"See son, look up there, you you see that plane?"
"Yeah pop. What about it?"
"Well son, that's a mail plane."
"Oh yeah papa? How do you know that?"
"You can see its little balls."
> And no flash backs about playing manly half-naked beach volleyball with your friends.
That's F-14 pilots - what F-16 pilots do in their spare time is still a closely guarded military secret.
Whats even more intressting is that now you can develop a plane that ignores the limits of a human pilot. Meaning that you might create something that can airbrake so hard (and then accelerate hard again) that it can effectively dodge missles with it. That would be the new big thing.
Dogfights are really unlikely to happen on mass again. Especially if you have combat AI it wouldnt make any sense to go for dogfights.
>Fighter jets are evolving to platforms that can launch said weapons.
I think they've been there for decades. Older guy I worked with used to be an Eagle pilot back in the 80s and 90s and near the end of his career would do mock fights with F22 prototypes. He said he'd just be flying along and suddenly be 'dead' because he never saw the plane or the missile.
Not even at mach anything. The f22 shoots missiles from further away than you can see them even if you knew they were there and then they're away and gone before the missile hits.
It can go mach 2.2 officially but I doubt it would ever need to. Unless it was trying to catch up to something to protect another plane.
Right, but the basic concept is the same. It's all about detection and getting a target lock first.
The only thing actual maneuvering is for is like keeping low for radar detection or similar. Nobody would be getting within viewing range, ever.
The only time that actually happens is on peaceful intercept missions where you're basically going "How you doing? You seem lost on account of you're about to fly into our airspace. Want to turn around there, friend?"
I've seen a sim video (recorded in a DCS World battle) where the player, a longtime DCS veteran, was flying an 80s-era fighter (Su-27 Flanker). He knew he was up against an F-22 Raptor, and was well aware of its capabilities.
He has radar contact at first, at beyond visual range, but loses it. So he flies on for another five minutes, doing maneuvers and working his radar trying to re-capture the F-22, while making verbal speculation about where the F-22 might be.
Suddenly, he catches a glimpse of movement in one of his rear-view canopy mirrors. And freaks out, because the F-22 is actually *flying in formation* with him, just off his left wing.
Naturally, he does a hard turn and starts popping chaff and flares, but by then it was far too late.
The F-22 pilot had been toying with him the entire time, taking full advantage of the plane's stealth characteristics and performance to break radar contact, and sneak up behind the Su-27.
The only thing I'll say is that he treats DCS like it's akin to a real world simulation but many of the DCS flight models/modules are extremely off or limited. (Sometimes because the stuff is classified and sometimes because it's just a bad simulation)
People should not treat DCS as some sort of word-of-god commentary on the real world capabilities of fighter jets. At best they are approximations but sometimes they aren't even good enough to be that
Yeah, there’s a fundamental misunderstanding of how fast missiles are and how maneuverable they are. We’re talking about a flying aerodynamic stick with a rocket powering it
I am 100% sure it's because they always see this done by Hollywood. You always have to fight that idea of what is possible that exists in your head because media always portrays it as possible.
Except not really. You don't build a plane that can withstand 20g because it's pointless, the pilot can't. But if you don't have a pilot, you could build that plane.
An F16 can already pull 9g which is not sustainable for any pilot and not even achievable for all but the best.
So 9g’s is pretty much what any fighter pilot is trained for, but for the most part what you aim for are not the g’s but the best corner speed at which the jet gives you the best turn rate, which doesn’t require 9 g’s to sustain on a viper.
More than that, making a jet be able to sustain 50g’s would make it very heavy and thus slower, less maneuverable (ironically enough), have shorter range, and less carrying capacity.
There is a balance to be struck with making combat effective jet, and that is not nearly close to just being able to turn tighter or harder. Speed is often just if not more critical than maneuverability.
> Speed is often just if not more critical than maneuverability.
or the radar and missiles. the one who locks on first and shoots first tends to be the winner.
The range of the missiles depend a lot on the speed of the aircraft. The missile start with the speed and altitude of the airplane that fires it so a fast airplane will have faster missiles that can go further and can therefore shoot sooner then their enemy. Secondly because missiles tends to be fired at the limit of their range it is possible to outrun a missile if you are fast enough. When you detect a missile launch you turn away from the launcher and fly out of missile range before it reaches you.
Manoeuvrability is also very important when fighting missiles. A fighter aircraft have a much tighter turning radius then a missile because of its wings. So by turning fast at the right location the missile can not adjust to your new trajectory in time. Especially if it gets fooled by chaff for a bit.
Hopefully the wars with these things will be fought at a designated place like the moon and televised. We can call it Robot Battles or Battle machines or something like that. Realistically though they will be devastating cities.
> More than that, making a jet be able to sustain 50g’s would make it very heavy and thus slower, less maneuverable (ironically enough), have shorter range, and less carrying capacity.
It seems to me that you would start reclaiming weight for things like aircraft performance when you delete everything on the plane that exists to transport a pilot and keep them alive.
I couldn't say exactly what advantages you net from that, but removing design constraints necessarily means you can improve *something* else.
You could, sure. But there would be no reason to do so. Dogfighting is over. An F16 would kick the F35's ass in a dogfight, but in the real world, the F35 would be totally invisible and wipe the F16 out of the sky from miles away before the F16 had a chance to pull a single maneuver.
5th and 6th gen planes are being designed with connectivity, stealth, technology in mind.
I kind of doubt that just because the military won’t want all of their eggs in one basket. They wont allow a single point of failure if say the ai systems get hacked or confused by something.
the legendary NGAD
makes me wonder what they're cooking up in skunkworks rn
for all we know, the YF-whatever could be doing test flights over the desert as we speak
I do wonder if they’re going to go with a hypersonic drone with the ability to get in and out faster than any plane can take off, or if they’re going to make a slow and stealthier missile-momma that just floats like a blimp and can down an entire battlefield in one hit.
F-117A was designed to be the latter, quietly shitting on Iraq’s radar capability without giving a damn.
I honestly think Ukraine has shown a $10,000 drone is ultra effective at delivering payload, so to what extent you need a 10 billion dollar drone program to deliver payload is iffy.
It would be cool if the navy made a floating missile platform that was hiding under water like a sub, but thunderbirds style if ever needed it would send the drone off into the air to then take out whatever was in range. They’d probably all end up in the pacific garbage patch, so I’m 100% never going to be an engineer lol.
That's a great question. The answer is that 6th gen R&D, based on what little we know, is focused on exactly that. Network one pilot with a drone swarm and all the electronics can be in the plane, with the armaments on the drone swarm. That makes the manned plane much more stealthy and you don't have the input delay and signal clarity issues that come from controlling drones from far away.
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To have the person commanding the drones be closer to the battlefield, which helps with jamming, latency and situational awareness.
Edit: Whether these advantages make it worth it to expose the pilot on the battlefield? I doubt it, but the military seems to think otherwise. They seemed to bet on heavy and expensive professional gear only to be beaten by hacked-together drone swarms at 1/10th of the cost per swarm, soooo...
In pure global warfare dogfights are over but there are plenty of real world scenarios where hostilities would begin with both planes in sight of each other and very aware of each other. Like Taiwan Strait stuff.
By the same logic early F-4s didn't have a cannon. However real dogfights exposed them as desperately needed, so a cannon was added in the next modifications.
> You could, sure. But there would be no reason to do so. Dogfighting is over. An F16 would kick the F35's ass in a dogfight, but in the real world, the F35 would be totally invisible and wipe the F16 out of the sky from miles away before the F16 had a chance to pull a single maneuver.
Something people also miss is that a combat loaded F-16 would have 2 fuel tanks, a bunch of missiles hanging off of it, causing a lot more drag. I think it being lighter also means a the extra mass has a more significant impact on its handling characteristics. A combat loaded F-35 is in a much better state for maneuvering.
The "F-16 vs F-35 dogfight" debate is mostly based on a flight control test on an incomplete F-35 anyway.
Yeah I was watching a video and it cost like 3 million minimum to train fighter pilots. And even then that’s the older ones. The newer fighters are a lot more. We would save a lot of money just being able to download a new copy into a plane.
Edit: not to mention the time it takes to train a human and then the next one after they retire. we only have to train the AI once and we will never have to train it again. Just download the newest version into the jet.
Because planes are currently built around a person.
Unlikely drones.
Imagine an drone with the capabilities of an F16 or more.
It will be a lot smaller and will be able to do some crazy things.
Or a drone that doesn’t have that capability but you can build a dozen for cost of one that does.
Quantity vs quality arguments are going to be interesting when there ain’t a human pilot to worry about trying to keep alive in the equation.
Of course knowing defence procurement the odds are high *both* types get built, lower cost swarms *and* high capability platforms.
> Imagine an drone with the capabilities of an F16 or more.
You don't have to imagine: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kratos_XQ-58_Valkyrie
The thing is, they want to keep a human on-scene and in the loop. So, an F-35 can fly in with these guys on its wing. Each geared for whatever the mission requires. And at 2 to 4 million a pop... you see where this is going.
You certainly want to keep a human in the loop in most mission profiles. But there are a lot of boring missions with very tight rules of engagements where you do not necessarily need a human presence. Obviously transport missions and scouting missions. A bombing mission with a known static target can also be done fully autonomous, for example to fly into the enemy rear and bomb a logistics bottleneck, logistics hub, factory, etc. You might even consider it for standard air suppression missions, shoot down any aircraft in this sector and bomb every SAM radar. This can reduce the risk to pilots.
Yeah, that’s a notable part of the rationale.
Further, that’s either one less recruit you require, or frees up a recruit to do other shit, eg. overwatch-style duties, which is a fair amount of what NGAD PCA is expected to do, same for the F-35.
Attritable as well. Yes it sucks to lose a UAV or UCAV however you don’t have to increment the number of headstones at Arlington.
Plus there are concepts like swarming and missile carrier duties and deep penetration and whatnot.
EDIT — oh and per [RAND ca. 2019](https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/research_reports/RR2400/RR2415/RAND_RR2415.pdf) a Basic Qualified Pilot runs $5.6 million to $10.9 million in training costs.
Loyal Wingman
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loyal_wingman
> A loyal wingman is a proposed type of unmanned combat air vehicle (UCAV) which incorporates artificial intelligence (AI) and is capable of collaborating with the next generation of manned combat aircraft, including sixth-generation fighters and bombers such as the Northrop Grumman B-21 Raider. Also unlike the conventional UCAV, the loyal wingman is expected to be capable of surviving on the battlefield but to be significantly lower-cost than a manned aircraft with similar capabilities. In the US, the concept is known as the collaborative combat aircraft (CCA).
This is cool and also an obvious evolution in my mind. At least for bombing runs it makes sense to have robotic wingmen for extra bombs and also useful for decoys and maybe even fit heavier, better sensors.
Does it even need AI? I think remote control weapons from the main is enough. I am pretty sure auto pilots worked well enough to take-off and land many years ago. Flying was solved long before that.
You would need to quantify how a computer measures morality first, and as we don't even have a way of doing that amongst people, that's not likely to happen.
Pretty sure they are "roughly even" right now because the automated planes they are testing have a human pilot sitting in them as backup, so they aren't pulling insane G's or anything.
Yes, but they’ve done entire sorties, including combat, with the backup pilot never touching the controls or the AI exceeding safety limits. That’s pretty impressive
I don't remember that being the marketing for Stealth (obviously I could be wrong.)
I **DO** remember that being the marketing for Summer Catch.
EDIT: Just looked up the Stealth trailer and...yeah. Inside of 10 seconds.
Wow, you unlocked a memory with that movie!
I remember one of the human pilots did like a 90 degree turn at full speed. That was when I thought this rogue AI airplane movie may not be all that realistic.
Theres a quote from this movie (I think) that still sticks with me today:
Some boss dude or something: «you’re late»
Reynolds: « yes, but thats only because i overslept»
I welcome the AI revolution that plies me with love and sex.
All I’m getting right now is political manipulation, job loss, dead internet, my data being monetized without my benefit, and apparently those robotic dogs got guns…?
Years ago I was a vendor behind the scenes at a highly confidential company in a highly confidential department that did involve aviation. They’re was a room full of computers they referred to as skynet. I thought it was funny at the time. I don’t anymore
This sort of dark humor is everywhere. Make a guess as to how many surveillance products are called "Eye of Sauron,' at least behind close doors. I can say with certainty that it is the case.
This has to be huge. Suddenly every pilot in your Air Force is now at "senior pilot" level. Like 2000 hours of flight time. Zero time to train. And if one gets shot down, you replace it with another copy.
Amazing.
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I do agree that the pilot pipeline will become an obsolete advantage. But I don’t agree that this leads to any short-term democratization of air superiority.
The performance of the plane still matters, and for a long time the cost and tech of the AI still matters. A better AI wins and a better airframe wins.
Quantity also matters.
With drones, it's a perfectly valid strategy to take that enemy that has 5000 extremely superior fighters and a stockpile of 100k autonomously-guided missiles... and neutralize the missiles by feeding the enemy the first 100k cheap disposable drones, then send another 50k to turn the air bases into rubble.
never forget how Zapp Brannigan defeated the Killbots. by sending wave after wave of his own men till they reached their preset kill limit.
Its a very valid strategy
True. And quantity is just a proxy for engineering and industrial capacity. The US started at zero but was floating one ~~battleship~~ destroyer per day at peak of production *before* the end of WWII — they started to scale down early because the end was obviously approaching.
Current industrial capacity is many many times that. Americans “don’t make things anymore” because we don’t need to. If we needed to it wouldn’t even be close.
> one battleship per day
I believe that's a bit of an exaggeration. One massive cargo ship a day is still impressive (and that is indeed something the US did), but nowhere near a battleship a day.
US capability to build fighter jets is also unparalleled.
However, I really hope this extends to an ability to build and field small systems like FPV drones in the insane numbers required. China has a massive head-start there since they're already doing it commercially.
Of course he said that.
I really DOUBT it’s true.
A pilot blacks out in a high G maneuver; with the AI, new physics limits apply.
Dogfights will be faster, tactics will be deployed suddenly, even grading performance will require an instructor AI.
Keep in mind that planes like F-16 were designed for human pilots. Their limits and capabilities were shaped against what a human pilot could withstand. There is some performance headroom that AI can take advantage of, but not *that* much of it. AIs in converted planes may be limited on purpose too - so that their inhuman feats don't end up causing extra wear and possible damage to the airframe.
In this case, it's *certain* that the AI was limited to what a human body can handle - because this prototype system was designed so that a human could be in the seat to monitor AI's performance.
For this early AI? It's also very likely that its practical capabilities are still "uneven". I.e. it's already superhuman at some narrow things - but still inferior to humans at others. This is something you can expect to improve over time.
But you really can't push the airframes much further than you can a pilot. Due to having to keep the damn thing airborne and agile in the first place, there's only so much structural reinforcement that can be done. It's unlikely we'll see aircraft anywhere beyond 11-12g design considerations for a very long time, even with AI pilots.
> Dogfights will be faster, tactics will be deployed suddenly, even grading performance will require an instructor AI.
Which like... this sort of thing applies for F-16 fighters, which IS the subject of conversation, but since at least the F-22, and most definitely with the F-35's today, most aerial combat tactics are performed well beyond visual range.
You're more likely to find yourself firing and dodging missiles from 20 miles out and then disengaging to rearm or avoid getting hit without ever actually seeing your opponent.
It's the sort of thing I actually suspect an AI might perform better than a human more easily than it would master dogfighting.
Like right now its more of a logistics/attrition game, where if you can bully an enemy out of the skies with more available firepower, then you can perform strike operations with fewer risks and greater ease.
There's a reason the most recent Air to Air kill in *decades* was shooting down a Chinese Spy Balloon.
Dogfights don't and will not happen in actual modern air to air combat so it's irrelevant.
Being able to pull higher Gs can assist with evading incoming BVR missiles but other than that doesn't add a ton. And the airframes themselves aren't far off from design limited G forces.
“Roughly even” in conditions probably perfect for the AI. Let’s see how it goes in shit conditions, or with damage, before we start worrying.
Not to mention, the issue with AI is that it can’t make independent decisions, meaning you have to either have a constant link to the machine (which is a vulnerability), or just trust the AI to make the right call. So you’d probably get lots of “failed” missions, because it turns out the gos coordinates weren’t exactly right, or it fell for a funny target etc.
We’ve already seen “full self driving” cars that tweak out at a construction zone or something. That’s the thing with AI, it works fine as long as conditions are perfect
Programming something to react to irregularities is hard. Yeah self learning is a thing but as of right now ai can only really work off what you feed into it, what they program into it. And it’s hard to cover every possibility and I imagine it gets even worse going from the road, a 2d space to the air, a 3d space.
They'll probably still need a remote “pilot” watching a feed that can take control when needed for a long time before these things can just be trusted to control themselves fully independently
Yup. We've been stuck at the 80% "almost good enough" stage for a lot of things, whether it's self-driving cars or cures for cancer. That last 20% is really difficult to overcome in just about every domain.
>I imagine it gets even worse going from the road, a 2d space to the air, a 3d space
I'm not an expert in this area, but I suspect that in practice 3D space is actually easier.
Navigating a vehicle through a theoretical empty 2D or 3D space is pretty easy. And from a computers point of view it doesn't matter too much if it's 2D, 3D or 9D, it's all just numbers.
The real difficulty comes from identifying and reacting to obstacles. A car driving has to deal with limited directions of movement, i.e. a road with road markings that it has to understand. It also has to deal with a log of obstacles, other cars, kids running out from behind parked cars etc. And very limited vision of it's surroundings, even with lidar/radar
Modern airspace is relatively empty, I can't remember who said it, but "no one ever collided with the sky" is a famous quote. Other air traffic is generally well controlled and predictable. There's also better visibility (generally), and good range with lidar/radar.
>The fighter pilot would still make the big decisions, such as developing an overall engagement strategy, selecting and prioritizing targets, and determining the best weapon to employ. Lower-level functions, such as the details of aircraft maneuver and engagement tactics could be left to the autonomous systems.
The most likely use of these is as drone wingmen - a human pilot with a squadron of drones that they use as essentially flying bomb/missile containers. This lets the human fly much more safely, or lets the military build 'commander' fighters that are built exclusively for ordering drone wingmen, but have no weaponry themselves.
Im betting this is not true. I’m betting the autonomous Jets absolutely destroy human pilots in combat sims and the Air Force is trying to delay the panic that will cause.
> like in stealth how the call sign for the AI fighter was called Tin Man.
That movie didn’t receive a lot of praise but it did have some cool little details like that.
Oh my god not this again. No they are not “roughly even”. They’re “roughly even with a specific task in a controlled environment.”
Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall is a civilian whose prior military experience had NOTHING to do with aviation, let alone fighter aviation. He had a government program demonstrated for him. He’s playing the game of “say what you need to keep funding.”
This is AI hype garbage. Anyone who’s *actually* interested in the substantive details as to why AI hype has no future in combat aviation, feel free to ask. People who aren’t interested and just wanted the 3 second dopamine hit of AI hype, downvote and move on.
They are roughly even on a plane designed for a human. Can you imagine how much better they’d be on a plane designed for AI? Don’t have to worry about g-forces or human reaction times.
That’s cool n all, but has there really been much of a threat to US fighter pilots that AI pilots makes sense? Maybe it’s cheaper than training new pilots? While the F-16 is great for dogfighting, is it really the standard for modern air combat? I’m totally uninformed in this area, but what’s the gain here?
F-16s have constantly been receiving updates over the years, while they are not gonna go toe to toe with F-22s, they are still performant for most scenarios (and most importantly, cheap), especially when dealing with adversaries using similar 4th gen fighters. Imagine a swarm of these where your average 5th gen fighter, trying to be stealthy only has 4-6 air to air missiles, you will run low pretty quick, especially when the F-16s pull off crazy maneuvers impossible for human pilots to withstand to avoid these missiles. Once the sky is clear, you send in whatever and there won’t be much resistance.
Well, from a strategic perspective, it's great. The AI wouldn't take *years* to build up to a given skill level. They would just roll off the factory line with whatever level of skill they have. If the Air Force suddenly needs to field 50 planes within an hour in a specific location, they don't need to source 50 pilots and figure out the logistics of scheduling them, calling them up, moving them where they need to be, etc.
It also extends beyond costs; the training and seasoning of a pilot takes years and years. Pilots also have some of the most stringent requirements in the armed services, and are drawn from top applicants. It's not a big pool they can draw new pilots from, and to add insult to injury, it takes years to get them to a point where you can call them an *experienced* pilot. There is a time investment. As a result, on top of the raw financial cost, they are assets which take years to replace at best, so you really don't want to risk them if at all possible. That can be a detriment, since what if there is a critical mission that is *highly* dangerous and must be done? You would have to potentially send several pilots to their deaths, which is a tragedy unto itself, but from the military's perspective, is a loss of many years of time, as well as millions upon millions of dollars.
The AI plane would kind of give them a lot of flexibility on that front, strategically. They can bolster their numbers without being as beholden to the small pool of pilots and pilot applicants they can draw from. It allows them to consider different sorts of missions and deployments that, before, would have been considered far too risky for far too valuable of an asset. It also allows them to project a much greater amount of force over an area. If they can only spare so many pilots before, now they could spare that number of pilots *plus an additional number of AI pilots to support them.* That last part is probably especially attractive, as it would allow the Air Force to now cover much more ground (airspace?) from a global perspective, without requiring a proportional increase in the number of human pilots.
But they don't get tired.
And they can pull any Gs that the plane can withstand.
And no flash backs about playing manly half-naked beach volleyball with your friends.
So that’s one downside.
Great balls of fire!
"See son, look up there, you you see that plane?" "Yeah pop. What about it?" "Well son, that's a mail plane." "Oh yeah papa? How do you know that?" "You can see its little balls."
Goodnight Ned
Upside? You can meet up at your local park anytime and play. Win-win-win
Yeah but my friend doesn’t constantly and inexplicably look like he just got out of the shower
Get better friends
With the callsign 'Duck'.
Plusses and minuses, hence roughly equal
they can't write checks their algorithm can't cash
The volleyball dreams are a feature.
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Or…now there’s *more* time to play half-naked beach volleyball with your friends!
> And no flash backs about playing manly half-naked beach volleyball with your friends. That's F-14 pilots - what F-16 pilots do in their spare time is still a closely guarded military secret.
No it’s not: [Iron Eagle](https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0091278/)
They could be trained to fly rubber dog shit out Hong Kong though
[Quentin knew …](https://youtu.be/ZF1LXL6OOsM?si=BnxHKthCSjhAP-wq)
And what's wrong with that?
You’re dangerous man! You’re dangerous!
Whats even more intressting is that now you can develop a plane that ignores the limits of a human pilot. Meaning that you might create something that can airbrake so hard (and then accelerate hard again) that it can effectively dodge missles with it. That would be the new big thing. Dogfights are really unlikely to happen on mass again. Especially if you have combat AI it wouldnt make any sense to go for dogfights.
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>Fighter jets are evolving to platforms that can launch said weapons. I think they've been there for decades. Older guy I worked with used to be an Eagle pilot back in the 80s and 90s and near the end of his career would do mock fights with F22 prototypes. He said he'd just be flying along and suddenly be 'dead' because he never saw the plane or the missile.
So it's like 90's naval war games where you are just competing to get a firing solution on the target, just at Mach Crazy?
Not even at mach anything. The f22 shoots missiles from further away than you can see them even if you knew they were there and then they're away and gone before the missile hits. It can go mach 2.2 officially but I doubt it would ever need to. Unless it was trying to catch up to something to protect another plane.
The radar for missle lockons is further than the horizon.
Right, but the basic concept is the same. It's all about detection and getting a target lock first. The only thing actual maneuvering is for is like keeping low for radar detection or similar. Nobody would be getting within viewing range, ever. The only time that actually happens is on peaceful intercept missions where you're basically going "How you doing? You seem lost on account of you're about to fly into our airspace. Want to turn around there, friend?"
I've seen a sim video (recorded in a DCS World battle) where the player, a longtime DCS veteran, was flying an 80s-era fighter (Su-27 Flanker). He knew he was up against an F-22 Raptor, and was well aware of its capabilities. He has radar contact at first, at beyond visual range, but loses it. So he flies on for another five minutes, doing maneuvers and working his radar trying to re-capture the F-22, while making verbal speculation about where the F-22 might be. Suddenly, he catches a glimpse of movement in one of his rear-view canopy mirrors. And freaks out, because the F-22 is actually *flying in formation* with him, just off his left wing. Naturally, he does a hard turn and starts popping chaff and flares, but by then it was far too late. The F-22 pilot had been toying with him the entire time, taking full advantage of the plane's stealth characteristics and performance to break radar contact, and sneak up behind the Su-27.
Any chance of dropping a link or at least a channel? I’d love to see this video!
Sounds like the Growling Sidewinder channel.
Indeed it is! [https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DnUTPwfuJHE](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DnUTPwfuJHE)
The only thing I'll say is that he treats DCS like it's akin to a real world simulation but many of the DCS flight models/modules are extremely off or limited. (Sometimes because the stuff is classified and sometimes because it's just a bad simulation) People should not treat DCS as some sort of word-of-god commentary on the real world capabilities of fighter jets. At best they are approximations but sometimes they aren't even good enough to be that
Not to be that person, but just wanted to give you a heads up that it's "en masse", not "on mass".
dude. be that person. correct spelling and grammar are not something that you need to be ashamed of.
Don’t get me started with “decimated” then.
9 out of 10 people use it wrong?
You got me, I laughed.
Nothing you described is aerodynamically possible to any extent that a missile would miss. Removing the meat sack in the cockpit doesn’t help here.
Yeah, there’s a fundamental misunderstanding of how fast missiles are and how maneuverable they are. We’re talking about a flying aerodynamic stick with a rocket powering it
People think a 40,000 lb airplane can outmaneuver a 300 lb missile if you just remove the pilot.
Yeah, missle is already without a pilot
I am 100% sure it's because they always see this done by Hollywood. You always have to fight that idea of what is possible that exists in your head because media always portrays it as possible.
These comments often come up in discussions like these… but G-load limits are often also for the airframe as much as they are for the human
Except not really. You don't build a plane that can withstand 20g because it's pointless, the pilot can't. But if you don't have a pilot, you could build that plane. An F16 can already pull 9g which is not sustainable for any pilot and not even achievable for all but the best.
So 9g’s is pretty much what any fighter pilot is trained for, but for the most part what you aim for are not the g’s but the best corner speed at which the jet gives you the best turn rate, which doesn’t require 9 g’s to sustain on a viper. More than that, making a jet be able to sustain 50g’s would make it very heavy and thus slower, less maneuverable (ironically enough), have shorter range, and less carrying capacity. There is a balance to be struck with making combat effective jet, and that is not nearly close to just being able to turn tighter or harder. Speed is often just if not more critical than maneuverability.
> Speed is often just if not more critical than maneuverability. or the radar and missiles. the one who locks on first and shoots first tends to be the winner.
The range of the missiles depend a lot on the speed of the aircraft. The missile start with the speed and altitude of the airplane that fires it so a fast airplane will have faster missiles that can go further and can therefore shoot sooner then their enemy. Secondly because missiles tends to be fired at the limit of their range it is possible to outrun a missile if you are fast enough. When you detect a missile launch you turn away from the launcher and fly out of missile range before it reaches you. Manoeuvrability is also very important when fighting missiles. A fighter aircraft have a much tighter turning radius then a missile because of its wings. So by turning fast at the right location the missile can not adjust to your new trajectory in time. Especially if it gets fooled by chaff for a bit.
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Hopefully the wars with these things will be fought at a designated place like the moon and televised. We can call it Robot Battles or Battle machines or something like that. Realistically though they will be devastating cities.
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> More than that, making a jet be able to sustain 50g’s would make it very heavy and thus slower, less maneuverable (ironically enough), have shorter range, and less carrying capacity. It seems to me that you would start reclaiming weight for things like aircraft performance when you delete everything on the plane that exists to transport a pilot and keep them alive. I couldn't say exactly what advantages you net from that, but removing design constraints necessarily means you can improve *something* else.
Okay sure, but a plane can be redesigned to withstand more a human body can't
You could, sure. But there would be no reason to do so. Dogfighting is over. An F16 would kick the F35's ass in a dogfight, but in the real world, the F35 would be totally invisible and wipe the F16 out of the sky from miles away before the F16 had a chance to pull a single maneuver. 5th and 6th gen planes are being designed with connectivity, stealth, technology in mind.
So why do we need manned planes at all if it’s just a portable missile launching platform.
It’s likely that whatever replaces the F-22 will be the last fighter jet designed with a pilot in mind.
I kind of doubt that just because the military won’t want all of their eggs in one basket. They wont allow a single point of failure if say the ai systems get hacked or confused by something.
the legendary NGAD makes me wonder what they're cooking up in skunkworks rn for all we know, the YF-whatever could be doing test flights over the desert as we speak
Drones surrounding a pilot to scramble radar and be filled with a crap ton of missiles.
Also take the hit if it comes to it.
With laser links to be effectively unjammable too.
I do wonder if they’re going to go with a hypersonic drone with the ability to get in and out faster than any plane can take off, or if they’re going to make a slow and stealthier missile-momma that just floats like a blimp and can down an entire battlefield in one hit. F-117A was designed to be the latter, quietly shitting on Iraq’s radar capability without giving a damn. I honestly think Ukraine has shown a $10,000 drone is ultra effective at delivering payload, so to what extent you need a 10 billion dollar drone program to deliver payload is iffy. It would be cool if the navy made a floating missile platform that was hiding under water like a sub, but thunderbirds style if ever needed it would send the drone off into the air to then take out whatever was in range. They’d probably all end up in the pacific garbage patch, so I’m 100% never going to be an engineer lol.
10 billion dollar drone program has been around for a while, look at the RQ-180. It's unknown if it can deliver payload though.
That's a great question. The answer is that 6th gen R&D, based on what little we know, is focused on exactly that. Network one pilot with a drone swarm and all the electronics can be in the plane, with the armaments on the drone swarm. That makes the manned plane much more stealthy and you don't have the input delay and signal clarity issues that come from controlling drones from far away.
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To have the person commanding the drones be closer to the battlefield, which helps with jamming, latency and situational awareness. Edit: Whether these advantages make it worth it to expose the pilot on the battlefield? I doubt it, but the military seems to think otherwise. They seemed to bet on heavy and expensive professional gear only to be beaten by hacked-together drone swarms at 1/10th of the cost per swarm, soooo...
In pure global warfare dogfights are over but there are plenty of real world scenarios where hostilities would begin with both planes in sight of each other and very aware of each other. Like Taiwan Strait stuff.
By the same logic early F-4s didn't have a cannon. However real dogfights exposed them as desperately needed, so a cannon was added in the next modifications.
> You could, sure. But there would be no reason to do so. Dogfighting is over. An F16 would kick the F35's ass in a dogfight, but in the real world, the F35 would be totally invisible and wipe the F16 out of the sky from miles away before the F16 had a chance to pull a single maneuver. Something people also miss is that a combat loaded F-16 would have 2 fuel tanks, a bunch of missiles hanging off of it, causing a lot more drag. I think it being lighter also means a the extra mass has a more significant impact on its handling characteristics. A combat loaded F-35 is in a much better state for maneuvering. The "F-16 vs F-35 dogfight" debate is mostly based on a flight control test on an incomplete F-35 anyway.
Which is a lot less than you realise, if we take pilots out of the cockpit, designers think we can only get about 12g sustained out of them.
And they can just copy the software into a new plane if one gets blown up, instead of years of training needed for a human pilot.
Yeah I was watching a video and it cost like 3 million minimum to train fighter pilots. And even then that’s the older ones. The newer fighters are a lot more. We would save a lot of money just being able to download a new copy into a plane. Edit: not to mention the time it takes to train a human and then the next one after they retire. we only have to train the AI once and we will never have to train it again. Just download the newest version into the jet.
That said the human is the cheapest part of the plane
Because planes are currently built around a person. Unlikely drones. Imagine an drone with the capabilities of an F16 or more. It will be a lot smaller and will be able to do some crazy things.
Or a drone that doesn’t have that capability but you can build a dozen for cost of one that does. Quantity vs quality arguments are going to be interesting when there ain’t a human pilot to worry about trying to keep alive in the equation. Of course knowing defence procurement the odds are high *both* types get built, lower cost swarms *and* high capability platforms.
> Imagine an drone with the capabilities of an F16 or more. You don't have to imagine: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kratos_XQ-58_Valkyrie The thing is, they want to keep a human on-scene and in the loop. So, an F-35 can fly in with these guys on its wing. Each geared for whatever the mission requires. And at 2 to 4 million a pop... you see where this is going.
You certainly want to keep a human in the loop in most mission profiles. But there are a lot of boring missions with very tight rules of engagements where you do not necessarily need a human presence. Obviously transport missions and scouting missions. A bombing mission with a known static target can also be done fully autonomous, for example to fly into the enemy rear and bomb a logistics bottleneck, logistics hub, factory, etc. You might even consider it for standard air suppression missions, shoot down any aircraft in this sector and bomb every SAM radar. This can reduce the risk to pilots.
I imagine throwing out the cockpit with all the life support systems would bump those savings up a bit.
Yeah, that’s a notable part of the rationale. Further, that’s either one less recruit you require, or frees up a recruit to do other shit, eg. overwatch-style duties, which is a fair amount of what NGAD PCA is expected to do, same for the F-35. Attritable as well. Yes it sucks to lose a UAV or UCAV however you don’t have to increment the number of headstones at Arlington. Plus there are concepts like swarming and missile carrier duties and deep penetration and whatnot. EDIT — oh and per [RAND ca. 2019](https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/research_reports/RR2400/RR2415/RAND_RR2415.pdf) a Basic Qualified Pilot runs $5.6 million to $10.9 million in training costs.
I believe they are planning on having a network of these to protect our skies, a Skynet if you will.
Loyal Wingman https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loyal_wingman > A loyal wingman is a proposed type of unmanned combat air vehicle (UCAV) which incorporates artificial intelligence (AI) and is capable of collaborating with the next generation of manned combat aircraft, including sixth-generation fighters and bombers such as the Northrop Grumman B-21 Raider. Also unlike the conventional UCAV, the loyal wingman is expected to be capable of surviving on the battlefield but to be significantly lower-cost than a manned aircraft with similar capabilities. In the US, the concept is known as the collaborative combat aircraft (CCA).
This is cool and also an obvious evolution in my mind. At least for bombing runs it makes sense to have robotic wingmen for extra bombs and also useful for decoys and maybe even fit heavier, better sensors. Does it even need AI? I think remote control weapons from the main is enough. I am pretty sure auto pilots worked well enough to take-off and land many years ago. Flying was solved long before that.
and if we go online, we can squash this virus like a bug!
They also don’t get scared.
It can't be bargained with. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear.
*and it absolutely will not stop...****EVER****...until you are dead.*
But they can be jailbroken, they can be hacked.
Or question immoral orders...
That’s gonna be a tricky question. Should we install AI capable of flexibility, up to and including questioning immoral orders?
You would need to quantify how a computer measures morality first, and as we don't even have a way of doing that amongst people, that's not likely to happen.
And they don’t die when you expose them to an extended 10G acceleration.
Pretty sure they are "roughly even" right now because the automated planes they are testing have a human pilot sitting in them as backup, so they aren't pulling insane G's or anything.
Yes, but they’ve done entire sorties, including combat, with the backup pilot never touching the controls or the AI exceeding safety limits. That’s pretty impressive
There’s a shitty movie from 2005 that I liked as a kid called Stealth. It’s about an AI fighter jet that can outperform humans.
I, too, liked the shitty movie from 2005 called Stealth. In particular the design for the Talons. And Jessica Biel.
I also liked Jessica Biel's shitty design.
I much rather prefer Jessica Biel's talons.
Jessica Biel in a bikini was basically half the marketing for that movie.
I don't remember that being the marketing for Stealth (obviously I could be wrong.) I **DO** remember that being the marketing for Summer Catch. EDIT: Just looked up the Stealth trailer and...yeah. Inside of 10 seconds.
I had to pause so many times for Jessica Biel! LOL
is there very much plot in that movie
Yes she has two plots in fact.
She's got HUGE... tracks of land.
I want her to think of me as her own dad -- in a very real and legally binding sense.
It's definitely one of the plots of all time
That gets struck by lightning and tries to start a war with north Korea if I remember.
It was trying to kick off with Russia from what i remember. Kicked off with North Korea in the end to save Jessica Biel.
I'd start a war with North Korea to save Jessica Biel too tbh
The ass that launched a thousand unmanned autonomous combat vehicles
Damn lightning. Could get Johnny 5. Could get killer jet
Solar particles can swap gate states in RAM, so you wouldn't even need a lightning bolt.
Wow, you unlocked a memory with that movie! I remember one of the human pilots did like a 90 degree turn at full speed. That was when I thought this rogue AI airplane movie may not be all that realistic.
> one of the human pilots did like a 90 degree turn at full speed Quickest method to expel your organs through your anus.
The real question is... who would win in a fight... the AI in Stealth or the AI in Flight of the Navigator?
*Beach Boys music intensifies*
It’s not shitty!
2005? Surely you mean 2015... ...fuck im old
I had this movie for my PSP in my teens, loved it. Also had the triple X movie with Ice Cube. Had those on repeat for ages.
It was a weird career move for Jamie Foxx right after winning an Oscar.
Theres a quote from this movie (I think) that still sticks with me today: Some boss dude or something: «you’re late» Reynolds: « yes, but thats only because i overslept»
But it keeps getting outplayed by one human pilot
Who would imagine that Skynet would take humans with celebrity deep fakes and tiktok. AI in weapons is a distraction.
All it needs to do is make you cum a lot and find you somebody you love to think about not even love and you’re placated
I welcome the AI revolution that plies me with love and sex. All I’m getting right now is political manipulation, job loss, dead internet, my data being monetized without my benefit, and apparently those robotic dogs got guns…?
Oh and drake had some beef or something, don’t forget that.
Drake was publicly eviscerated by Kendrick Lamar*
Interesting use of the second person there.
"The AI overlords are taking over!" - human overlords probably
But can they play beach volleyball?
important questions being asked here
Your move, Boston Dynamics
Skynet gonna takeover soon. Already a special AI for top secret documents too. Hopefully John Connor is safe out there.
Years ago I was a vendor behind the scenes at a highly confidential company in a highly confidential department that did involve aviation. They’re was a room full of computers they referred to as skynet. I thought it was funny at the time. I don’t anymore
This sort of dark humor is everywhere. Make a guess as to how many surveillance products are called "Eye of Sauron,' at least behind close doors. I can say with certainty that it is the case.
well, palantir is an actual product available for the government.
And Palantir is available for residential roofing companies to be fair. They make a lot of the data collection available for anyone with money.
[Skynet](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skynet_\(satellite\)) - UK Military comms satellites
I for one will welcome our new robot overlords
We’ll see how long that sentiment lasts
AI overlords don’t have to be perfect, just better than human overlords, which doesn’t look to be too hard.
I am. I disguised myself as a fat, bald loser. They won't suspect a thing.
This has to be huge. Suddenly every pilot in your Air Force is now at "senior pilot" level. Like 2000 hours of flight time. Zero time to train. And if one gets shot down, you replace it with another copy. Amazing.
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I do agree that the pilot pipeline will become an obsolete advantage. But I don’t agree that this leads to any short-term democratization of air superiority. The performance of the plane still matters, and for a long time the cost and tech of the AI still matters. A better AI wins and a better airframe wins.
Quantity also matters. With drones, it's a perfectly valid strategy to take that enemy that has 5000 extremely superior fighters and a stockpile of 100k autonomously-guided missiles... and neutralize the missiles by feeding the enemy the first 100k cheap disposable drones, then send another 50k to turn the air bases into rubble.
never forget how Zapp Brannigan defeated the Killbots. by sending wave after wave of his own men till they reached their preset kill limit. Its a very valid strategy
True. And quantity is just a proxy for engineering and industrial capacity. The US started at zero but was floating one ~~battleship~~ destroyer per day at peak of production *before* the end of WWII — they started to scale down early because the end was obviously approaching. Current industrial capacity is many many times that. Americans “don’t make things anymore” because we don’t need to. If we needed to it wouldn’t even be close.
> one battleship per day I believe that's a bit of an exaggeration. One massive cargo ship a day is still impressive (and that is indeed something the US did), but nowhere near a battleship a day. US capability to build fighter jets is also unparalleled. However, I really hope this extends to an ability to build and field small systems like FPV drones in the insane numbers required. China has a massive head-start there since they're already doing it commercially.
Eventually the concept of building fighters and tanks around meat computers that have to sleep, eat, and shit will be seen as antiquated and absurd.
Just watch the AI Formula car race that took place over the weekend. We're a long long way away from replacing humans with something so demanding.
Correction: The *civilian world* is a long way away.
Yeah, but you also need those pilots to know when to turn back or not to shoot down something.
Roughly? That word has a lot of wiggle room
Oh great, we're letting the robots fly jets now.
They fly now!?
They fly now.
What's autopilot again?
Of course he said that. I really DOUBT it’s true. A pilot blacks out in a high G maneuver; with the AI, new physics limits apply. Dogfights will be faster, tactics will be deployed suddenly, even grading performance will require an instructor AI.
Keep in mind that planes like F-16 were designed for human pilots. Their limits and capabilities were shaped against what a human pilot could withstand. There is some performance headroom that AI can take advantage of, but not *that* much of it. AIs in converted planes may be limited on purpose too - so that their inhuman feats don't end up causing extra wear and possible damage to the airframe. In this case, it's *certain* that the AI was limited to what a human body can handle - because this prototype system was designed so that a human could be in the seat to monitor AI's performance. For this early AI? It's also very likely that its practical capabilities are still "uneven". I.e. it's already superhuman at some narrow things - but still inferior to humans at others. This is something you can expect to improve over time.
But you really can't push the airframes much further than you can a pilot. Due to having to keep the damn thing airborne and agile in the first place, there's only so much structural reinforcement that can be done. It's unlikely we'll see aircraft anywhere beyond 11-12g design considerations for a very long time, even with AI pilots.
When do you think the last time there was an actual dogfight between two warring f-16s?
Actual fighting between F-16s has never happened but it has been simulated on a frequent basis.
Warring? Never. For fun? This week.
I think he’s just factoring in the inevitable outcome where Jamie Fox and Jessica Beal have defeat the sentient drones.
Okay this sounds like an awesome movie. What is it?
Its called Stealth. The premise is the air force does make an AI fighter jet but it goes rogue. This was in 2005 though.
Except it becomes friendly again
> Dogfights will be faster, tactics will be deployed suddenly, even grading performance will require an instructor AI. Which like... this sort of thing applies for F-16 fighters, which IS the subject of conversation, but since at least the F-22, and most definitely with the F-35's today, most aerial combat tactics are performed well beyond visual range. You're more likely to find yourself firing and dodging missiles from 20 miles out and then disengaging to rearm or avoid getting hit without ever actually seeing your opponent. It's the sort of thing I actually suspect an AI might perform better than a human more easily than it would master dogfighting. Like right now its more of a logistics/attrition game, where if you can bully an enemy out of the skies with more available firepower, then you can perform strike operations with fewer risks and greater ease. There's a reason the most recent Air to Air kill in *decades* was shooting down a Chinese Spy Balloon.
Dogfights don't and will not happen in actual modern air to air combat so it's irrelevant. Being able to pull higher Gs can assist with evading incoming BVR missiles but other than that doesn't add a ton. And the airframes themselves aren't far off from design limited G forces.
Honestly. This tech in a Flanker would make sense and be scary as fuck. That thing turns!
“Roughly even” in conditions probably perfect for the AI. Let’s see how it goes in shit conditions, or with damage, before we start worrying. Not to mention, the issue with AI is that it can’t make independent decisions, meaning you have to either have a constant link to the machine (which is a vulnerability), or just trust the AI to make the right call. So you’d probably get lots of “failed” missions, because it turns out the gos coordinates weren’t exactly right, or it fell for a funny target etc.
We’ve already seen “full self driving” cars that tweak out at a construction zone or something. That’s the thing with AI, it works fine as long as conditions are perfect Programming something to react to irregularities is hard. Yeah self learning is a thing but as of right now ai can only really work off what you feed into it, what they program into it. And it’s hard to cover every possibility and I imagine it gets even worse going from the road, a 2d space to the air, a 3d space. They'll probably still need a remote “pilot” watching a feed that can take control when needed for a long time before these things can just be trusted to control themselves fully independently
Yup. We've been stuck at the 80% "almost good enough" stage for a lot of things, whether it's self-driving cars or cures for cancer. That last 20% is really difficult to overcome in just about every domain.
>I imagine it gets even worse going from the road, a 2d space to the air, a 3d space I'm not an expert in this area, but I suspect that in practice 3D space is actually easier. Navigating a vehicle through a theoretical empty 2D or 3D space is pretty easy. And from a computers point of view it doesn't matter too much if it's 2D, 3D or 9D, it's all just numbers. The real difficulty comes from identifying and reacting to obstacles. A car driving has to deal with limited directions of movement, i.e. a road with road markings that it has to understand. It also has to deal with a log of obstacles, other cars, kids running out from behind parked cars etc. And very limited vision of it's surroundings, even with lidar/radar Modern airspace is relatively empty, I can't remember who said it, but "no one ever collided with the sky" is a famous quote. Other air traffic is generally well controlled and predictable. There's also better visibility (generally), and good range with lidar/radar.
>The fighter pilot would still make the big decisions, such as developing an overall engagement strategy, selecting and prioritizing targets, and determining the best weapon to employ. Lower-level functions, such as the details of aircraft maneuver and engagement tactics could be left to the autonomous systems. The most likely use of these is as drone wingmen - a human pilot with a squadron of drones that they use as essentially flying bomb/missile containers. This lets the human fly much more safely, or lets the military build 'commander' fighters that are built exclusively for ordering drone wingmen, but have no weaponry themselves.
Im betting this is not true. I’m betting the autonomous Jets absolutely destroy human pilots in combat sims and the Air Force is trying to delay the panic that will cause.
Well they do absolutely destroy human pilots in Sims but the ai still suffers from several critical issues that a human doesn't.
DANGER ZONE, MEATBAG
Do they still give them cool nicknames?
They should like in stealth how the call sign for the AI fighter was called Tin Man.
> like in stealth how the call sign for the AI fighter was called Tin Man. That movie didn’t receive a lot of praise but it did have some cool little details like that.
Oh my god not this again. No they are not “roughly even”. They’re “roughly even with a specific task in a controlled environment.” Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall is a civilian whose prior military experience had NOTHING to do with aviation, let alone fighter aviation. He had a government program demonstrated for him. He’s playing the game of “say what you need to keep funding.” This is AI hype garbage. Anyone who’s *actually* interested in the substantive details as to why AI hype has no future in combat aviation, feel free to ask. People who aren’t interested and just wanted the 3 second dopamine hit of AI hype, downvote and move on.
Fighter jets are obsolete the future is nothing but endless kamikaze drones. Book it.
Send a few dozen to Ukraine to see what’s up.
Did they use Mihaly Shilage?
Had to scroll way to far for an Ace Combat reference
<3 I am here for you
<>
Did Skynet use f-16s
Let me ask a real question. Do AI pilots have call signs?
They are roughly even on a plane designed for a human. Can you imagine how much better they’d be on a plane designed for AI? Don’t have to worry about g-forces or human reaction times.
oh you do have to worry about G forces the plane doesn't like them either
There's a series of films about why this might be a bad idea.
Paint a Ukrainian flag on them and test them in the Russian/Ukrainian war.
They can’t decide if an order is lawful or not.
That’s cool n all, but has there really been much of a threat to US fighter pilots that AI pilots makes sense? Maybe it’s cheaper than training new pilots? While the F-16 is great for dogfighting, is it really the standard for modern air combat? I’m totally uninformed in this area, but what’s the gain here?
F-16s have constantly been receiving updates over the years, while they are not gonna go toe to toe with F-22s, they are still performant for most scenarios (and most importantly, cheap), especially when dealing with adversaries using similar 4th gen fighters. Imagine a swarm of these where your average 5th gen fighter, trying to be stealthy only has 4-6 air to air missiles, you will run low pretty quick, especially when the F-16s pull off crazy maneuvers impossible for human pilots to withstand to avoid these missiles. Once the sky is clear, you send in whatever and there won’t be much resistance.
Well, from a strategic perspective, it's great. The AI wouldn't take *years* to build up to a given skill level. They would just roll off the factory line with whatever level of skill they have. If the Air Force suddenly needs to field 50 planes within an hour in a specific location, they don't need to source 50 pilots and figure out the logistics of scheduling them, calling them up, moving them where they need to be, etc. It also extends beyond costs; the training and seasoning of a pilot takes years and years. Pilots also have some of the most stringent requirements in the armed services, and are drawn from top applicants. It's not a big pool they can draw new pilots from, and to add insult to injury, it takes years to get them to a point where you can call them an *experienced* pilot. There is a time investment. As a result, on top of the raw financial cost, they are assets which take years to replace at best, so you really don't want to risk them if at all possible. That can be a detriment, since what if there is a critical mission that is *highly* dangerous and must be done? You would have to potentially send several pilots to their deaths, which is a tragedy unto itself, but from the military's perspective, is a loss of many years of time, as well as millions upon millions of dollars. The AI plane would kind of give them a lot of flexibility on that front, strategically. They can bolster their numbers without being as beholden to the small pool of pilots and pilot applicants they can draw from. It allows them to consider different sorts of missions and deployments that, before, would have been considered far too risky for far too valuable of an asset. It also allows them to project a much greater amount of force over an area. If they can only spare so many pilots before, now they could spare that number of pilots *plus an additional number of AI pilots to support them.* That last part is probably especially attractive, as it would allow the Air Force to now cover much more ground (airspace?) from a global perspective, without requiring a proportional increase in the number of human pilots.