The United States has used unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) or "drones" for several years now for multiple mission roles. These include aerial reconnaissance, surveillance, and missile strikes against high-value targets. Drones are often praised for their cost effectiveness, as well as the safety of the operator--if the drone is shot down, it poses no risk to the human pilot who can be on the opposite side of the world.
However, drones are not without their flaws. There is a long list of arguments against the morality of drone warfare. Also, drones that are shot down may be captured by enemy soldiers, allowing them an opportunity to reverse engineer our technology. Another is their limited range.
A new program aims to rectify this last shortcoming and expand the operational range of unmanned aircraft. Given that the Obama administration is seeking to continue drone warfare in Afghanistan and Pakistan despite the removal of American ground forces, this will benefit the United States by reducing the costs of sustaining these drone bases.
The combat power of these UAVs is limited to within their effective range, leading to the necessity of multiple sustainment bases throughout the theater of operations. This is regardless of the number of missions they have to fly in a given period. Increasing the range of the drone fleet allows the United States to condense the number of bases while maintaining (or potentially even expanding) the "umbrella" provided by UAVs.
In turn, fewer bases means fewer personnel assigned to security, infrastructure, and logistics, increasing the U.S. military's tooth-to-tail ratio (T3R). Although these soldiers will be out of Afghanistan eventually, in the short term this allows them to be reassigned to combat operations, actively achieving the United States' military goals instead of just supporting them. Later, operating costs for sustaining this smaller number of soldiers will be significantly lower.
You make a good point about how increasing the range of a drone fleet will decrease the number of sustainment bases within an area. While increasing the range will decrease the amount of bases required to sustain UAVs, what will do in terms of the security of the area and of the drones themselves? I agree that drones can serve a purpose in combat, but in certain areas the greater purpose is met with “boots on the ground”. Even if they are predominantly a sustainment base, they still have a presence in the area and interact face-to-face with the people of that area. Will moving to a more predominantly UAV strategy be helpful to the over-arching purpose in the region?
ReplyDeleteWhile I agree that there is a distinct need for face-to-face interaction in today's conflicts I do not think that should take detract from the potential gains of having an increasingly "drone" based force. I would not go so far as to say that men (and women) should be removed from the battlefield entirely; they certainly have a job that cannot currently be done in any other way. But the effects that such automation could have for aviators, truck drivers, and tankers is incredible. The key is Potato's point on the tooth-to-tail ratio.
DeleteIf the manpower used in the tail of this ratio is reduced significantly then there is room for the tooth to grow. This is even more relevant at a time when cuts to out force are being focused on number of personnel, not the number of vehicles or "drones."