible inputs, outputs, enviromental conditions, electrical noise in the system, interuptions to the power etc etc. Software based systems have failed spectacularly many times before. Consider...

Sea Wolf system software in Type 22 Frigates malfunctioning in the Falklands.

Computers "locking up" in the same conflict. This was a contributing factor in the loss of HMS Coventry.

Ariane 501. The software failed simply because a 64 bit number was put into a 16 bit register. Despite the hundred of millions of (whatever currency you like) put into the design and development, this still slipped through the net.

The loss of a pilotless Airbus. It flew right into the trees.

The loss of a US F22 due to a software malfunction.

Basically, allowing software to control things without having a human ON THE SPOT to make sure things are OK is just asking for trouble.

As for the issue of G limits, this is less of an issue now than it used to be. It a pilot losses conciousness for a second or two (and you would never experience more than 6G for longer this) it doesn't mean a crash. Modern instrumentation and controls (eg those being developed for the JSF) will tolerate transientry loss of pilot control.

[The English Passenger]

WEBF.

"you would never experience 6g for longer than 1-2 seconds".

You can tell you've never flown anything other than a flight sim on your PC.

Other than that probably all valid points but it will not stop it all happening as technology looks great to politicians, as do a no casualty prospect for our side.

[rob_frost]

Out of interest, what the maximum number of G a top fighter pilot can take? (+ and - )

[high spirits]

A UAV stylee Wokka... now that would be a challenge to fly from a ground station!

[izod tester]

Hmmm, a long list of reasons why it is not safe to rely on software - ending with the statement that the system will save a pilot should he black out during high "G". Of course, to be a good fighter pilot it is important to be unpredictable!

[The Apprentice]

Well this generated more than I thought it would......

Most comments seem to state a belief that UAVs are not armed, well one of the prime reasons I asked the original question is that they are now armed. A Predator has succesfully fired Hellfire and hit real targets.

Much has been mentioned on not having a pilot would mean a loss of flexibility in response to arising situations. Well most of the more complex have multiple means of data passage to its operators, to overcome reduced bandwidth.

I believe that we will see a combination of both manned and unmanned. Read the following and you will see how close uncle sam is getting.

http://www.mat-kmi.com/features/1_2_Art2.cfm

Sensible discussion on Pprune I don`t believe it !

[Flatus Veteranus]

What's the max 'g' that can be sustained by a "top fighter pilot"?

Good question! And as unlikely to get an honest answer as "How long is a top fighter pilot's willy"?

Being a long way past boasting on either score, I think I can recall that on the Meatbox, where we did not have 'g' suits but we did have a "upper" rudder pedals to get your feet as high as possible, descending in a spiral to maintain max permissible Mach/IAS, a chap who was in practice (v. important because special abdominal muscles are used) and who had not had too heavy a night before, could sustain 6 'g' whilst still retaining sufficient vision and mental capacity to function. Instantaneous 'g' could be much higher - as long as you did not pull the tail off!

Negative 'g' was not an issue. I know of know tactical manoeuvres that require it, and airframe stress limits are much lower in negative 'g'. :eek:

[STANDTO]

interesting stuff this. Particularly respect the commentsof WE Branch Fanatic. however:

I leared to compute on a Tandy TRS80 in 1981. The dogs hind legs, it had a 14 inch black and white monitor, twin 5 1/4 inch disk drives and 16 meg of RAM. - it was crap. Now, here we are with 2 gig processors on desktops, and flying across the atlantic on 2 engines. What we were achieving in 1982 in the falklands with weapons systems was incredible then but primitive now. Who knows what is going on deep deep in labs across the world

[BEagle]

When I was on detachment to an RAF aerodrome in Tchermany 20 years ago, along with our creaking old F4s there were also French Mirages and Uncle Spam's F-15s. One day we had a visit form a 'typical' French general who reckoned that he was a fighter pilot (probably used to fly Ouragons or Vautours or somesuch). The Spams offered him a trip in the back of a T-bird F-15, which he accepted. When they went to flying clothing, the Spams handed him a g-suit. With typical Gallic arrogance he announced "Non. Ah amm a fighter peelot. Ah do not need a g-suit!" The Spams asked him if he was certain, "Mais oui!" came the response. So the F-15 Detco tracked down his hardest-a$$ed pilot and said "Show the General what the F-15 can do!".

Apparently they launched in max AB and accelerated to warp several, whereupon the F-15 mate snapped to about 7g, spiralled upwards to flight level nosebleed, then came down again with idle power and full speedbrake before breaking into the circuit. Le General des grenouilles had slumped into his seat at the first 7g snap and had slept soundly throughout the rest of the trip! "How did you like the jet?" asked the Spams. "It was very...err, memorable" said the Frog as he staggered away to his colleagues!

[Green Bottle]

"Will it be politically acceptable to arm UAVs?"

Already been done with Predator.

"A ground based controller will never have the same level of situational awareness as a pilot."

The ground based controller might have better SA because he may have more info feeds. If a pilot cannot see the enemy, then he has to rely on sensors in the same way as a ground based controller.

"Another thread on PPRUNE talks about "friendly fire". These incidently would inevitably be much more common with UAVs."

I disagree what do you base this supposed inevitability on?

"(particularly in the offensive role or with long range missiles) will not be entrusted to autonomous systems so a human bloke on the ground will have to OK weapon release."

Yes, but how do long range cruise missiles cope. Target ID does not need to have an operator with eyes on the target passing the "arm" code. It will be dependant on ROE.

"Then there is the issue of infrastructure."

More required for manned ac - longer runway, more fuel, more defence, more personnel etc. etc. UAVs have the potential to travel much further than manned ac, hence can be based in much safer locations.

"Basically, allowing software to control things without having a human ON THE SPOT to make sure things are OK is just asking for trouble."

Basically allowing a human to interfere will cause many accidents and has in the past. You quote various software caused crashes, however the Pilot didn't save the YF22 so how does having a human operator make it safer. The Mull of Kintyre accident has never conclusively been solved - many have their pet theories. There is no conclusive proof of what caused the accident - it COULD have been human error or it COULD have been computer error - to name just a couple of possible reasons.

[WE Branch Fanatic]

UAV infrastructure will mean dedicated comms systems. Either RF (or more probably) microwave. These would have to be speacially designed and built. If the decision was to use Satellite comms (best for security) then real time communication would require a constellation of dedicated birds in LEO or MEO orbits. Still no answer to the weather problem. Telemetry and Telecommand will require a large bandwidth due to the required data rate, in fact the trend is to increase the bandwith with CDMA and then recover the data with Signal Processing.

Do you know how much data is sent back from the sensors on the engine of a Formula 1 car? 1Mbit/s.

The Predator has been armed with Hellfire missiles. In other words using short range weapons for short range missions against fixed targets at known locations in relatively benign (to electromagnetic radiation, ie RF/Microwave and (particularly) laser) weather conditions. Now try a CAS mission against suspected enemy vehicles on a rainy day in the Balkans, 200+ miles away from the base......

I am sure that most of the pilots who use PPRUNE could tell you stories of how they saved their aircraft by intervening in things...

I have no experience of flying, not even in a sim. So there you are right.

Politicians will become weary of UCAVs when they realise how expensive and unpredictable they are. The political mood in the US has changed since 11 September, the politicians are starting to realise that sometimes you have to accept casualties. And what about the danger of hitting your own troops/aircraft/ships etc?

Cruise missiles are not UAVs. Not really. They just fly into known targets with fixed locations. I would not want to see one being used for CAS.

As for computers, they will never be foolproof. They might get faster, but software is still liable to be full of bugs.

[andrewc]

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

[Stan Moore]

An interesting and informative debate on prune... hooray!

I have to say that, given the US progress in this area, the question is 'when' rather than 'if'. However, ROE constraints etc lead me to believe that UCAVs will form part of a force mix with other platforms, manned and unmanned.

I follow all the S/N decibel blah but... the US have changed the laws of physics before!

[Mike RO'Channel]

There seems a lot of sense spoken here with WEBF fighting the human interface (pilot) corner and others desperate to prove him wrong. However, what does seem likely, is that the MOD and politicians will chase after UAVs - most probably as a cost-saving measure in the first instance. Methinks that is a blind alley. However, I tend to agree that the thought of not having to train, house and pay a fair number of comabt pilots (not to mention have them come home in body bags) will be the biggest attraction for our Lords and Masters. In time, they may even be proved right.
However, to go back a way to Skylark - will anyone ever get on board a UAV transport ac (paying or not)? I know I won't and can't see Trooper Jones (Hereford) being all that enamoured that the Chinook (2030) version is controlled by some computer whizz in a nice comfy office 200 miles away! Perhaps the we will be the Royal Transport Force by 2050!:( :p :confused:

[Green Bottle]

WEBF,

The compression techniques and other methods of maximizing bandwidth that are available today compared to 10 or 15 years ago lead me to believe that in the future we will find better methods. If I could predict what they are, I would be a rich man! Yes weather does cause a problem but it is not inconceivable that in 10 years time it would not be a problem.

1 Mbit/sec may be a large amount of data to us now but a 56K modem was considered impressive 10 years ago.

Predator with Hellfire missile is just a start. Compare Wilbur and Orville Wrights efforts compared to the Supermarine Spitfire 4 decades later, or compare the Spitfire to the F16.

Yes casualties are more politically palatable since Sept 11 but at the same time funding for UAVs has increased massively during the same period.

I'm sure most pilots could tell you a few stories of how they lost or nearly lost their aircraft due to their own actions.

"I would not want to see one being used for CAS."

Who is to say that the controller of the UAV providing the CAS is not colocated with the infanteer? The UAV could be launched from thousands of miles away and loiter for hours on end in the target area. Control could be handed over to a ground controller local to the infanteer - doesn't have to be in the firing line, could be 10 miles away.

"As for computers, they will never be foolproof. They might get faster, but software is still liable to be full of bugs."

Historically materials have failed (metal fatigue etc.) and have been replaced by better materials or better monitoring - in time computers develop in the same way. Software and processors that have been used for many years are likely to be pretty reliable as bugs are ironed out over time.

MROC,

In time attitudes change. Whilst now it may seem unthinkable to most people to have a pilotless transport, in 2030 it could be the norm. 30 years ago a driverless train would have been unthinkable, now however we are seeing automated monorails and the like beginning to pop up.

Flying an aircraft low-level using TFR whilst in IMC strikes me as a rather scary thing to do - trusting your life to a computer getting it right, but it can be and is done so I'm led to believe.

GB

[BEagle]

Any UCAV would either need a fair degree of autonomy or else some very sophisticated control methods. In an era when it is still easier to communicate with the dead than with Cyprus Flight Watch, what degree of assurance could there be that any RAF-operated communications circuit would be sufficiently reliable to control a UCAV? Even then, either someone would probably turn the on/off to off, the cleaner would pull out the plug to plug in a hoover - or Plod would ban the transmission of confidential information....

UAVs are OK for recce in hot areas - and the odd A/G munition has been pooped off by them already - but we're a very long way from sufficiently reliable systems to control anything more than over-the-air re-targetting of recce sensors, I would guess.

Quite right that the only real reason that They are interested in UAVs is to save cost...

[LXGB]

This may be worth watching...

"Discovery channel (UK)
Monday 13 May, 2002
16:00 BATTLE FOR THE SKIES

Showing how a piloted aircraft is still the most effective and flexible aerial option in the theatre of modern warfare. "

[WE Branch Fanatic]

BEagle I agree.

WEBF = the pilots' friend (particulary if you fly a certain RN STOVL fighter).

:)

[Green Bottle]

Beagle,

Agree that we're a long way off from over-the-air re-targetting but I think it will come.

I think you've hit the nail on the head when you say it's all about cost - If you can deliver the same or similar capability using UAVs rather than manned aircraft and it's cheaper then what treasury walla will go for the expensive option?

LXGB,

Thanks, I've set it up to record - should be interesting. Well OK maybe just relevant to this thread - I don't get out much!

GB

[Flatus Veteranus]

Well, on my PC Board at Ramridge House in '49 I had a hell of a set-to with some Gp Capt who thought that the writing was on the wall for manned aircraft. It got quite heated and I went a litle "OTT". He clearly thought I was a brash young undergrad (which I was) and I thought he was a pompous old technofart (which he probably was not). I was quite glum about my prospects but the Air Commode must have been on my side. "Plus ça change..."

It does strike me some times that you young tearaways are busy pricing yourselves out of the market. The Treasury must be licking their chops at some of the current gizmos.

WHEN the day comes that UAVs take over the main offensive and defensive combat roles, THEN the culture of military aviation will have died and the raison d'être of the RAF with it. Best then to burn the light blue uniforms and hand the "unmanned airfarce" over to the fisheads and grunts - who have been plotting and scheming to kill off the RAF for the last 80 years. We can then shake the graveyards with our mirth at the inevitable "blue-on-browns" and "brown-on-blues". :D

[lightningmate]

UCAVs may be cheaper to purchase as a unit. But they are not intended to fly for the 6,000 hrs life of a FJ aircraft.

Hence, you have a training problem. If some form of ground control is to be utilised, people must train regularly and in so doing, you rapidly use up the system life of the UCAV and need to buy some more. Please do not shout about simulators, you have to use the real thing to determine its actual limitations amd weed out the 'bugs'. It is lethal to base operational plans on a defence contractor's optimistic claims for the capability of its product only to find out the hard way that the thing does not work as advertised. Consider what the 'cost' of that situation could be.

Even if the thing is simple and can sit on a shelf until required, you still need to carry out some maintenance activity, which equals cost.

Finally, we never, never, never fight the battle we plan for!!! So the in-built flexibility of having the human, right there in the air platform 'close' to the difficult bit, is vital when it's 'all change'.

I am not a luddite, these things have their place and will, no doubt, develop. But using simple unit cost as a prime justifier for following the UCAV route is a flawed argument. Even the Americans have realised that one.

lm

[andrewc]

There currently is no real impetus to go to fullscale UAV
deployment because the solution we have works well
enough already. NATO manned airforces are capable of
closing down the air-defense networks of any likely feasible
enemy without significant combat losses. If the cold war
was still rolling this would not be the case.

I personally believe that an actively funded UAV program
with todays technology could create aircraft that would be superior in combat to conventional air forces.

However there is always a lot of investment in status
quo, so I don't see NATO doing this overnight. However
a small country which was willing to take a chance on
new technology might well be able to field systems which
could beat a more conventionally equipped opponent.

The places where I would look to see this happening would
be say, India-Pakistan, China-Taiwan.

-- Andrew

[WE Branch Fanatic]

BEagle, Flatus and LM

I am pleased that you have given some thought to the issues here, as have I. I agree with LM, a pilot means flexability. Also I had never considered the issue of UCAVs having a limited lifespan.

I think the proponents of UCAVs have not given enough thought to the nagative implications of autonomous offensive systems.

[Mike RO'Channel]

When you lose comms (happens fairly regularly) with a manned aircraft, you still expect it to do its job and then land somewhere in one piece. If you lose contact (no matter how many Megs/sec)with a UAV, then its landing might be catastrophic or at least politically unacceptable, especially if its carrying things that go 'whoosh..... bang'.

:p

[The Apprentice]

Lost comms is generally not a catastrophic failure, however it means that you may have to wait an awful long time to get that "real-time data" the manufacturer promised you would get.

An awful lot of that huge new US Defence budget is going on UAV`s.

Maybe they price US lives higher than ours, (or at least can afford to).

Another point is how do you train with the things, especially in UK airspace !.

Many a poor Gazelle pilot has been sent aloft with a video camera, simulating a UAV.

[WE Branch Fanatic]

Exactly my point Mike.

[TropicMoon]

Congratulations to The Apprentice for opening-up this string - an historic move.

Equally historic:

"Methinks writing off UAVs might be a bit premature";

"we're a long way off from over-the-air re-targetting";

"UAVs are OK for recce in hot areas - and the odd A/G munition has been pooped off by them already - but we're a very long way from sufficiently reliable systems to control anything more than over-the-air re-targetting of recce sensors, I would guess"


As the Chief of Staff of the USAF said recently, this technology is developing faster than our capacity to use it.

The fact is .....it's all been done already and most of it is already routine - in some quarters.

Predators were passing live target imagery to F-18s in Kosovo. USAF AC-130s now receive real-time Predator imagery for "air to air re-targetting". The capability to pass real-time Predator target data to RAF Jaguars (at low level) and AH64s is proven.

OK, Hellfire is a short range weapon, that's a weapon issue, not a platform issue. The new MQ-9s will carry14 Hellfires or just about everything else in the shed.

Early Predators were non-de-iced - its wasn't part of the ACTD. Now RQ-1s are de-iced so the all-weather issue is down to the sensor.

The current Predator SAR is ballast but the next generation will offer real-time all-weather, targetting against fixed and mobile targets (subject to ROI), it's flying on the MQ-9s. The imagery is geo-referenced so can be passed directly to a JDAM. The UCAV is a reality.

As for re-fuelling them A-A, with nearly 30 hours endurance, why would you want to - but this too will come.

As far as I know, there has never been a lost link over the satellite, due to weather or anything else - and they don't need to be LEO or MEO (in fact they shouldn't be). And, we don't need to buy a network of our own, most of the USAF\other agency stuff goes over commercial networks (encrypted).

We have two options; we can nit-pick this techological revolution in the hope it will go away, or, we can live in the real world.

[steamchicken]

Weellll......I doubt they will have a big fighting role in the foreseeable future, but their importance for recce and cloak-and-dagger tasks is already large and growing. On this topic, the Washington Post covered quite a bit of this under its "Dot.Mil" column, and a look through their archive could be interesting. Amongst other things they reported that the live video feed from Predators to HQ during Op. Anaconda had been more of a distraction and a temptation for the staff to interfere with micro-tactics than anything else. One US Army officer told them it was "an interesting toy" but not much else!

[Green Bottle]

It will take a fundamental change in mindset and the way business is conducted. Mistakes like micro-managing will be made and lessons learned but that doesn't detract from the potential of this technology.

Their fighting role will take some time to develop but that is because of the slow mil procurement processes.

"One US Army officer told them it was "an interesting toy" but not much else!"

Yes and Bill Gates said "the internet will never take off" (or words to that effect) but boy did he move fast to exploit the internet once he realised his mistake.

[ChristopherRobin]

Most people seem to think that bandwidth/commlinks for realtime control of UAV's (and the problems associated with their loss) are the problem. Well that depends on how you use the UAV and is by no means a bar to their employment in current, or indeed, future roles.

The enabling factors for UAVs, particularly CUAVs aren't so much the comms links or air frames although these are important. The key enabling technology that will see an exponential growth of their capability is computer processing power and novel approaches to their software.

Yes it will take a lot of bandwidth for non-stop remote-pilot control flying. But we don't need to do it that way. Anyone can see that a short data message to tell the aircraft to go to a certain point, or attack a certain target takes neglible bandwidth. The software on board assesses it's threat environment thru it's sensors, and works out how to achieve its set objective in a way that a real pilot would. This is not artificial intelligence - this is simply the CPU applying

Input (from sensors and targeting instructions)
against
Rules (flight controls, weapon release parameters, survivability subroutines, laws of aerodynamics, where is the ground, possibility of collateral damage)
to produce
Output (achieving release parameters, staying airborne, evasive manoeuvres and getting outta there!)

Now think about this - combine CUAVs into teams that can cross-reference their actions with one another and work out how to attack targets together for maximum effect
and can all pull 20G turns cos they don't have pilots...

They may not be as clever or as good looking as (Lynx) pilots, but would you want to mix it with them? And with the objective-oriented software architecture, one controller could 'fly' 3 or 4 or more together - controller inputs destination, issues weapon states, loiter time, objectives, goes for a brew and comes back when they get there - he doesn't fly them there himself. And he's cheap.

Failsafes are easy to build in - eg no release without the executive order from General Whoever.

The rise of the computer will see the fall of pilots. Take for example passenger aircraft - leaving aside for the minute that psychologically noone wants to be flown by a computer. If over 90% of all accidents are pilot error, if we replace the pilot with something that would not make those errors then we could slash the accident rate by nine-tenths (and remove the problem of terrorists in the cockpit).

Now although ironically this would then leave 100% of all accidents being down to aircraft malfunction, I think you can see what I mean!

Now I speak as a pilot - I do think that there will always be a place for a manned aircraft, but the UAV's are coming and they'll likely go to SEAD next after recce. It always makes me smile when people say things like "nice toy" as recounted above, but the chairman of IBM once said that he saw a world market for "4 maybe 5" computers; Bill Gates once said that he couldn't see why anyone could ever need any more than 4 MBytes of disk space; and many of you will have heard the officer who complained in WW1 that airplanes "are a damned nuisance, and frighten the horses!"

Should we now change that to:

"UAVs are a damned nuisance, and they frighten the pilots"?

[steamchicken]

There are just as many stories about futures that never came true......I advise Herman Kahn's "The Emerging Japanese Superstate", the same man's predictions of the colonisation of Mars by 2000 and personal helicopters instead of cars, Francis Fukuyama's "The End of History" and most futurologists' predictions generally. Also hordes of hard-right rants about the fall of the West. I recall finding in my university's library a book called "The Death of British Democracy", published 1977. About the only thing nobody mentioned was computers. Predictions and conservatism both tend to be wrong.

[Green Bottle]

I agree many predictions made in the past about the future have been wrong. My point was that you can find lots of quotes even from people with apparent credibility to support either case - talk is cheap.

[TropicMoon]

Green Bottle has it exactly.

Giving the commanders information which allows them to micro-manage is, and always has been, an error.

Cleft sticks were the start of a slippery slope, semaphore was a disaster and carrier pidgeons were the last straw.

If you think you can resolve this issue by ignoring the technology which makes the information available you may as well sit in a deck-chair and tell the waves to go back. Don't shoot the messenger.

As for "interesting toys"............not even the US has the $ to make "interesting toys" their highest and most urgent spending priority or the CoS USAF to request 5 squadrons of MQ-9s on the basis of recent armed RQ-1 experience - and he could put that funding into other "toys".

[WE Branch Fanatic]

As Green Bottle said...."there will always be a place for manned aircraft" as well as UAVs.

ENDEX!!

[Green Bottle]

I could be wrong but I can't find where I am supposed to have made the statement you attribute to me WEBF. I am more likely to have said there is a place for manned aircraft for the forseeable future, however in 20 or 30 years time who knows?

[Mike RO'Channel]

Let me ask you this GB, CR etc.

Would you put your family on an UAV transport ac flying them from say, Middle East, over the alps, Paris and London to Manchester over some f...ing big hills, in poor wx and across the most congested airspace in the world - and trust to the sensors and satellite link?

I don't think so - not now, not never!

[WE Branch Fanatic]

Sorry, I quoted the wrong person earlier.
Mike, good point. If you wouldn't put up with that then why should we put up with ARMED ones?

I'm not going to repeat my earlier points, go back and read them if you want.

[andrewc]

WE Branch Fanatic

UAV's will be deployed because they will be better at
various operational tasks than manned combat aircraft.

Sooner or later some manned airforce is going to get
the stuffing kicked out of it by a UAV based force.

I would like to hope that its not ours because we are too
wedded to 'the way we do things now' to realise that
times change.

I'm not saying that manned combat pilots will disappear
overnight but the writing is on the wall.

For what its worth we can be encouraged by the example
of the Navy in 1905 launching Dreadnaught and making
obsolete every other battleship in the world.

-- Andrew

[PTT]

When we make decisions, in any environment, we employ a set of rules. This set of rules is used to determine what the best decision is through a form of risk management. Someone, somewhere, is busily beavering away finding out what those rules are. When he has finished he will have the basis of an AI capable of emulating the flexible mindset of the human pilot, but with all of the data in accurate numerical form available. This AI can be programmed into an appropriate computer which will then be used, on-board, to fly the UAV. Simple if-then statements will do for mission objectives, with more complex routines to cover more difficult manouvers such as air combat, but everything will be essentially if-then based (just like we work). For political reasons, there will likely be a human monitor (not mission essential) who will have the ability to destroy the UAV.

UAV's are unlikely to hit the commercial sector, though, since people are "happier" with human pilots.

Ta muchly

PTT

[ChristopherRobin]

Mike RO'Channel - I did concede earlier that it was a psychological difficulty, bur consider this:

When fly-by-wire first came in people said "no way am I flying that, unless there is a mechanical linkage" - they were afraid that the computer between them and the aircraft might screw it up. This is not a dissimilar argument. I accept that people would not want to put their families on robot airliners, but if these were proved to be far safer than humans what then?

People have eye surgery done on them by computers wielding lasers every day. Why? Is it because the human surgeons can't be @rsed to do it or is it that computers are better at some things than humans?

The reverse is also true, but if ever there was a job that could be broken down into a set of rules its flying and is therefore a prime candidate for improvement in this way.

I don't relish the days when chaps like me can never fly again, but the technology is maturing to make it happen. And saying the public won't wear it is, I feel, somewhat shortsighted. Precedents abound - moving from horses to cars; the machine wreckers; going to the moon (try doing that better without computers).

And would I put my family on an unmanned aircraft that had proved safe under the no-doubt relentless testing?

If it removed the high percentage of accidents down to pilot error then why not? Seems logical to me.

[Mike RO'Channel]

I admit there will probably come a time when pilotless aircraft have proved themselves to be better than those with a human interface (yuk). Until then, I'll trust one of us highly trained lot anyday to take to my family home!

UCAVs on the other hand, will come - and come quickly - probably as recce/SEAD/spiking role rather than BAI/CAS/strike.

Possibly, I may be shortsighted but I am able to get some specs/contacts, rather than have my eyes lasered at all!

[WE Branch Fanatic]

I agree Mike.

And as for the comparison with the Dreadnought, you would do well to remember that Dreadnought was a new battleship with superior speed and firepower, NOT a new concept.

[lightningmate]

Whilst the peacetime deployment of the Dreadnought class ships certainly 'got attention', immpressive glossy brochure stuff, when the fleet action at Jutland arrived things were played for real. The quote, attributed I believe to Sir David Beatty, was:

"There is something wrong with our bloody ships"

That quote followed the dramatic loss of several British capital ships, including some in the same class as HMS Hood!!

The lessons of history remain as rock solid as ever; hence, it is a pity people do not remember them.

lm

[WE Branch Fanatic]

Too true lm.

HMS Hood was lost because of inadequate armour, particulary on the deck. Therefore she was vulnerable to penetration through her deck. That is what happened.

[The Apprentice]

Although inadequate armour was a major factor, it had as much to do with the fact that the british fought there turrets with much ammunition in them, rather than in the magazines.

This was apparently due to the fact that our ammunition feeding system was slow compared to the Germans. An equal factor was that we had very poor sighting systems so the answer was to fire twice as many rounds. Which our boys did.

Now if they had had UAV`s sighting for them (to regain the tracks) you would have seen the following.



If anyone is interested in how hard it is to succesfully procure a UAV that does what you want, as opposed to the Manufacturer; read the following.

[URL]http://www.vectorsite.net/avuav6.html (http://uav.navair.navy.mil/pioneer/video.htm)

[andrewc]

WE Branch Fanatic

As I said the launch of the Dreadnaught made obsolete every
existing capital ship in every navy in the world. Its combination
of single type main-armament, armour and speed meant that
fleets based on pre-dreadnaught designs were going to lose
against dreadnaught designs. You may not think that it was
a revolution but every other navy in the world at the time did.

The positive point is that a century ago we had the balls to make
a peacetime change of such magnitude.

Lightningmate

The fleet action at Jutland in 1915 took place between two mainly
Dreadnaught based fleets - Beatty was complaining about
the loss of three battlecruisers to magazine explosion when the
battlecruiser squadrons ran head-on into and actively engaged
the lead battleships of the High Seas Fleet before the Grand Fleet
battleships became engaged. I agree with your quote about
people not remembering the lessons of history completely.

WE Branch Fanatic

No one presently knows why the Hood was lost - there are at
least two plausible theories - certainly putting BC's against BB's
is equal numbers is a bad plan. The whole design of gun armed
warships revolved around placing them into battle at a range
where their guns would penetrate the armour of their opposition
and their likely opposition's guns would not penetrate theirs.

Apprentice

Lots of factors squeezed together here, at Jutland, the loss of
the BC's was down to flash from turret penetrations igniting
ready use ammo with the fire proceeding down the ammo hoists
to the magazine below with catastrophic results. This didn't
happen at Jutland to the Germans because in 1914 at the
battle of Dogger Bank the German BC Sedlitz had and survived
a similar turret fire - which resulted in improved ammo handling
and flash guards throughout their fleet. The British learned the
lesson at Jutland with Lion another BC that suffered a turret
fire but survived due to a posthumous Marine VC. Our optics
and ammo were not as good but the thing that saved the
High Seas Fleet at Jutland was the fact that it ran way from
full scale action twice and an British intelligence failure failed
to pass the rendezvous point of the High Seas Fleet the next
day to the Grand Fleet at sea.


Anyway, on the subject of UAV's, time will tell...

-- Andrew

[BEagle]

The difference between the dreadnought days and today is also evident in public pride in the Armed Forces. Can anyone really imagine another "We want eight and we won't wait" campaign to increase defence spending in Tony's Utopia??

[Mike RO'Channel]

Couldn't agree more Beagle. (Although we are somewhat 'off-thread' here).

Guy Gibson briefly wrote on the causes of war in Enemy Coast Ahead in 1944.

"After many years, they (the people) will probably slip and ask for disarmament so that they can do away with taxes and raise the standard of living. If people forget, they bring wars on themselves and they can blame no-one but themselves."

Whether or not its more pilots/ac/UAVs/battleships/landing ships/FA2s, we need more defence investment (not spending) now (and ad infinitum).
:)

[Muff Coupling]

UAVs are here to stay..no doubt. I go with Tropic and Christopher Robins reasoning. Never say never!

A Global Hawk recently flew from California to Queensland Australia, the first USAF UCAV Squadron formed (with no pilots!)and the CIA are throwing more loot at I-Gnat, than David Beckhams account can hold. Control the technology, before it controls you!!

Forget your bandwidth mularky..we are all missing the most important factor...UAV design, doctrine and employment might be irrational..but we are led by irrational politicians..who just happen to be pig sick at doshing out FRIs to irrational pilots!

:D

[TropicMoon]

X-45 first flight video here


http://www.boeing.com/news/releases/2002/q2/nr_020523m.html

[PercyDragon]

From my many years experience with a IT equipment I have come to the conclusion that the development of this stuff is driven primarily by the IT indutry's desire to flog new systems. And the potential rewards of being awarded a systems development contract by the MOD or simliar are absolutely breathtaking.

The company in question doesn't really care if the damn thing works in the end. The point is to get the development contract in the first place.

On my own personal side, I have just shelled out quite a lot of money on a new computer system, hoping that this would cure the problems of my last system crashing. I have to admit that its a lot better than the last one. But I still have problems getting to do extemely simple tasks. If it was in control of a flying machine it would have ended up as a smoking hole in the ground within a few hours of me switching it on.

I think that anyone who has driven flying machines for any length of time will know that the whole idea of pilotless aircraft is an unrealistic dream.

[Reheat On]

So your opionion of Global Hawk would be.....

[Flatus Veteranus]

I think we can see the way things are going. In recent "interventions" (The Gulf, the Balkans, Afghanistan) the pattern has been to neutralise (or severely degrade) potential hostile air defences with Cruise Missiles and stealthy manned bombers, before releasing much in the way of tactical OS aircraft. In the not-too-distant future the stealth bombers will be substituted by UAVs. The targets are generally fixed, and their positions should be accurately determined by intelligence sources.

Once the opposition has been eliminated, the need for fast jet OS aircraft disappears. What is needed then is aircraft capable of delivering a heavy weight of PGWs economically and at the greatest possible range against targets designated by special forces. Unsurprisingly, once the need to penetrate defences is obviated, the bomber is once again supreme. The Yanks have been sensible enough to upgrade the B52's systems. Would that we had done the same with the Vulcan!

Someone needs to study the relative costs of delivering ordnance by a big, fat sub-sonic aircraft with a capacious bomb-bay, using current civil aviation technology, compared with delivering the same weight of ordnance via a brace of strike carriers and all their attendants.

[allyn]

(My first post on here)

The ancestor of the UAV. Fascinating site.


www.gyrodynehelicopters.com (http://www.gyrodynehelicopters.com)

[nosefirsteverytime]

An interesting article in this month's "Flyer" springs to mind....

t'was about the times of "Prime Ministuh, I do say,guided missiles will replace this manned fighter malarchy wot wot. Beaaaah! Nursie!" in the 50s, and the article described a novel way to get around the red tape this ensued.

Methinks if we make the same mistake again (the missle>fighter shyte, not the tape-dodging), someone, somewhere, sometime, will have his arse rightly reddened

[moggie]

I would have thought that UAVs have a future in mud moving but perhaps not air-to-air as yet.

Unless the air combat facility is fully autonomous they will require data link to a human on the ground (or in AWACs) who will "fly" the thing. That means a second or so for the data to travel each way via satellite and then be processed by the magic black boxes. One second in air-to-air combat is a HELL of a long time.

Remember also the "intuitive" element that a human can bring. Sometimes a move that the software writer may not have thought of could be the one that gives the edge.

I believe that this means (for now at least) that we can expect to see UAVs chucking bombs at the ground while the manned aeroplanes try to shoot them down.

As for blue on blue - if the ground assets have IFF then maybe UAVs would reduce the risk?