SECDEF's DoD Budget Proposals

[Mooks]

Mooks,

The manned fighter is not going away anytime soon. There are real and severe technical limitations to what UAV's can do. A UAV loitering overhead is not the same thing as a fighter pulling a 9 g's while inverted. Maybe someone will figure out how to reliable maintain a satellite link under all the conditions under which fighters must operate, but it is much more difficult that most seem to assume.

The bombing mission, particularly long-range penetrators, will be going unmanned next. The Navy is already well along this road.

I completely agree there are a number of technical issues that may never be solved. However given the recent strides that have been achieved there is questions over whether purchasing large numbers of a single type of manned fighter is prudent. Its quite possible in the next 20 years technical progress allow UCAVs to operate without the need for persistent control due to some limited form of autonomy. A2A isn't that hard actually once the decision to kill has been made. You don't need a remote pilot to maneuver the aircraft during, it can do that itself, just like an AMRAAM or a JDAM guides itself towards a target.

Given what I've seen in computer science, 20 years is not an ambitious timeline; some of the key technology needed for this already exists and are in commercial applications. Northrop-Grumman and Boeing are pouring billions into this area with the X-45, 47 and the bird of prey, which are integrating technology from various areas to create the next generation of UCAVs.

In any case, as you pointed out it doesn't have to be classic aerial combat where UCAVs become dominant, but other missions like SEAD or deep penetration to attack high value targets. They can dent the overall rationale behind buying more manned fighters like the F-35 at the volumes currently considered.

This brings me to my overall point of my last post; we don't know what the airforce of the future will look like but it is clear a technological change is occurring. I merely raise the scenario of UCAVs being very effective as one a possible scenario of how these issues may play out. I'm personally not sold either; AlexTX may well be right about the risk to UAVs and its well known that the Chinese have been looking into countermeasures in this area. I made this exact point to several government army of the future researchers a couple of years ago (and didn't get a very sympathetic reply.) Yet its difficult to deny there is much promise for this technology to the extent it might revolutionize air warfare.

Considering this and the era of strategic ambiguity the U.S. resides in as well I believe the Pentagon is somewhat hedging its bets in purchases of manned fighter aircraft at this time.