Specialty Press' Birds of Prey

To paraphrase a quote from someone, "The future is here". By that, I mean that the era of un-manned combat aircraft is upon us. It wasn't more than a few years ago that we were saying 'Never happen' when it came to the discussion about UCAVs or Unmanned Combat Air Vehicles. There acronyms are still flying in terms of what to call these. Many of us think of them as drones as that is what we have grown up with.

A drone is basically a radio controlled aircraft. Initially these were set on a predetermined course to be used as a target for anti-aircraft gunners. Later, some rudimentary abilities to be flown from the ground was added and things just took off. The USAF and USN both developed full scale targets equipped with cameras and a full array of flight instruments so that out of service tactical jets could be operated much as if there was a pilot and allow the target to be maneuvered. This would provide an even more realistic engagement experience for the attacking pilot. While the Navy has given up on this, the USAF still flies old Phantom IIs to be used as expendable targets out of Tyndall and Holloman AFB.

But now, things have changed. Starting out as simple reconnaissance platforms, the current batch of drones or UAVs allow battle field commanders to have real time photo recon of an area of interest that would otherwise be rather hazardous flying for a manned aircraft. Ranging in size from planes no larger than a good size R/C aircraft to the huge Global Hawk, able to stay in the air for many, many hours and fly at vary high altitudes, they are now redefining aerial recon and in many ways, making manned recon obsolete.

Of course, it didn't take long to figure out that with some of these, you could hook up an air to ground missile (like the Hellfire) and actually use it in offensive operations. This is what happened to the RQ-1 (now MQ-1) Predator. Originally put in service as a recon platform, it is now, in conjunction with the larger and more capable MQ-9 Predator, a major strike aircraft in both Iraq and Afghanistan. Two things make these aircraft so valuable. One is that they can stay on station for 18-24 hours. Few pilots can remain that alert for so long and though manned aircraft can stay in the air through air to air refueling, the UCAVs don't have to refuel.  Secondly, these aircraft are somewhat quiet so the bad guys are often not aware they are there until the missiles are hitting around them.

Thanks to these two traits, the target group in Afghanistan and Pakistan is slowly being eliminated or kept in even closer hiding. It is amazing to think that these aircraft are flown by operators sitting in air conditioned spaces near Las Vegas, Nevada. 

In this book on these vehicles, author Bill Yenne tells the full history of unmanned aviation from the old biplane Kettering Bugs of 1918 through the various Radioplane target aircraft of WWII, the Ryan Firebees of Vietnam and up to the current and future crop of aircraft. The USAF is very much buying into the program, with not only a full wing of four squadrons based in Nevada, and a squadron at Beale, but also several ANG units, who have turned in their KC-135s, F-16s and other aircraft for unmanned planes.

Most of the book is on the development and operations of the Predator, Reaper and Global Hawk, which are proving to be extremely useful and capable platforms. It is a book that I have to say exceeded my initial expectations by quite a bit. It is interesting, timely and a book that I fully believe every aviation enthusiast should read.

As Bob Dylan said "The times they are a'changin".