Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire SECNAV: F-35C should be Navy's last manned strike jet

http://www.defensenews.com/story/mi...t-strike-fighter-f-35-unmanned/25832745/


Before all you ex airdales start in on this, let me go grab some popcorn...

makes sense to me.

I like this idea - swarms of smaller, basically expendable drones since anything that flies can and will be shot down eventually.

They can attack targets directly or identify and illuminate them for a larger attack craft standing by with a heavier ordnance capability or stand-off type munitions.

The size of them would be adaptable to mounting on a mobile land based carrier which could be stationed just behind the lines or close to areas of combat in dispersed regions with no front line like Vietnam was or Afghanistan is today.

LOCUST swarm

What can you expect from an obama appointee and other idiots...?

I knew I could count on you. :-)

Sure, always a good idea to make sure that your armed forces have a small number of options. It makes it very nice for the potential opponents too since they can use a minimal defense budget and pretty much be sure that they'll be ready to ensure the USN Power projection isn't a factor.

Growing up my Dad had an extensive collection of Popular Mechanics an such from the 60's predicting the same demise. Wasn't true then. Isn't true now.

Not seeing the issue with going to attacking via program. Indoctrination of a human to do anything they are ordered is close to, but not 100%, guaranteed.

KW, regale us with your expertise in combat, planning, strategy, tactics etc.

I like this idea. You could cut back the manned aircraft back =by half and replace it with twice the number of unmanned drones.

You'd still have to keep pilots and conventional transport and combat aircraft, because there are just some missions that couldn't be done any other way.

So what is to be done when someone learns to jam the control systems on the drones, or even worse takes controls and turns them against us?
Can't be done?
Maybe not yet but anyone willing to bet their future against someones future skills?
A man in the bird has hands on the stick and feet on the rudders. Difficult to take over that system.

Oh disturbed one, my experience is not relevant to the discussion. In case you missed it, the point of posting this story was to solicit the views of those with extensive military aviation experience -- such as Jorge and Pugs, who I respect -- on SECNAV's comments about taking pilots out of the cockpit.

I was not an aviator and I make no claims to any special martial prowess, but I did my job and served honorably, mostly forward deployed in WESTPAC and the IO for roughly 3 1/2 years, during a never-dull period of history. I make no apologies for that to you or anyone else.

Correct. There are things drones do very well. long endurance Intelligence Surveillance and Recon (ISR) are sweet spots for sure. When it comes to boys in green in trouble though I want a guy looking down with eyeballs on, transport troops? No CO wants to tell a parent his child was killed by a robot aircraft software glitch.

Don't think drones are cheap and they still have a lot of issues. Predator loss rate run about 10/100,000 hours. This compares to the overall Navy rate of less than 1/100,000 hours in manned aircraft. That's class A's so it doesn't include combat losses. Numbers like that mean that the technical and operational maturity of drones is still quite low.

I believe part of the development is to make the UAV's autonomous or as autonomous as possible. Just point'em at what you want attacked - i.e. GPS coordinates or whatever - and they do the rest without a human pilot either in a cockpit or 5,000 miles away in a control room. No outside data link, no jamming them.

There will always be a need for manned aircraft for certain missions but for ground attack or CAS which are very high risk missions, especially with the portable anti-air capabilities available to even guerrilla forces these days, it makes sense to have a smaller, extremely maneuverable vehicle capable of G-force turns no human could stand, and without the risk of a very expensive to train pilot becoming a casualty or POW.

That's called a Tomahawk land attack missile. They work really well.

Curious on how you'd preprogram a drone for CAS...

Well, continue to stir the pot to no good end. SecNav is here today, gone tomorrow. Irrelevant as a tick on a dog's butt. Just as knowledgeable as McNamara.

Don't forget to add "I think New Braunfels is awesome" to your resume.

It says a LOT.



Clark

Over half a million Americans plus their friends and families would disagree about Robert McNamara being irrelevant.

How do you sustain your energy sans Bluedreaux's COCK these days?

Protein bars?


Clark