Drone Wars: Pioneers, Killing Machines, Artificial Intelligence, and the Battle for the Future by Seth J. Frantzman

Author:Seth J. Frantzman [Frantzman, Seth J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781642936759
Google: n6_8zQEACAAJ
Amazon: 1642936758
Published: 2021-04-28T16:00:00+00:00

IAI’s operations consul for UAVs. As drones have increased in their abilities, operators are tasked with less piloting and focusing more on missions. (Courtesy IAI)

At IAI in central Israel, the company that pioneered drones was tweaking its success with systems that had flown some 1.7 million combat hours by 2019. It was adding capabilities to its Heron line of UAVs, the signature twin-tailed long-endurance surveillance aircraft. These machines had helped revolutionize drone warfare in the 1990s, and IAI had sold them worldwide. The company, closely linked to Israel’s government and often staffed by former air force officers, added something called a Tactical Heron in 2019 and the Heron MK II in 2020. It also had the “Super Heron,” rolled out in 2014, along with a class of small tactical UAVs called Bird Eye.486 Launched from a truck or mechanism, it was like similar drones such as the American ScanEagle.

What was IAI’s vision for the future? Like most companies, it sold UAVs as a system, with several UAVs and a control station.487 The company had around twenty countries using its Herons and thirty other users worldwide. In contrast to the American way of using “pilots,” Israelis were training “operators.” This is an important distinction, because modern technology enabled the drones to take off and return to base automatically. The plane can fly itself, so you fly the mission only. This had come a long way from the old Scout, with its 2.5 hours of flying time and range of 150 kilometers, flown with knobs and joysticks. As with most drone manufacturers, the view of the future was not of redesigning the whole airplane but adding more capabilities to it like sensors, optics, and devices. Every maker of big drones was aware that there probably won’t be another F-35, so their drones may be called upon to do much of what the F-35s are currently doing.

The Israeli concept of UAVs, focusing more on missions than on pilots and platforms, was clear from a round of interviews I did in the spring and summer of 2020 with all of Israel’s major drone manufacturers. At Elbit Systems, a line of Hermes drones were being tailormade for different customers. One, the Elbit StarLiner, would be certified to fly in civilian airspace in Europe. The StarLiner has the same look as a Predator, the bulbous nose with radar and long wings.488 This was the next drone revolution, to have them everywhere, including at civilian airports, including doing homeland security, or maritime missions to save sailors. Elbit, for instance, is working with Thales in the UK on its Watchkeeper drones, based on the Hermes 450, used in Afghanistan.

“We’re not going to replace dogfights,” a former Israeli pilot said to me. That’s the reality. It’s more about integrating more “sensors” into these aircraft. Because Israeli fighter pilots are often involved in work with these drones, they know what needs to go in them.

Aeronautics, which sells to some seventy-five clients in fifty-six countries, also makes a line of Israeli UAVs.

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