{"id":137102,"date":"2023-02-14T07:15:19","date_gmt":"2023-02-14T12:15:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=137102"},"modified":"2023-02-13T16:44:03","modified_gmt":"2023-02-13T21:44:03","slug":"remote-control-of-u-s-air-force-drone-wingmen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=137102","title":{"rendered":"Remote control of U.S. Air Force drone wingmen"},"content":{"rendered":"
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An artist’s concept of drone wingmen near piloted fighter jet. (U.S. Air Force)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Air Force is considering the idea of having remote controlled drone wingmen flying adjacent to manned fighter aircraft. Instead of being controlled by the fighter pilots, these drones would be partially guided by airmen riding a KC-46 Pegasus, E-7 Wedgetail, or other similar aircraft. The U.S. Air Force is considering this concept for a future generation fighter.<\/p>\n

From the Military Times:<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

The Air Force wants these autonomous CCAs to accompany its future Next Generation Air Dominance fighter, and perhaps also the F-35. Their missions could include striking targets, conducting intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions, or electronic warfare operations such as jamming enemy signals, said Brown.<\/p>\n

There are a lot of finer points that have to be worked out relating to the way CCAs are guided, he said, whether from the cockpit of the fighters they are accompanying or from other aircraft in the area.<\/p>\n

“How does it team with a crewed aircraft?” Brown said. “And could you operate it from the back of a KC-46? We’ll have E-7s eventually, could you operate it from the back of an E-7? Could you operate it from a fighter cockpit? We’re thinking through those aspects.”<\/p>\n

His comments echoed suggestions made by the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies in an October 2022 paper on drone wingmen. The Mitchell Institute urged the Air Force to focus as soon as possible on refining how humans will interact with these drone aircraft, and one model floated by Mitchell envisioned a swarm of drones being directed by an air battle manager operating from a nearby Wedgetail.<\/p>\n

Brown said that as the Air Force lays out future budgets for CCAs, it’s also considering what the aircraft itself — and the autonomous capability that will allow them to fly primarily on their own — will look like.<\/p>\n

And the Air Force is also figuring out how it will build the organizations that are needed to operate and maintain these aircraft, and how it will train and equip the airmen who will operate and rely on them, he said.<\/p>\n

Keeping costs down will be crucial if this concept will work, Brown said. One of the intended benefits of CCAs is they would be less expensive than traditional aircraft, and would not require an aircrew, he said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Military Times<\/a> and Defense News<\/a> provide additional details on this concept.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Air Force is considering the idea of having remote controlled drone wingmen flying adjacent to … Remote control of U.S. Air Force drone wingmen<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":661,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[187,463],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-137102","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-air-force","category-air-national-guard"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137102","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/661"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=137102"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137102\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=137102"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=137102"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=137102"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}