Posted on 08/19/2007 7:31:22 PM PDT by MCH
Right up to the point where your communications satellite meets with a "mishap", leaving all your drones without controllers.
This is one of the key points. While it is certainly appealing to use a reachback capability to run a 9-5 air war from the states, the guys on the ground in theatre who have MUCH more skin in the game may not be as well served by the inherent inefficiencies associated with operating this way. There are potential comms failures, bandwidth issues, software architecture issues (processing backlogs, having to push products through databases vs. stream them directly to field commanders), inter-service red-tape that may hinder the exchange of intel products in a timely manner, potential exploitation of products for the wrong reasons, etc.
If my butt was on the line in the next 30 mins to 1 hour time frame, I certainly wouldn't want to depend on another organization half a world away that tends to operate at a much slower tempo, complete with all the bureaucracy in between. This is especially true if we move into another theatre in the future that is once again target-rich from the AF's standpoint - they won't want to give up their ISR assets to do much of anything else but conduct the air war.
SAC is gone, but maybe we need it back, now that the Russians have their long range bombers up and flying again.
Ha! That is something to watch for this year. How many sports talking heads use the term “dogfight”.
B4L8r
My brother is a weapons controller for the AF, and has done two tours in Iraq.
The one thing I remember that he talked about was the incredible pressure and complexity of controlling aircraft from all the services and civilian aircraft in the area and drones flown by who knows.
The fact is that there are other planes in the sky who all need to stay away from each other. If there isn't a single point of control, how do you keep that nifty army UAV from being sucked into an F-22 intake during a bombing run? Even when they are in contact with one another, it's a difficult task. When they aren't in contact, it's a recipe for pure chaos.
Since the AF is ultimately responsible for keeping everyone from running into each other, it seems that giving them some control over what's in the air makes a lot of sense.
Dude, I've had a much higher 'sitting on my butt doing nothing/productive work' ratio while working with the Army than with the USAF.
Do not mistake USAF office weenies for flightline guys. There is nothing 9-5 about fighter ops/maintenance.
Also, operating a remote vehicle is not the same as flying inside a fighter. The roles are different, and much of what a UAV needs to do can be done as easily from CONUS as from a FOB.
Once again, the Air Force tries to monopolize everthing that flies. The Navy/USMC/Army is smart enough to know what would come next....neglect of the ground support and fleet support missions.
Ask the other services which one is the most arrogant in the Pentagon....you’ll get “USAF” from three of them.
Anyone who saw the difference between AF and Marine technique for close air support in Viet Nam would agree.
I should add that a lot of what I have seen from Iraq coverage might lead me to revise the AF close air support opinion. They appears to have been some big changes from what I saw 40 years ago, with the A-10 and F-16 tactics in particular.
There's much to be said for a state of affairs where the people working the UAVs, and the people whose butts are being covered by them, share the same mess. It greatly increases the motivation of the controllers
They worked their butts off to kill Army aviation back in the sixties even though they had no interest in buying the aircraft and doing it themselves.
***So they were the “dog in the manger”. Maybe Bill O’Reilly can make a big deal out of that.
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