As a starter for 10

In the case of a fully or semi-autonomous UAV it requires the control system to implement the mission, which in term involves additional planning infrastructure

In the case of a remote controlled or semi-autonomous UAV it requires the ground station, additional ATC interaction and technology to deal with loss of (accidental or malicious) control links

Those technology exist today,

you can pretty much fly a civil airliner today, with out pilot’s intervention.

pilot’s flying would limit to…

pushing back from the gates, steer it onto the runway, powerup, push, rotate and hit V2.

rest of time a competently designed system can fly the waypoints via ATC management, all the way down to glidepath capture, autoflare and roll out, all can be flown by the aircraft system with out pilot intervention.

care to guess what are these same people who designed these systems doing on the military side?

vehicle technology wise there is nothing new.

@i.e.
Apples and Oranges. One thing to do a ~50 mil. EUR R&D program.
Hell, another ball game entirely to even fund a full scale technology demonstrator.
But a whole-scale fighter program, …

as I point out, SAAB people have ambition, something BAE doesn’t have. it is a necessary condition.

it’s remarkable, when you get down to it, how much money it really requires to put a state of art. fighter together. DoD and EuroConsortiums runs these multi-trillion behemouth of a program… doesn’t mean that’s the only way.:dev2:

Why do you think EADS went on the US tanker deal. They perfectly knew they would never get it in the first place.

Nic

… I donno about that, there are those in the defence department who are not really happy with the single supplier situation us military faces for its big logistics platforms.

The Swedish stealth Gripen is a University project and isn’t likely to go anywhere.
…

right now,
yes,

in couple of years, may not be.
Grippen people still have some ambition left in them… unlike their castrated Bae counterparts.

I think it wouldn’t hurt to take a look at it from another direction…

for example an updated CAS aircraft in line of A Su-25.

or even a turboprop alternative?

Q-5 is just tooo old. of an platform.

And saved weight – important on the E-2D.

one advantage of a rotating AESA array is that given a radome,you can mount a bigger array (vs a fixed, IL-76-Phalcon type of triangular array)

don’t think size of array doesn’t matter.

bigger array = bigger combined output power, more range, better angular resolution.

I also read the article in the context of munitions. Cheap but accurate and usable munitions are just as much part of the cost picture. US and NATO countries use weapons that are meant to take out tanks, or fortifications, for stuff that needs 10% of the TNT. Laser guidance seems where it`s at for this role in terms of cost… Actually, maybe somebody can answer this question I`ve had for a while: Lasers can`t be used thru clouds, fog, etc. At least thru water vapor effects (not dust, smoke) wouldn`t X-Ray lasers, or masers, be a viable option as well? Why haven`t I heard anything about such a thing? 🙂 Airborne gun platforms are also another platform that is useful to have, yet doesn`t seem to be in any new developments past the C-130 gunship.

Guided concrete bombs!

as for masers part…

wouldn;t a mm-wave longbow hellfire your weapon?

or are you talking about a beam rider radar guided weapon?

something like a 40mm/70mm hydra rocket guided by something like a interfereometry beam rider? instead of semi-active laser like “Guided Advanced Tactical Rocket”???

well if you were in charge, what would you suggest the PLAAF mount it on?

I would buy up all the 767 cargo jets I can get my hands on.

modular conformal array. and modular mission-crew modules.

plus a proteus type of aircraft with an long range L-band rotating array hung underneath as peace time survallence platforms.