| A manned aircraft may perform better.
But consider this.
At the price of a manned airplane, you could build and maintain ten. And when you lose three, no one really cares. There'll be a review board on how the planes were lost and disciplinary action carried out on the guys who controlled it. There will be no issue of rotting for years in a rat infested gulag.
Close air support? You could just talk to the guy controlling that aircraft as you would talk to the pilot. In fact, because of cameras that can be mounted looking down from the aircraft he could have a MUCH better view of how the situation is unfolding. Then the controller of the aircraft, in a safe location, has an image of the battle area on a large multi function display now dotted iwth blue dots and red dots for friends and foes determined by IFF devices on the ground now used like popping smoke... except completely invisible to the enemy. The IR Sinature formations that do not share the IFF ID anywhere are determined as foe (in a platoon of friendies, at least FIVE of those IFF thigns have to be working, right?) Information processing will be very quick as there will be a whole staff of people organizing incoming information into meaningful ways for the controllers of the aircraft to use.
The best approach will be determined within minutes and a well coordinated close air support is delivered.
Think about that. A flight of four UAVs... each controlled by one person but supported by a staff of maybe even up to 12 people. You got the organization of a small AWACs plane with the firepower of 4 strike jets. |