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As The war zone
Boeing is expected to unveil a unmanned stealth fighter, or UCAV, for the Royal Australian Air Force at this year's Avalon Air Show in Australia. The unmanned aircraft seems to be a model of gliding never before seen and will be able to function as a "loyal winger" with a manned aircraft, such as the F-35 Joint Strike Fighters of Australia.
The Australian Broadcasting Company (ABC) was the first to get the details of the new drone on February 26, 2019. The day before, Boeing had teased the official revelation of the unmanned aircraft, which must still arrive on February 27. 2019.
The unmanned aircraft shown has a "bespoke" configuration similar to that of the YF-23 Black Widow, as well as centrally mounted wings on either side of the fuselage. The wings are similar to those found on General Atomics Predator-C / Avenger and, more recently, on a set of mysterious Scaled Composite test cells. It also appears to have travazoidal air inlets on either side of the fuselage, likely fueling a single recessed jet engine at the rear to minimize the infrared signature. The shape of the drone differs from the company's MQ-25 Stingray drone tank for the US Navy and appears to be completely independent of the design of the Phantom Ray flying wing.
Beyond the picture, seen at the top of this story and below, ABC got little more detail about the drone's capabilities. According to the report, the 20-meter-long combat drone could be equipped with a modular payload bay capable of receiving sensors, electronic warfare systems and ammunition.
Boeing reportedly developed the unmanned aircraft in Brisbane, Australia, as part of a "Loyal Wingman" program for the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) and the Australian Department of Defense (DOD). Australian Defense Minister Christopher Pyne will be the first to officially unveil the drone tomorrow, according to ABC.
Deputy Chief of Vice-Marshal RAAF, Gavin Turnbull, spoke about this project in an interview published February 27, 2019 by the think tank of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. The service is also in the midst of a major modernization effort called Jericho Plan. , which is partly trying to leverage the exploitation of artificial intelligence, machine learning and the unmanned human team to offset its relatively small overall force structure.
"In terms of value for money, we can have the greatest impact on our members' success in any combat environments they may have to enter," Turnbull said. "We have to be able to provide a level of deterrence that means if you make fun of us and we have to bite, it will hurt."
"So, in the future, you have to take into account the mix of forces between inhabited and unarmed combat elements," he continued. "And there will always be a synergy by mixing them in some way."
The war zone In the article yesterday, Tyler Rogoway spoke specifically about these potential benefits of Australia's acquisition of a UCAV capability:
An unmanned combat air vehicle, capable of semi-autonomous missions and able to play the role of a loyal winger, where it is "attached" to a nearby equipped platform via data links, makes perfect sense for Australia as this would increase their air combat capabilities without having to buy other expensive fighters or train new crews. It would also make all their fighting forces easier to survive and able to adapt to hostile threats on the fly. In addition, it would also increase the store capacity of their fighter frames, sensor diversity, range. The drones themselves can also be networked into a swarm, giving them a greater capacity than the sum of their components.
These concepts can manifest themselves in separate aircraft, or potentially combined in a single cell, with some compromises. Nevertheless, they should still cost less than an ultra-stealth, high-end, flying-wing UAV, designed for semi-autonomous or even autonomous operations located deep within enemy territory.
It is also possible to use a "combat aircraft" drone, but because of the costs and investments already made by Australia in its growing fleet of F-35s, this seems dubious at the moment. In addition, high kinetic performance would mean sacrificing stealth and range, which makes little sense. And we know from the characteristics that Boeing has shown that this aircraft is designed for speed and maneuverability similar to those of fighter jets, and not for extreme stealth and long range.
Boeing was the first to openly demonstrate the incredible potential of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UCAVs) nearly two decades ago, but has since struggled to turn their vision into an operational state. Keeping this in mind, tomorrow 's announcement will be a big blow for the Chicago planner and will only create new opportunities. In addition, since Boeing also won the Navy's MQ-25 contract, the company is now firmly at the forefront of advanced unmanned aircraft development.
We will continue to update this story as more and more information becomes available.
UPDATE: 3:25 pm PST
Looks like someone had a pic in the Boeing tent in Avalon. There is what seems to be a model. A prototype is possible because of the poor quality of the image, but it is doubtful. Yet this gives us an idea of the scale.
Now, Boeing has just posted this video showing CGI from the plane in action in a man-machine association mode alongside an Aussie Growler and an E-7 Wedgetail . Oh, and his name is officially Boeing Airpower Teaming System:
A clearer picture of the model:
UPDATE: 3:47 PM PST
Some basic facts about the Air Airpower grouping system:
- It is built in Australia and intended for export worldwide. Exports will be easier without going through the US FMS process.
- The Australian Ministry of Defense and Boeing shared about 60/40 of the system's development, and Boeing took the bulk of the deal, spending about $ 62 million on the program.
- A prototype is under construction.
- Can fly with or without a partner.
- Has a range of about 2000 miles.
- Is 38 feet long and uses a bizjet class engine.
- Will team with E-7, EA-18G, F / A-18E / F and P-8 Poseidon.
- Modular design for "snap-in" payloads and fast reconfiguration capability.
- The initial configuration will focus on sensors / intelligence and electronic warfare.
- Controlled via a ground station, by another aircraft, and has a certain level of autonomy that can be adapted to the mission.
- The design was mainly based on what would be attractive for a global market filled with small arms.
- Will be tested on the vast deserts of Australia where there is plenty of room for experimentation. (Probably based in Woomera)
- Technology and development will be provided locally in Australia.
- Boeing will be able to adapt the technology to foreign customers much more easily than the development and construction in the United States.
You can read more here at Aviation Week exclusive embargo. I will soon do an overall analysis that addresses issues that are not addressed in this report.
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