Step one: We need to get rid of these complex, bespoke technology development programs and go COTS.

Step two: Systems not platforms! It's the electronics that really matter. We could stick them on a drone and that would be great, because drones!

Step three: The kit don't fit.

Step four: Redesign the electronics.

Step five: The drone isn't capable enough.

Step six: Well, let's use several drones in a [adopts Californian tone] networked swarm.

Step seven: Bandwidth.

Step eight: *Autonomous* drones!

Step nine: The mission profile really doesn't fit with the Reaper airframe.

Step ten: Why not...deploy another tiny UAV from the drone?

Step eleven: And redesign the radios to work securely in the civilian spectrum

Step twelve: Well, at least we'll save on crew.

Step thirteen: Uh, no, you need a crew of five per drone per shift...

Step fourteen: Automated ISTAR!!

So that's a swarming, autonomous, horizontally networked, marinised fleet of UAVs deploying sub-UAVs and using over-the-horizon cognitive radio, with an automatic underwater target classification system, and it's got to use the MQ-9 air vehicle and associated infrastructure. Thank god we didn't start one of those terrible technology development projects!

How will this effect the uk's investment in killer drones
 

If the UN says drone attacks are illegal, will they take retrospective action against those involved in attacks conducted so far?


UN inquiry into drone killings

The use of drones has become increasingly controversial
The UN is launching an inquiry into the impact on civilians of drone strikes and other targeted killings.

There is a need for "accountability and reparation where things have gone badly wrong", the British lawyer heading the investigation told journalists.

Ben Emmerson QC, a UN special rapporteur, said the "exponential" rise of drone technology required a proper legal framework to be put into place.

The inquiry will study the impact of drone strikes in five places.

Twenty-five attacks will be examined - in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, the Palestinian territories and Somalia.

Mr Emmerson told journalists in London that the increasing use of drones "represents a real challenge to the framework of international law".

If unregulated, he said, the use of drones would continue to grow.

The inquiry will assess the extent of civilian casualties, the identity of militants targeted and the legality of strikes where there is no UN recognition of a conflict.

Defenders of drones say they minimise civilian casualties, but opponents say drone strikes can constitute extra-judicial killing and point to data suggesting hundreds of civilians have died in such strikes.

'War crime'

Drones - or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) - have become an increasingly potent weapon for nations seeking to target militants but there is increasing controversy over their toll on civilians.


Drone attacks have been a key source of tensions between the US and Pakistan
Between 2004 and 2013, CIA drone attacks in Pakistan killed up to 3,461 people - up to 891 of them civilians, according to research by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism.

The vast majority of the strikes were carried out under the administration of President Barack Obama, it said.

Some kinds of drone attacks - in particular "double tap" strikes where rescuers attending a first blast become victims of a second - could constitute a war crime, Mr Emmerson has previously said, according to the Guardian newspaper.

Addressing journalists on Thursday, he denied the inquiry was unfairly singling out the US and Israel, saying 51 states had the technology to use drones.

He said it was not a substitute for "effective, official and independent investigation" by states, and called for independent investigations where there was "plausible evidence of a war crime".

The inquiry will report to the UN General Assembly in the latter half of the year.

BBC © 2013

Lockheed Pursues Possible International Consortium for Maritime C-130 | Defense News | defensenews.com

A news item I noticed in Defense News a couple of days ago. Lockheed Martin is investigating the appetite for existing C-130/P3 operators to collaborate on marrying existing airframes with proven and available systems to plug the MPA gap for the UK and others. The potential advantages being the sharing of the development costs, which in any case should be much more affordable than new planes and equipment. And not a UAV in sight.

Others on here will be better able than I to judge the suitability of the Herc for this role but my initial impression is that this is a pragmatic suggestion in these financially constrained times. May be the last we ever hear of it or it may have legs. Given our current MPA capability I think it would be a positive, short to medium term option, even if not the one we would ideally want to see if we had a larger budget.

LF

FYI check out https://www.dstl.gov.uk/downloads/De...r%25202012.pdf page 3, "deployed sensors review".

And check out the task list for MarCE: http://www.baesystems.com/page/BAES_154726

:)

Realised I got the first link pretty fubar: https://www.dstl.gov.uk/downloads/De...ter%202012.pdf

Use a C-130 and load it with a shipping container fitted out to do either ASuW or ASW. This was one of the options looked at before the Mk4 was decided upon. Simples.

P.S. This will also be appreciated by the UK's pie makers.

or even EW? :8