The Air Force lrecently released a long-term plan for expanding the role of unmanned aircraft.
Col. Eric Mathewson, director of the service’s Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) Task Force, told reporters on July 23 that the leadership is moving away from “the notion of UAS as a separate, minor Air Force capability.”
“In order for UAS to be institutionalized, they must be integrated into Air Force programs, plans, processes and culture,” he said.
The 80-page “flight plan” for UAS contains proposed changes in doctrine, training and equipment.
Lt. Gen. David Deptula, deputy chief of staff for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, said the degree to which the Air Force has tapped the potential of UAS is today at about where it was in the 1920s with manned aircraft.
All the military services own an array of small UAS for reconnaissance and targeting. But over the next several decades, the Air Force plans to expand the size spectrum. Matthewson said the flight plan envisions larger drones as bombers and cargo lifters, as well as miniature versions for intelligence work.
He said the service will create UAS alternatives for almost any Air Force mission currently conducted by piloted aircraft.
Mathewson said one of the most ambitious goals of the flight plan is to create modular aircraft in which a simple airframe could be endlessly modified with various payloads to fit each type of mission.