Military/aircraft buffs get in here! (Nute, this means you!)

[Flying Beastie]

Try to pick up the latest copy of Popular Science (June 2001).

 

The cover story is about Unmanned Combat Air Vehicles (UCAVs). According to this, they could be deployed as early as 2010, and be a mainstay of air combat by 2030.

 

"UCAVs will take on some of the dangerous and demanding kinds of missions during a combat situation," says Lt. Col. Michael Leahy

 

The unmanned fighters are much more manoeuvrable (no need to worry about high-Gs).

 

Imagine a manned fighter having to duel with an aircraft that can make 15-G turns!

 

The article mentions four prototypes (Northop Grumman's Pegasus, Boeing's X-45, Dassault's AVE [Aéronef de validation expérimentale], and Saab's SHARC [swedish Highly Advanced Research Configuration]).

 

Now I know how Col. Treize feels about Mobile Dolls.

 

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"Do fish-people eat fish, or would that be like humans eating monkeys?"

"Humans do eat monkeys. In fact humans eat other humans. . . Y'know, as a species, we are really quite unpleasant."

[Guest Rogue 9]

I feel just about the same way, if you take away the Human Factor mercy is no longer an option. A Damaged fighter may be let go by a human. A computer will kill them, once the computer responses are discovered they will be ineffective as pilots will know what they'll do next. Combat manuevers designed by humans who act randomly can not be anticipated enarly as accuratley.

[K_Kinnison]

I bet ehy can still be piloted by humans, remotly

[Guest Rogue 9]

then radio jamming would cause some rather severe problems for the entire Air Force.

[Guest Coffeebean_uk]

It will take a long time to get working 2010 is to unrealistic. It could be possible but there would be to many unknowns. I say stick to manned fighters.

 

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Yea as I walk through the valley of the shadow of Death.

I shall fear no evil,

For I have The BIGGEST F***ING Stick in the valley. - Deep Blue Sea.

[Darth Sceltor]

BIPLANES FOREVER

[Commander 598]

Hmmm

Apparently were taking the approach of Aliens(Battleships that require no crew but have one anyway)

 

As I noticed while on the bridge of the transport Ferarco it had only one seat and multiple monitors.Once I took out the main computer(Mother) all of its systems began to fail(Life support,defense,etc).

 

Now what happens when a squad of AI Fighters meets an EMP?(Their easier to make than you think)

 

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Official Forum Nuclear Terrorist & God of Insanity

[Guest Rogue 9]

Sure EMP is Easy to do, just blow a huke in the upper atmosphere and kiss thoughs fighters goodbye

[Guest Fondas]

I've recently read one similar article. What FB omitted was that these planes are controled by remote and that although G-LOC is not a problem anymore, they believe that they would not be a match to a manned plane in a dogfight.Therefore they develop them as spy planes and even kamikaze bombers.

 

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"No matter how pretty the bait,

a hook is still a hook !"

TZG+7

[Guest Hamblin]

I'm more of a Naval "buff", I specialise in the modern Royal Navy and the modern US Navy, but I'll try and get involved anyway...

 

On this subject of EMP, wouldn't that affect aircraft anyway? The avionics of a military fighter would still be affected, and the pilot probably would have to eject in any case. So, EMP is still a threat with or without a pilot in the seat.

 

It all seems too much trouble to me, though the result of lowering human casualties would seem to be a mixed blessing, the way I see it.

 

It'd be good, because there's already enough death in this world, we don't need to constantly add more to it by engaging in pointless skirmishes, and wars which lead nowhere, fought for selfish, unjustifiable reasons (There have been a few exceptions to this in the recent past, though, like stopping the "ethnic cleansing" in former Yugoslavia).

 

It'd be bad, though, as it would give the extremists of this world (Both right and left) more reason to see war as a legitimate tool of foreign policy, as they could, literally, fight wars where the only casualties are in lost equipment. Except when civillians are caught in the middle, of course.

 

So, I don't know. We need to keep the human factor in war, because it then makes it undesirable precisely because of the human factor.

 

From a strictly technical standpoint, I wouldn't like the idea of a computer controlled aircraft, nor on having to rely on said aircraft for defence. There's a human element which computers (as of yet, anyway) just can't replicate, and it's that human element I wouldn't want to see taken away.

 

I mean, for instance, if you got a group of ten fighter pilots, chances are, maybe two of them are aces, the other six are about average, with varying levels of skill and different specialties (Though still around the same level), and two who are adequate, but could do with some more time in training.

 

If you got ten computers, chances are, they're all at exactly the same skill level. No variation, no differences. This makes them easy to predict, and therefore vunerable. If one of them has a glitch, they all have that same glitch.

[Flying Beastie]

Fondas, I didn't omit anything; the article didn't mention the RC factor. The impression I got was that these can recieve orders remotely, but can be "forgotten" until they return to base.

 

Frex, the UCAV is dispatched to fly a recon flight over enemy territory. As it's doing recon, it detects an enemy ground unit standing exposed with no cover. The remote-operators can either tell the UCAV to ignore the target, return to base/standby immediately, or attack. Once the order is given, the UCAV carries it out automatically, without someone manning an RC console.

 

I'd imagine it would work kinda like the wingmates in XWA.

 

In my SF, just by way of example, the Norak use UCA/SVs (Unmanned Combat Air/Space Vehicles). Each live pilot (in a fighter) has three drones under their control. The drones fly at about the same skill level as "Super Aces" in XWA, and all three are slaved to the lead.

 

"Red Lead" is followed by "Red 1.1," "Red 1.2," and "Red 1.3." More drones can be added for special missions, but they're never left unattended.

 

The Norak use the drones for support work, and they only supplement the live pilots, they don't replace them.

 

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"Do fish-people eat fish, or would that be like humans eating monkeys?"

"Humans do eat monkeys. In fact humans eat other humans. . . Y'know, as a species, we are really quite unpleasant."

[Nute Gunray]

People have to die in a war or else it's pointless. Sending men to fight and die also means that a war can be FORCED to end (the unofficial British strategy in WWI was to just put men into their trenches until the Germans ran out because they had a smaller population than Britian).

Something interesting to note is that an airplane MIGHT survive an EMP attack better than they think. Since there's no way for the static charge to get to the ground from an airplane, the pulse might just pass over it. Of course, this is purely theory.

[Guest Rogue 9]

Originally posted by Flying Beastie:

I'd imagine it would work kinda like the wingmates in XWA.

 

So they don't do anything

[Nute Gunray]

*cough*SkyNet*cough*

[Flying Beastie]

Originally posted by Rogue 9:

So they don't do anything

 

Or they hold their fire until you get between them and the target.

 

Anybody else been shot down by your own dumbass wingmates?

 

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"Do fish-people eat fish, or would that be like humans eating monkeys?"

"Humans do eat monkeys. In fact humans eat other humans. . . Y'know, as a species, we are really quite unpleasant."