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You will never create a computer that can tell me

The things you named so far are all things that (obviously, to me) a computer can do better and faster than a human. But maybe there are a hundred reasons lurking in there where you're right. A hundred failures later, they'll be identified and fixed, and they'll never be reasons again.

Now, someday, someone could likely program all those sensors into a fighter aircraft and return that data to the ground in about 3-4 seconds allowing someone to take positive action.

There will be no information returned to the ground, and nobody will take any action, positive or negative. The aircraft will make the decisions, and the decisions will take milliseconds. Acquiring and processing information is what computers do best of all, and every 18 months, they get twice as good at it.

I think what he alluded to were the sensors more than computer power ...

so let's look at a possible scenario ...

now, of course, an SU-27 has a certain profile from all aspects ... this can be mapped out ... it has certain signal emissions, depending upon configuration and active systems ... these can be identified ... if it were tracked from takeoff, it's range and remaining fuel could be estimated (if the whole flight path were tracked) ... this could be uplinked to a ROV ...

weapons load would have to be estimated ... might could be determined from high-energy radar but not without revealing your position ... same goes for a human pilot who would need some sort of visual to know what the enemy stores look like ... if either gets that close ...

This makes me think of AEGIS ... identifying threats, assessing the imminency of their potential threat and prioritizing targets while simultaneously assigning defensive systems to counter ...

I think we'll find we have justification for ROV AND Combat Pilot systems for easily a couple decades ...

I have to agree with Physicist on this one. With 360-degree millimeter radar (skin mounted antennas), IFF, visual cameras and voting computers, I think aircraft could be designed to operate autonomously.

One of the big rubs is the control law theory required for aircraft attitude control and orientation. This branch of science is taking off in leaps and bounds. I deal with spacecraft and satellites. They are getting far more robust and autonomous all the time. What used to take an army of flight controllers and engineers now is being accomplished with two guys and a computer. Much of the work has been delegated to the spacecraft.

I don't se any difference with aircraft. Think of a fighter that did not need the "life support", visual instrumentation, manual "stick and rudder" equipment, oxygen, canopies, ejection seats, etc. If you build the airframe light and strong, G loading could be tremendous and not exceed the design criteria.

As far as battlefield awareness, all you would need was a signature/lookup table for enemy platforms and IFF to determine hostiles from friendlies. If you had a squadron of these all data linked together, it would be a powerful force indeed. Again, think of a plane with no human life (friendly) in the equation. The plane could take maximum risk to "get the job done".

As far as decisions on targeting and thread acquisitions, a computer could be taught to accomplish these very things. Another nicety would be that if the plane was in trouble, it could have a mode where it would keep doing maximum damage until destruction. Even outside of its flight envelopes.

I am not saying this is going to happen anytime soon, however, I do believe it is a distinct possibility for the future of aviation warfare.