I'm glad to see you're still at it, bandit. We had quite a flame war over the Harrier a couple of years back.
Posted on 01/01/2008 2:50:40 PM PST by george76
The military's reliance on unmanned aircraft that can watch, hunt and sometimes kill insurgents has soared to more than 500,000 hours in the air, largely in Iraq...
the Air Force more than doubled its monthly use of drones between January and October...
The dramatic increase in the development and use of drones across the armed services reflects what will be an even more aggressive effort over the next 25 years...
For some Air Force pilots, that means climbing out of the cockpit and heading to places such as Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada, where they can remotely fly the Predators, one of the larger and more sophisticated unmanned aircraft.
About 120 Air Force pilots were recently transferred to staff the drones to keep pace with demands...
Some National Guard members were also called up to staff the flights. And more will be doing that in the coming months, as the Air Force adds bases where pilots can remotely fly the aircraft. Locations include North Dakota, Texas, Arizona and California...
Use of the high-tech surveillance and reconnaissance Global Hawk has also jumped, as the Air Force moved from two to three systems on the battlefield.
The bulk of the unmanned flight hours belong to the Army's workhorse drone, the Raven, which weighs just four pounds and is used by smaller units, such as companies and battalions, in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The Ravens, which soldiers fling into the air and use for surveillance, will rack up about 300,000 hours this year - double the time they were used last year, The Army has a total of 361 unmanned aircraft in Iraq alone - including Shadows, Hunters and Ravens. And in the first 10 months of 2007, they flew more than 300,000 hours.
(Excerpt) Read more at story.news.ask.com ...
I'd say that the CIA, NSA types probably already have the capability. The problem is power. Battery technology just isn't there yet---the rest of it is already feasible.
I want one of these !
They should hire some of us computer game freaks....we would take the enemy out in a heartbeat!
are oil pipelines and refineries being
attacked in Iraq?
if yes.
why can’t these drones help?
UAVs were a part of a bigger shift in the way we conduct war. I don't know what the term is this year, but infocentric warfare was a concept I used to laugh at. I envisioned some flag officer sitting in a room of big screen monitors micromanaging the battlespace. It may have started that way, but that same concept now gives troops on the ground and aircrew in the air a better view of the battlespace.
Now I realize that infocentric warfare is the key to our success. Never in history of mankind has any nation fielded a more lethal military force. Sharing info up, and more importantly, down the chain allows us to destroy more targets, with less weapons, in less time with less risk.
Welcome to someday.
Some of the bigger ones with gas engines can stay up all day ?
Wow! Do you have a link to that? I amagine this thing has a camera?
“Some of the bigger ones with gas engines can stay up all day ?”
Absolutely not true.
They can stay airborne for a week.
Thanks for the link....truly fascinating.
I've got a joystick... Piloting one of those things would be the the perfect "work from home" job for me.
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