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2014-08-01

Drones the future?

Unmanned combat aerial vehicles may decide outcome of wars

The prevalence and use of unmanned systems continue to grow rapidly.

The past decade of conflict has seen the greatest increase in unmanned aircraft systems, primarily performing ISR missions. Their use of unmanned systems in the other domains is growing as well.

Unmanned systems have proven they can enhance situational awareness, reduce human workload, improve mission performance, and minimize overall risk to both civilian and military personnel, and all at a reduced cost. The capabilities of unmanned systems are not unique over manned systems. Weapon systems produce same effects in nearly all domains, independent of being manned or unmanned.

Survivability

Unmanned systems provide persistence, versatility, survivability, and reduced risk to human life, and in many cases are the preferred alternatives especially for missions that are characterized as dull, dirty, or dangerous. Training an ordinary military pilot takes many years and millions of dollars, while creating a drone takes far less time and money. Furthermore, personnel operating them are based well behind their troop positions and will never get hurt in fighting.

According to Col Robert E. Chapman II, USAF, UCAVs employing direct-attack munitions could reduce costs per kill well below that of current standoff systems- cruise missiles, for example. During Operation Desert Fox, a 70-hour joint military operation in December 1998 to destroy military and security targets in Iraq, Navy ships fired more than 325 Tomahawk cruise missiles, and Air Force B-52s launched more than 90 AGM-86C conventional air launched cruise missiles (CALCM).

UCAV proponents contend that removing the operator from the weapons-delivery vehicle confers design advantages over manned aircraft. Firstly, since vehicle loss does not pose an inherent risk to human life, design margins can be reduced below the traditional 150 per cent design load factor traditionally used for manned aircraft. Lower design margins lead to reductions in structural weight.
Secondly, the elimination of pilot-support systems, such as egress mechanisms and environmental controls, also reduces weight and complexity. Collectively, these savings can result in smaller vehicle sizes.

Operational advantages

UCAV supporters also cite several potential operational advantages over manned systems, pointing out that smaller vehicle sizes yield greater range and endurance. Additionally, smaller vehicles possess inherent survivability advantages because radar cross-section and infrared signatures are reduced.

They argue that the absence of the cockpit, typically a large area of radar reflectivity and a significant contributor to radar signature, would further enhance UCAV survivability. UCAV advocates assert that smaller vehicle sizes may have even greater survivability implications in the future as new detection and tracking technologies mature.

Finally, without the risk of aircrew loss, vehicle attrition becomes less onerous from both a moral and a political standpoint. One could task UCAVs for high-risk, high-payoff missions without attendant risk to human life. As a result, UCAVs could expand the range of coercive options available to both civilian and military leaders.

It’s also stressed that a fleet of low observable (LO) UCAVs could contribute to the success of an air campaign in a number of ways. UCAVs could provide a powerful “day one” force enabler by conducting destruction of enemy air defenses (DEAD) and suppression of enemy air defenses (SEAD) missions.

UCAVs could also be used to supplement deep-penetration strike aircraft, such as the B-2 and F-117, by conducting conventional attacks against strategic fixed targets and enemy centers of gravity. Although the Air Force currently operates LO platforms capable of conducting this mission, the Navy does not. A carrier-based LO UCAV could provide naval aviators with a long-sought, survivable, day-one, deep-strike capability.

Time-critical targets

And operating as part of a general air campaign, long-loiter UCAVs could provide a persistent presence to rapidly strike time-critical targets such as mobile surface-to-surface missile systems or armored vehicles out of garrison. Besides carrying missiles and cameras, many UAVs also have lasers that can pinpoint targets to manned pilots.

UCAVs might also play an important role in low intensity conflict or contingency operations. Low observability, long endurance, and the absence of pilot support are ideal attributes for long-duration missions in hostile or contested airspace. Proponents envision UCAVs conducting armed-reconnaissance missions, patrolling the skies over hostile territory, and holding enemy targets at risk in a manner similar to missions currently ongoing over Iraq as part of Operations Southern Watch and Northern Watch.

Additionally, UCAVs might reduce demands on support assets such as combat search and rescue (CSAR) forces. These scarce resources, characterized as high-demand/low-density assets, are tasked with the hazardous mission of recovering downed aircrew members.

In the event of a UCAV loss, CSAR efforts would be unnecessary. Reducing rescue requirements directly lowers the risk of CSAR force attrition. Lastly, UCAVs could enhance a theatre commander’s ability to maintain a robust air campaign in the presence of chemical or biological agents because these vehicles would obviate the inefficiencies imposed by aircrew physiological-support requirements in such an environment.

Interestingly, it is on the very cusp of this global upswing that the US – the leading developer and employer of UCAVs – is taking a step back from further large-scale investment into the capability. At the height of the boom in unmanned systems, the UCAV was seen as a game-changer, but with a pivot in the operational landscape and the reality of constrained budgets, justifying the same levels of expense is difficult.

Like many allied countries, the US Government is in a process of restructuring its armed forces to account for both the budget deficit and the requirements of future conflict. It currently has around 11,000 UAVs in its stocks.

Shopping trip

While cost always seems to be the tallest hurdle when it comes to equipping militaries, the price tag of acquiring basic unmanned platforms continues to fall, and is a chief reason for the shopping trip that the rest of the world is planning to take. Access to either technological expertise or development, or indeed the ability to manufacture in lieu of expertise, is already proving a worry to western governments.

Iran recently unveiled what it claimed to be a successful copy of the US RQ-170 it captured in 2011. Iranian officials announced that it had decoded and reverse-engineered the aircraft. Photos that emerged from China in 2013 also seemed to show replicated RQ-170s.

Of course, in either case there is no solid evidence that the internal systems have been successfully reproduced, but speculation suggests that the two nations may have teamed up in efforts to build something that is at least close enough to the original model to have a wider impact on strategic planning. Several weeks before the Iranian announcement, tensions in Southeast Asia were done no favours by the discovery of rudimentary reconnaissance UAVs in South Korea, later determined to have been launched by North Korea and built with Chinese parts.

Armed variants are almost inevitable. Adding to the issue is the willingness of some advanced nations to begin exporting their products for profit to countries that are otherwise unable – or legally restricted – from developing the capability, then sharing access to that technology to third parties.

The biggest question mark remains in the validity of the unmanned system in tomorrow’s operational environment. Afghanistan presented a scenario in which the adversary was without an air force or major air defence capability, and UCAVs could operate largely without resistance. By the latter stages of the campaign, insurgents were acquiring electronic jammers to try to combat the systems, hinting at the efforts being done by other nations to readdress the balance.

Now, there is less likelihood of western forces re-engaging in a large-scale counterinsurgency campaign on the ground, and perhaps more likelihood that the next major conflict will take place in a contested environment. As previously explored, the notion of replacing all manned aircraft with a pilotless or remote alternative is currently impractical for a host of reasons.

Alongside the rise of any new weapon comes the rise of a countermeasure, and for UCAVs, electronic warfare systems and offensive cyber weapons are making it much less probable that these aircraft will be able to operate without interference, especially when pitted against a technologically advanced enemy.

Russian UCAVs

The Russian Air Force is to receive its first unmanned combat air vehicles (UCAVs) into service by 2020, with testing provisionally scheduled for 2017. Successful US operations using drone aircraft in Pakistan and Afghanistan spurred Russia to revive its development program.

According to Deputy Defense Minister Yury Borisov, research and development work for this project is now nearly complete. Drone fighters are able to tackle strategic tasks because they are difficult to detect and have better combat sustainability than manned aircraft.

There are over 600 types of unmanned aerial vehicles produced in the world today, including 25 in Russia. A mere 20 years ago, Moscow was an undisputed leader in this field. In the 1980s, it manufactured 950 Tu-143 reconnaissance UAVs alone. However, the Defense Ministry then wound up drone production.

It was the Americans who prompted the Russian military to revive the program. Successful US operations with the use of UAVs in Afghanistan and Pakistan have shown that no war of the future can be conducted without drones. Another impulse behind Russia’s drive to develop its own UCAVs may be the 2008 war in South Ossetia. When the Russian Defense Ministry saw that the Georgian side was using drones, it concluded that this type of aircraft was essential for the new century. That same year, the first tender for developing UCAVs was announced. It was awarded to several design bureaus.

The Yakovlev design bureau presented drafts of an unmanned combat air vehicle called Skad which won the first position. The second winner was the Sukhoi design bureau with a project named the Х-40. There is very little information about the development of both systems. In mid-February 2014, Russian Defense Minister announced that the ministry intended to spend 320 billion rubles (about $8.8 billion) by 2020 on a program of supplying the Russian armed forces with unmanned aerial vehicles. It is not clear which specific UAVs this money will be used to purchase.

UCAVs may therefore be an area that the US and its allies are perfectly right to lower down the priority list for military spending. This strategy does not however imply that funding will dry up altogether since countries like Russia are investing in the technology. Indeed, the unmanned system continues to provide invaluable influence in campaigns, and in a support role for both national and partnered forces.

The revolt in Libya, the ongoing struggle in Nigeria, and the fight against the illicit drug trade in Latin America are just a few examples in which unmanned systems have been proving their worth outside of conventional warfare in recent years.

Credit Text & Photo: Defence IQ

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