Daylife/AP Photo used by permission
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The Air Force will train more drone operators than fighter and bomber pilots combined for the first time this year, signaling a fundamental shift for the 61-year-old service.
The growing ranks of drone operators mark a turning point for the Air Force as it looks to a future that relies increasingly on unmanned aircraft. Over the next few decades, the Air Force plans to develop drones that would serve as fighters, bombers and tankers, the heart of its manned fleet, according to its Unmanned System Update. The document says piloted aircraft will be used in concert with drones…
The Air Force will train 240 pilots to fly Predator and Reaper drones compared with 214 fighter and bomber pilots for the budget year that ends in September. Overall, there are 550 drone pilots compared with 3,700 fighter and 900 bomber pilots. The current emphasis for drones reflects the need for persistent, eye-in-the-sky surveillance to track and kill insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan.
“The capability provided by the unmanned aircraft is game-changing,” Gen. Norton Schwartz, the Air Force chief of staff, told USA TODAY in an e-mailed statement. “We can have eyes 24/7 on our adversaries. The importance of that is clear in the feedback from the ground troops — this is a capability they don’t want to be without.”
Loren Thompson, a military analyst with the Lexington Institute, said intelligence gathering has been a weakness for the Pentagon for years but has improved recently. “The Air Force has now gotten the message that it’s important to be responsive to the war fighters on the ground,” he said.
Will this lessen the number of required fighter and bomber pilots – or simply involve an increased number of gamers/drone pilots? It looks like the reduction has already begun.
..and mamma said I was waisting all my time playing video games:)
In every business the Boss hates the talent.The admin types in the Air Force can’t wait to get rid of as many Pilots as possible.The people who get promotions are paper pushers not pilots.The guys running the Drones are Enlisted personal not officers and are much easier to control.
Cool… I wonder when civilian aircraft follow suite ….
# 3 Neo-Postdarwinst Ben said, “Cool… I wonder when civilian aircraft follow suite ….”
As soon as it is conclusively proven that no pilot is safer than 2-3 in the cockpit. In other words, not in your lifetime.
u guys r building fighters costing $360M per copy (according 2 ur own GAO) and can only afford 187 of them 2 defend ur entire airspace. Every Raptor pilot needs 2 sustain combat kill ratio over 15:1 at a conservative estimate. Good luck with all that.
(it’s y u don’t need so many fighter jocks)
& u can’t even export them to make back ur R&D cuz it’s “too advanced”. excellent planning, guys.
btw, some1 shud ask y aren’t they deployed into real combat?
If a drone gets shot down, there’s no family to mourn it, no media to exploit it, and no political party to use it as a symbol. nuff said…
I guess this is a case of “better, faster, and cheaper”? Or maybe just faster and cheaper…
We will always need traditional pilots but #6 is right…the drone may be shot down but the pilot lives.
It will be quite a while before the robotic autonomous ground soldier is deployed, but it’s coming, have not a doubt. We’ve already got robots for disarming bombs, etc. If the Discovery Channel can be believed, these bots have the capability of negotiating tough terrain on their own. Point and shoot.
# 5 EuroFighter said, “Every Raptor pilot needs 2 sustain combat kill ratio over 15:1 at a conservative estimate. Good luck with all that.”
The F-15 is currently 26:0. No luck needed to get even better than that with the F-22.
The US is broke. How are you going to pay for it?
# 10 jim said, “The US is broke. How are you going to pay for it?”
Same way O’Mama plans on paying for all the other deficit spending. Buy more printing presses. At least until the currency collapses…
#2 said
In every business the Boss hates the talent.The admin types in the Air Force can’t wait to get rid of as many Pilots as possible.The people who get promotions are paper pushers not pilots.The guys running the Drones are Enlisted personal not officers and are much easier to control.
Ever been in the military?
An unmanned plane can be made lighter and faster than one which has to accomodate a human on-board pilot. Also a plane with no human on-board can turn and accelerate while experiencing G forces that would diasable an on-board pilot. Faster and more maneuverable translates to a plane which can outfly others.
An airplane that can outfly another plane will be able to work itself into a position where it can shoot down an opponent. This means manned fighters and bombers will soon be rendered extremely vulnerable to these new planes. The fighter/bomber pilot as we know him today is soon destined to be as relevant to modern warfare as mounted cavalry.
That’s not the situation today but it will not be long before that is the reality. I’m not saying that’s good or bad. It’s just the way things are headed.
At least until the currency collapses…
And then?
The currency is fine, they are printing the shit out of it.
# 14 Improbus said, “And then?”
Total econ meltdown as no one will loan the US money and our worthless currency can’t purchase foreign goods.
Oh good!! Another excuse to plug The Onion.
http://tinyurl.com/ndbjfp
Patrick, why are you blaming Obama for everything. Your predicament has nothing to do with him and EVERYTHING to do with past administrations. Bush and his ilk an further back even, allowed banks to shit all over you. It really irks me that you have the gall to complain how he is mopping it up. No matter how you mop up such a nasty and irresponsible disaster, it’s not going to be fun. Shit is shit. And BTW, your dollar seems to be holding up just fine considering… It just gained 5% against the Canadian dollar in the last week, and we are supposedly the best off of all countries in this recession, so Obama must be doing something right.
19,
Patrick, or Paddy-O as he likes to be called, is still angry about his mom taking away the Ragu and giving it to the local poor shelter where a black kid might eat it… Give him time to grow up and he’ll realize that he’s an idiot.
So what happens when someone develops a computer AI to run the drones? Sounding more and more like Skynet…
The title is misleading. The aircraft the article is talking about are still piloted remotely. There’s still a human pressing the buttons and deciding when to fire the weapons.
We’re still a few years away from truly “unmanned” aircraft.
Now, drones are the way to go. A different kind of war, could change matters.
Gol, thats really gonna piss off the pilots. No pilot wants to remote fly a drone (time counts differently in the log book), you want to fly a real plane.
Its a dead end job for a pilot.
I like the idea of drones. I wish they had robotic means to search and destroy roadside IED’s in Afghanistan as well.
25,
The way they treat infantry, you’d think they qualified as robots…
# 19 JimR said, “Patrick, why are you blaming Obama for everything.”
Everything? No, just what he is doing? Where did I say “everything”? Or, are you hallucinating?
Either show where I said he’s to blame for everything, or explain why you are delusional…
I sure hope Sarah Connor knows about this.
Currently the drones don’t need a pilot or life support systems. That weight may be compensated for with fuel meaning longer flights.
Because the drone doesn’t need the same expertise to fly, the training isn’t rigorous and the errors not as unforgiven.
Will they ever be used as fighter? They have a long way to go before that. Until then, we will just have to be satisfied with using long range guided missiles.
Cow-Patty,
Can’t you ever quit with the troll responses?
EuroFighter
Can’t you grow up and write like a person?
#18, Scott,
I almost forgot, another fine piece of reporting never found in the MSM. My guess is the right wing nut controlling media barons are hiding the truth from us.
Well actually they do need a Pilot, he/she is just not in the cockpit. They’re controlling the drone from some other place by telepresence. But ther’re qualified pilots pulled from the same pool that fill all the other pilot slots.
Its a bummer job for anyone wanting to be a pilot afterwards as they can’t count it like they were flying any other aircraft. Back when they were first introduced the Air Force had a tough time keeping people in drones, as they would quit if they wouldn’t be put back into a real plane. The AF had to agree to a rotation back out to the regular squadron to keep the pilots from going civilian.