Unmanned Aircraft Systems Roadmap 2005-2030 - Federation of ...

UAS ROADMAP 2005
range/endurance aircraft. Fewer take offs and landings mean reduced wear and tear, and exposure to
historical risks of mishaps. Ground operating tempo benefits from the reduced sortie generation. The
ability to operate in distant theaters with ground stations at CONUS garrison bases means many crews fly
operational missions without deploying forward. This, in turn, reduces forward footprints, support costs,
and demands on force-protection authorities. Crew duty periods are now irrelevant to aircraft endurance
since crew changes can be made on cycles based on optimum periods of sustained human performance
and attention. The personnel impacts can additionally ripple through the Services to positive effect.
Fewer deployments reduce family stress and mean better retention for highly trained crews reducing
pipeline-training costs. High-endurance unmanned aviation enables CONOPs attributes that can’t be
fully reflected in aircraft unit costs. But they enable a future where counter-air operations, similar to
Deny Flight, Northern and Southern Watch, may quite conceivably be supported by crews, operational
staffs and CAOCs that substantially remain in either CONUS or established headquarters far away from
the point of intended operational effects. The J-UCAS program, now focused on developing a net-centric
strike capability, will mark another step toward just such a future. As shown in the “UAS Missions
Roadmap” (Figure 6.2-1), two major ‘families of missions,’ one emphasizing payload capacity and
persistence and the other autonomy, survivability, and weapons employment, need to drive UAS design
and development over the next 25 years. A start in these two directions has been made, as shown by the
examples of ongoing UAS programs that may eventually supplement manned aircraft in the roles shown
in Figure 6.2-1.
The first family of missions (shown in the upper half of Figure 6.2-1) employs endurance UA as
communication relays, SIGINT collectors, tankers, maritime patrol aircraft, and, eventually, airlifters.
Design-wise, these roles may use one common platform or different ones, but they must provide
significant payload capacities (power as well as weight) and endurances greater than 24 hours. The
DARPA Adaptive Joint C4ISR Node (AJCN), with the potential to deploy a Global Hawk-based
communication relay payload in the 2005-2010 timeframe, represents a significant step in the “payload
with persistence” direction for UA. From there, the mission similarities of the AJCN and the Global
Hawk imagery reconnaissance UA could be combined in an unmanned SIGINT collection platform by
placing the mission crews (“backend”) of the Rivet Joint, ARIES II, and Senior Scout aircraft in vans on
the ground, as is accomplished for U-2 SIGINT missions today. The maritime patrol mission could be
transitioned to UA in much the same way as for SIGINT collectors, by relocating the mission crew to the
ground, as is planned in the Navy’s Tactical Support Centers (TSCs) for the BAMS UA. The profile for
aerial refueling, long duration orbits along the periphery of hostilities, resembles that of the SIGINT
collection mission but adds the complexity of manned (receiver) and unmanned (refueler) interaction.
Unmanned airlift hinges on overcoming a psychological and a policy barrier, the former being that of
passengers willing to fly on a plane with no aircrew and the latter on foreign countries allowing access to
their airports by robotic aircraft. An interim step to unmanned airlift could be manned aircraft that have
the option of being unmanned. The technology to fly and taxi the large robotic aircraft required for such
missions has been demonstrated; NASA flew an unmanned Boeing 720 in 1985, and Global Hawk
routinely taxies at Edwards AFB.
The second family of missions (lower half of Figure 6.2-1) for future UA employs them in weapon
delivery roles, graduating from electronic warfare to air-to-ground to air-to-air in complexity. The
aircraft now in test for the J-UCAS program are just a start. Progress in the weapon delivery direction for
UA, because of the large number of decisions in a short span inherent in these missions, hinges on
development of increasing levels of autonomy (see Section 4.1).
SECTION 6 - ROADMAP
Page 73