WTF! Spying but NO fighting??
Who neutered the US Navy?
I think it is an inside job.
Joystick Actuators Union doesn’t want to relegate live pilots to truck and bus driving?
Part of the problem here is that the Navy is just flat-out late to the party. They were late with Stealth, and to a certain extent, PGM's. Once the navy gets a reliable, re-useable, ship-borne drone they will very quickly arm the thing. This is what happened with the early Predator drone. First it was a Recon bird only. Then somebody at CIA figured out that you could very easily hang a couple of Hellfire missiles on the thing and -- presto -- you had the Predator-B!
If the Navy had a working ship-borne UCAV, they'd be regularly on station over Afghanistan right now. The Navy's counter-arguments about mission (close air support) are fine, but as you go down the scale of conflict you end up basically as an airborne patrol, and a UCAV on hand is better than an F/A-18 that is 15 minutes away or sitting on deck.