In one form or another, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) have been employed for over 2,000 years. Lt Col Richard M. Clark’s Uninhabited Combat Aerial Vehicles: Airpower by the People, For the People, But Not with the People, draws on that long history to gauge what the future may hold for uninhabited combat aerial vehicles (UCAV).

The United States (US) Air Force’s experience with UCAVs dates back to World War I and the US Army Air Service’s order for 25 Kettering Bugs, explosive-laden unmanned minibiplanes. Over the next 60 years, the Air Force continued to experiment with—and periodically employ—UAVs...

Bill Sweetman’s description of Capt Scott O’Grady’s rescue highlights the fact that today’s United States (US) military leaders must be sensitive to political and social pressures to keep friendly casualties to a minimum.¹ The loss of a single airman can have a tremendous effect on an entire military operation. Leaders must also contend with shrinking force structures and decreasing military budgets, while the US armed forces remain engaged around the world and across the conflict spectrum. They must find ways to “do more with less.” These realities, which are unlikely to change in the foreseeable future, are forcing military leaders...

The first unmanned flight took place over two thousand years ago when a young man in China stood on a lonely windswept hill and flew “recorded history’s first remotely piloted vehicle (RPV)—a kite with a piece of string as a down link to the controller on the ground.”⁵ The first reference to kites used in a military application was in the second century B.C. when Han Hsin, an ancient Chinese general, used kites to triangulate the distance for a tunnel his army was digging under a besieged city’s walls.⁶ In 202 B.C. Han dynasty founder Liu Pang surrounded a...

Two major operations in which the US armed forces were involved in the 1990s were the Persian Gulf War in Southwest Asia and the peacekeeping operations in Bosnia. Though UCAVs were not used in either of these operations, UAVs were. The use of UAVs in these conflicts was significant in the advancement of unmanned aviation.

Though there was fairly extensive UAV use in the Vietnam War, general awareness of the value of UAVs for military operations did not emerge until Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm. The US Army, US Navy, and US Marines successfully used UAVs in the Gulf...

There are different views as to the manner in which UCAVs in the next century should operate. Some concepts are evolutionary, and some are more revolutionary relative to the way manned aircraft operate today. There are some aspects of UCAV concept of operations (CONOPS), however, that are common to most ideas on the subject. For example, most visionaries see SEAD and deep strike as the most probable missions that UCAVs will fly in the near term. There are some who envision UCAVs in an air-to-air or close air support role, but these roles are usually reserved for a longterm, technologically...

The history of unmanned flight began over 2,000 years ago when a pioneering Chinese aviator piloted the first kite over a breezy patch of Chinese landscape. The kite sparked the imagination of inventors around the world for hundreds of years, and eventually led to the invention that would change aviation and the world forever—the airplane. Though unmanned aircraft held an inferior position to manned aircraft after the airplane’s invention in 1903, unmanned aircraft nevertheless continued to evolve.

The Flying Bombs of World War I were among the first unmanned aircraft designed to deliver weapons; though very similar to cruise...

The potential payoff of UCAVs is high and is a technology worth exploring. Though there are some risks involved and some challenges to be overcome, none of the challenges appear insurmountable. Since it is an ATD and not an ACTD, it does not have to become operational until it has proven itself technologically. The investment in the ATD, which will be $140 million, is what is at stake in exploring UCAVs; and the possible return on investment is priceless. To give UCAVs the best opportunity to succeed as a weapon system, this study offers the following recommendations to help manage...