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UAV worldwide
efore the 1990s, Israel alone

B seemed truly committed to develop-

ing unmanned military aircraft,
which it believed would reduce the
loss of pilots and aircraft on dangerous recon-
naissance and surveillance missions. Although
the U.S. had been using remotely piloted ve-
hicles (primarily as aerial targets) since the
1960s, the technologies to make unmanned
aerial vehicles more than a curiosity did not
yet exist.
Not until Operation Desert Storm, and
the remarkable success of Pioneer—a joint de-
velopment of Israel Aircraft Industries and AAI
in the U.S.—did UAVs begin to win converts.
Pioneer, first called into service as a combat
spotter by the Navy on February 6, 1991,
aided the battleship Wisconsin in locating Iraqi
boats and shore targets 19 mi. away, and
The proliferation of UAVs continues to then destroying them with its 16-in. guns.
It was not long before Iraqi soldiers
accelerate, with a growing number of learned to associate the buzzing of the tiny Pi-
oneer with the Earth-shattering bombardment
companies, countries, and innovative that followed moments later—leading to the
first-ever surrenders of human soldiers to (un-
designs entering the market. armed) flying robots in combat. The real-time
and near-real-time tactical reconnaissance
provided by Navy, Marine, and Army UAVs
helped bring that conflict to a rapid end.
Pioneer also quickly caught the attention
of military and government leaders and the
media throughout the world. Aerospace firms
in the U.S., Europe, and Asia pulled long-
ignored concepts out of their files, updating
them with new technologies and materials.
Newer UAVs were sent into service in the
Balkans a few years later and continued flying
over Iraq, helping to enforce no-fly zones and
preventing Iraq’s military from conducting sur-
prise attacks on its own people.
By the time of Operation Enduring Free-
dom in Afghanistan and Operation Iraqi Free-
dom following the September 11, 2001, ter-
rorist attacks, just how far UAV technology
by J.R. Wilson
had advanced quickly became evident. South-
Contributing writer

30 AEROSPACE AMERICA/APRIL 2009

 WILSON-2layout409.qxd:AAFEATURE-layout.Template
e roundup 2009
west Asia became a proving ground for a wide
array of UAVs, led by the Predator, which
General Atomics Aeronautical Systems had
developed for the USAF. Others ranged from
hand-launched, over-the-hill observation air-
craft to the jet-fighter-sized Global Hawk, sent
into service while still a prototype.
Predators also became the world’s first
armed UAVs when the CIA equipped some of
its own with Hellfire air-to-ground missiles,
originally developed for helicopter use against
tanks (helicopter fire-and-forget). The UAVs
were used to attack an al-Qaida convoy near
Afghanistan’s border with Pakistan on Febru-
ary 2, 2002, opening a new chapter in UAV
combat applications.
Moving on to Iraq the next year, both
armed and unarmed Predators dominated the
skies over Baghdad and across the country. In
a single year (June 2005-June 2006), long af-
ter the toppling of Hussein’s government,
Predators spent nearly 34,000 hr in the air,
flying more than 2,000 missions over Iraq.
With the demand for Predators growing
beyond the number available to military com-
manders, a host of other UAVs were sent to
Southwest Asia. Of those, Predator and
Global Hawk were controlled via satellite by
Air Force personnel in the U.S. The remain-
der, however, are strictly local—launched, op-
erated, and recovered by ground and naval
forces in-theater.
The AAI-built Shadow, used primarily for
reconnaissance, target acquisition, and battle-
Shadow
3/11/09 3:24 PM Page 3
field damage assessment by the Army and
Marine Corps, had flown some 400,000 hr
over Iraq and Afghanistan by the end of 2008
(including those operated by the Romanian air
force). Those numbers are expected to jump
substantially this year, as military leaders note
that UAV operations in Afghanistan have
been doubling every three months.
One of the most popular UAVs in South-
west Asia is the 4-lb Raven, which warfighters
hurl into the air like javelins. Its Raven
three nose cameras then enable
them to see who or what is waiting
over the next hill or behind the
next building. Hundreds have been
deployed to Iraq, part of thousands
of different UAVs now belonging
to the U.S. military and coalition
forces—roughly twice as many un-
manned as manned aircraft.
UAVs also have seen increasing use in
other parts of the world—from Eastern Europe
to the Horn of Africa, from antipiracy patrols
over the Straits of Malacca, to drug and illegal
alien interdiction along national borders, to
agricultural, fire detection, wildlife tracking,
and weather observation missions worldwide.
These aircraft have moved to the top of both
military and civilian government, industry, and
academic requirements lists across the globe.
TECHNOLOGY
Today’s UAVs, and their users, are benefiting
from a nearly “perfect storm” of turn-of-the-
century technology breakthroughs.
Faster, less expensive computer technol-
ogy has enabled more and better sensors.
Lighter, more durable composite materials for
skin and structure, combined with more pow-
erful lightweight powerplants, increased both
payload and range. GPS navigation and loca-
tion have given UAVs unprecedented preci-
sion in reaching designated targets and pin-
pointing targets of opportunity. Improved
WILSON-2layout409.qxd:AAFEATURE-layout.Template 3/11/09 3:24 PM Page 4
size, weight, and capability in satellite commu-
nications have enhanced contact with ground
forces in remote mountains and urban
“canyons” and added communications relay
to the growing list of UAV missions.
By 2000, so many advances and suc-
cesses had been recorded that Sen. John
Warner (R-Va.), then chairman of the Armed
Services Committee, inserted a directive into
the defense budget mandating that a third of
all aircraft used to attack behind enemy lines
had to be unmanned by 2010. The following
year, the September 11 attacks forced a
rewrite of all budget, technology, and defense
plans. The Pentagon budget jumped 74% be-
tween 2002 and 2008 (even without the costs
of the wars), with an equally substantial boost
in R&D and procurement funding, especially
for UAVs and ground and water counterparts.
New battlefield successes further bol-
stered the increasingly positive environment
for all unmanned systems, turning them into a
global growth industry attracting both estab-
lished defense giants and start-ups. With that
much money and openness to new concepts,
the how-when-where of UAV use grew almost
exponentially.
Predator or Global Hawk can be “piloted”
from ground stations halfway around the
world, while a hand-launched micro air vehi-
cle (MAV) like the Marine Corps Wasp can be
monitored from a laptop or hand-held video
display. Specialty UAVs “sniff” the air for
chemical or biological weapons, monitor radi-
ation levels, look for improvised explosive de-
vices, protect convoys from ambush, patrol
borders, locate smugglers and terrorists using
small boats, aid search and rescue missions,
and perform a seemingly endless list of addi-
tional tasks.
The growing variety of platforms world-
wide has led to a wide range of shapes, sizes,
propulsion systems, and range/altitude/en-
durance mixes. That, in turn, has brought
about a rebirth for lighter-than-air unmanned
fliers, from small and medium-sized tethered
balloons and blimps to massive powered air-
ships. Lockheed Martin, for example, is de-
signing a high-altitude airship 25 times larger
than the Goodyear blimp that could remain
“parked” 100,000 ft above its target zone for
weeks or even months.
Even that does not come close to the
Vulture, currently in competitive design for
DARPA by Aurora Flight Services, Boeing
Integrated Defense Systems, and Lockheed
Martin Skunk Works. The program work
statement was extremely basic: Carry at least
32 AEROSPACE AMERICA/APRIL 2009
1,000 lb of payload, produce 5 kW of on-
board power, demonstrate 99% on-station
capability and high probability of mission suc-
cess—and stay aloft for five years without
landing.
Also being resurrected in labs, thanks to
both advances in micro- and nanotechnology
and the desire to see and hear inside build-
ings, are bird- and insect-style MAVs, the first
targeted for 2015, the latter for 2030. Tiny
platforms, designed with flapping wings to
make them more easily mistaken for actual
birds or insects, could be launched in a swarm
into a building to seek out terrorists, hostages,
snipers, and intelligence.
UAVs are so much a part of warfare and
military planning that two new concepts—ded-
icated UAV carriers and counter-UAV sys-
tems—are under consideration or develop-
ment. The most ambitious of the former is the
UXV Combatant warship proposed by BAE
Systems. The 8,000-ton vessel, which could
enter service in the 2020s if pursued by a ma-
jor naval force, would be dedicated to the
launch and recovery of large numbers of un-
manned vehicles, serving as mothership, con-
trol center, and maintenance facility for UAVs
and, in all likelihood, unmanned surface and
underwater vessels as well. Serving as a kind
of small carrier, it also could host helicopters,
VTOL aircraft like the Marine Corps V-22,
and smart munitions such as cruise missiles.
Another group of BAE engineers has de-
veloped a land-based launch boost system for
small UAVs, pairing vehicles up to 25 kg with
a mortar-based launcher. That would give
small units more capable aircraft while incor-
porating a technology that greatly reduces the
typical launch forces a mortar creates—forces
that would seriously damage most UAVs.
The U.S. and its allies are not the only
militaries deploying or planning to deploy
UAVs, of course. And although the technolo-
gies that have made the current generation of
U.S., European, and Israeli systems so suc-
cessful will take time and resources to dupli-
cate, the speed with which space launchers
and nuclear weapons are proliferating sug-
gests that gap may close far faster in the less
complex UAV race. As a result, engineers also
are now looking at anti-UAV systems, both to
use against potential adversaries and to learn
how best to protect their own UAVs from
someone else’s countermeasures.
“We’re very concerned about the emerg-
ing unmanned aerial vehicle threat and, in
fact, a lot of us here think that threat is here
and now,” Michael Means, business develop-
WILSON-2layout409.qxd:AAFEATURE-layout.Template
ment manager for the Stinger antiaircraft
missile at Raytheon, told the Association for
Unmanned Vehicle Systems International
(AUVSI) last December. “Currently, the Army
doesn’t have a near-term cost-effective capa-
bility to counter an emerging UAV threat to
protect brigade combat teams and high-prior-
ity assets.”
Raytheon is looking at a modified Stinger,
either hand-held or mounted on a Humvee, as
a possible anti-UAV weapon. The company is
also working with Boeing on a directed-en-
ergy weapon called Laser Avenger, designed
to detonate IEDs at a distance but also seen as
a way to shoot down or blind enemy UAVs.
CHINA
One of the few opportunities to see what
China is doing in UAVs comes at the annual
Air Show China. That was the case at the 7th
Air Show in November 2008, but, as with
previous Chinese exhibitions, what was real
and what was illusion were difficult to sepa-
Wong Long
rate. Nonetheless, it appeared to show, for
the first time in public, the extent of China’s
UAV effort—more than a dozen aircraft from
multiple state-run manufacturers.
Those numbers remain hard to validate,
however. Aerospace America has found refer-
ences, with varying degrees of detail, to 41
primary UAVs and variants from 14 different
manufacturers (including the air force). For
this year, however, we could find updated in-
formation on only 23, and little or no verifica-
tion on the remainder.
It also is possible that some of these refer
to one aircraft by multiple names, noting
slightly different specifications. That also
could account for the multiple aircraft with
pictures or descriptions indicating they are
downsized replicas, at least outwardly, of the
U.S. Global Hawk.
EUROPE
The U.K., France, and Germany continue to
lead Europe in the development and produc-
3/11/09 3:24 PM Page 5
tion of UAVs, with over 90 different
aircraft or variants, from some 30
manufacturers. Those platforms
run the gamut from MAVs to multi-
ton behemoths.
The European Union’s basic
UAV thrust has been to develop
dual-use systems for military and Patria mini-UAV
civilian applications, thus broaden-
ing market demand both within the EU and
worldwide. Numerous meetings during the
past year have looked at ways to further co-
operative development efforts among EU
member states and companies. That includes
synchronizing military research funded by the
European Defense Agency with civil security
and other commercial applications supported
by the European Commission.
At the same time, efforts are under way
to implement regulations for UAVs to operate
in the continent’s crowded, multinational air-
space—regulations that could benefit EU in-
dustry by limiting the degree to which U.S.-
built UAVs meet the new standards. This is
especially important to both EU and U.S. de-
velopers of large platforms such as nEUROn
and Global Hawk, as well as UCAVs, which
are seen as a less expensive route than new
manned fighters to enlarging air attack and air
superiority capabilities. But adequate training
ranges within Europe are severely limited un-
der current flight restrictions.
In January 2008, EDA awarded a €0.5-
million contract to the Air4 All consortium—
comprising more than a dozen of Europe’s
largest aerospace and defense contractors—
to develop a detailed road map for the inte-
gration of UAVs into European airspace by
the end of 2015 at the latest. The project in-
volves not just industry but also government
air traffic and airworthiness agencies, as well
as academic and private research groups, in
an effort to address safety issues for both mil-
itary and commercial UAV operations across
the continent.
Meanwhile, as with U.S. programs, Eu-
rope’s militaries are finding new uses for the
technologies they are receiving and are mak-
ing ever greater demands
on the R&D community to
expand those applications.
One such develop-
ment, from Germany’s
EMT Penzberg, is the
VOLANS covert optical
airborne reconnaissance
naval adapted system, Sperwer-B
which enables a modified
AEROSPACE AMERICA/APRIL 2009 33
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version of EMT’s Aladin hand-launched MAV
to be catapulted from a submerged subma-
rine. Three MAVs can be packaged into a
pressure-tight tank along with a folding cata-
pult launcher and mounted to a telescoping
multipurpose mast. The submarine need only
rise to periscope depth to lift the launcher
above the surface and get the MAVs airborne.
Signals from the MAVs can be retrieved
through an antenna, allowing the submarine
to extend its sensor range on the surface and
in the air above it while remaining submerged.
The MAV could either transmit real-time
data from within a 30-km range, if the sub-
marine keeps its communications mast ex-
tended, or widen its patrol and rendezvous
with the boat at a preselected time and loca-
tion to download stored data, including video.
Because the submarine would have to
surface to recover the drones, they probably
would be deployed on one-way missions. And
any decision to launch the MAVs and risk hav-
ing a well-equipped enemy track its broadcast
signal to pinpoint the submarine’s location
would make VOLANS a special-use-only sys-
tem, such as providing a submarine-based
special operations team with a current view of
a target.
INDIA
India has been a major buyer of UAVs, espe-
cially from Israeli manufacturers. But govern-
ment and military officials also have been
pushing for an increased indigenous capabil-
ity. One way to upgrade the country’s own
technology is through joint development pro-
grams with others, as announced at Aero In-
dia 2009 in February. Ashok Baweja, chair of
Hindustan Aeronautics, reported that HAL
and Israeli Aerospace Industries have under-
taken a joint program to develop helicopter
UAVs. Baweja said one prototype has been
developed for trial, and that India’s navy has
placed an order for eight of the new UAVs.
India’s primary UAV manufacturer has
been DRDO, with its mid-size Rustom, Lak-
shya, and Nishant/Gagan reconnaissance and
Lashya surveillance platforms.
IRAN
Iran’s UAV programs also are difficult to ver-
ify, with at least half a dozen companies said
to have developed nearly a dozen vehicles,
most reported to be short-range reconnais-
sance and surveillance models. Some experts
in Israel, which has dealt with Iranian UAVs
34 AEROSPACE AMERICA/APRIL 2009
Abadil
used by Hezbollah, dismiss their vehicles as
copies of outdated Italian, South African, and
Chinese models.
However, given the secrecy of the Islamic
giant’s internal affairs—and the scientific suc-
cess it claims to be having in other aerospace
efforts, such as rockets and space launch ve-
hicles—it would be unwise to dismiss Iran’s
UAV programs out of hand.
The most prolific of the state-owned
firms, in terms of systems that are known or
believed to be under development or in pro-
duction, is Qods Aeronautics Industries. It has
been credited with multiple variants of the
Mohajer (Dorna and Hodhod), Tallash (En-
deavor and Hadaf), and Saeqeh UAVs. An-
other is HESA, which also produces the Russ-
ian Antonov An-140 airliner under license. It
is believed to have developed several variants
of the Abadil UAV.
In 2007, Iranian officials, who have made
numerous claims about the country’s UAV ex-
pertise and reconnaissance flights over U.S.
ships in the Persian Gulf, announced develop-
ment of a stealth vehicle with a 700-km
range, but little other information is available.
ISRAEL
and the
MIDDLE EAST
Israel’s list of UAVs matches China’s at 40
models and variants, from 10 manufacturers—
but with a significant difference: Most can be
fully vetted.
Israeli platforms cover a broad spectrum
of sizes, capabilities, and missions, from the
0.5-kg Mosquito urban MAV to the 4,650-kg
medium-altitude long-endurance (MALE) mul-
Skylark
WILSON-2layout409.qxd:AAFEATURE-layout.Template
timission Heron TP, both from IAI. Most Is-
raeli manufacturers have at least two UAVs
under development or in production; Elbit
Systems, IAI, and Aeronautics Defense Sys-
tems offer at least nine each.
Turkey has developed its own wide range
of UAVs in recent years, most under the ban-
ner of TUSAS Aerospace Industries. And
while TAI earned its reputation with a series of
small, short-range, low-altitude vehicles, its
principal effort since 2004 has been the
TIHA, a Predator-class MALE intelligence,
surveillance, target acquisition, and reconnais-
sance (ISTAR) vehicle, scheduled for first flight
in this year.
Heron
Also planned to debut this year, according
to reports quoting Turkish Defense Minister
Vecdi Gonul, is a mini that can be carried in a
soldier’s rucksack and outfitted with day/night
cameras for close-
range surveillance.
Abu Dhabi has
joined the race to
field its own Preda-
tor-class MALE UAV Yablon
with Adcom Military
Industries’ Yabhon RX-18. The company al-
ready produces two UAVs under the Yabhon
name—a jet-propelled high-speed diving target
drone (Yabhon HMD) and a piston pusher
prop for long-endurance reconnaissance and
surveillance (Yabhon RX-6).
Although it has no production facilities,
the Lebanese-based Shiite militia Hezbollah
has made considerable news in the past few
years by flying UAVs, believed to be supplied
by Iran, over Israel. Various reports have iden-
tified the Hezbollah vehicles as the Mohajer 4
and Abadil-T.
3/11/09 3:24 PM Page 7
One Israeli response has been an in-
creased program to develop UAV counter-
measures, something its Arab neighbors also
would be eager to field.
PAKISTAN
Facing a growing Indian UAV capability, and
angry over U.S. UAV operations against al-
Qaida and its supporters along the Afghan
border, Pakistan has been seeking to advance
its own unmanned capabilities, already among
the most vigorous in the region.
More than half a dozen companies are re-
ported to have at least 30 UAV models under
development or in production. The most ac-
tive is Integrated Dynamics.
All of the known Pakistani UAVs are
small, short-range aircraft, primarily designed
for reconnaissance and surveillance or as aer-
ial targets.
RUSSIA
With the rebuilding of Russia’s military forces
in recent years, UAV programs and manufac-
turers have proliferated. These have included
efforts in the Predator class as well as devel-
opment of massive aircraft along the lines of
Global Hawk.
A number of familiar names have joined
the unmanned ranks, including Kamov, Suk-
hoi (responsible for Russia’s largest UAVs),
and Yakovlev.
Russia’s most recent UAV deployments
were during its 2008 invasion of Georgia,
where both sides fielded unmanned systems
and accused each other of using them to trig-
ger combat engagements.
While looking to bolster its own military
capabilities in an area where it has long trailed
its Western European neighbors and the U.S.—
and cognizant of China’s UAV efforts—Russia
also sees UAVs as a potentially lucrative ex-
port market, with a primary customer in India.
Yakovlev Pchela
AEROSPACE AMERICA/APRIL 2009 35
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X-47
UNITED STATES
As the U.S. military moves deeper into the
evolving realm of the networked battlespace,
attention is turning to the need for better co-
ordination of manned and unmanned aircraft.
Some combat pilots in Southwest Asia have
referred to the hundreds of UAVs operating in
the same airspace as “FOD [foreign object de-
bris] in the sky.” But surpassing the relatively
remote possibility of a crowded-sky collision is
the potential of UAVs and manned aircraft
working as a team.
Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grum-
man have created a joint venture called Long-
bow to develop an unmanned tactical com-
mon data link assembly, or UTA. It would al-
low the crew of an AH-64D Apache Block III
attack helicopter to control linked UAVs. The
UTA completed its first powered flight at the
end of 2008, successfully acquiring and track-
ing an unmanned Little Bird. The UTA is fully
integrated with the Apache’s display systems,
allowing the crew to receive and view real-
time, high-definition streaming video from
UAVs at long distances from the helicopter.
At AUVSI’s Unmanned Systems Pro-
Global Hawk
36 AEROSPACE AMERICA/APRIL 2009
gram Review 2009, Navy officials talked
about the prospects of a sixth-generation un-
manned combat air vehicle (UCAV) to supple-
ment and eventually replace the fifth-genera-
tion F-35 aboard carriers. The concept
vehicle for that will be the Northrop Grum-
man X-47B, scheduled to begin carrier-based
launch and recovery flight tests in 2011 and
attempt an autonomous carrier landing
around 2013. The X-47B could stay aloft for
up to 50 hr with a range of 3,000 n.mi. using
autonomous refueling, which is to be tested in
about 2015.
The Navy has no current plans to procure
such a system, but is looking at it as part of an
examination of future “capability gaps.”
That also applies to the Navy’s broad
area maritime surveillance system (BAMS).
Capt. Robert Dishman of the Persistent Mar-
itime Unmanned Aircraft Systems Program
Office told AUVSI that BAMS will leverage
hardware, infrastructure, and expertise from
across DOD “to provide persistent maritime
intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance
integral to the Navy’s airborne ISR recapital-
ization strategy,” and that a $1.16-billion de-
velopment contract awarded to Northrop
Grumman in April 2008 “represents the
Navy’s largest investment in unmanned air-
craft systems to date.”
The BAMS UAV, based on Global Hawk
and its accompanying system, would give the
Navy persistent surveillance capability even in
a “satellite-denied environment.” That need
gained importance after a successful Chinese
antisatellite test in 2007 and Iran’s claim to
have launched its first indigenously produced
satellite. The on-orbit collision in February be-
tween a derelict Soviet-era satellite and an op-
erational Iridium communications spacecraft
was an even greater underscore, demonstrat-
ing not just the potential for the direct loss of
a satellite but also the continuing danger of
the expanding debris field it created.
But despite the now firmly set inclusion of
UAVs in military planning and operations at
all levels, the realities of a sagging global econ-
omy and pressures to reduce defense spend-
ing are likely to slow what has been a spectac-
ular two-decade record of development and
deployment. The Government Electronics In-
dustry Association (GEIA), for example, pre-
dicts DOD spending on UAVs will decline by
about one-third in the next 10 years. Global
Hawk and Predator currently dominate UAV
spending, and GEIA predicts Global Hawk
and BAMS will be taking the bulk of U.S.
funding by 2019.