The argument goes, if you want to win the next air war, you should use drones. lots of drones. Air to air combat is all missiles, and each of those missiles is half a million dollars.
Now, I'm not aware of an autonomous drone that can shoot down an f-22 with a missile, but it seems like a solvable technical challenge, especially if you're willing to throw a trillion dollars at the problem.
So anyway, for each f-22 send up 7 drones. one for each missile, and one to survive to get the kill, as long as the 6 lost drones are cheaper than the f22, you're winning, kinda.
Furthermore, pilots are expensive and take time to replace. I doubt there are even 10,000 combat pilots in the world (wag) kill off a few thousand, and the drones are against rookies. All the while, the drone software is improving and getting even tougher to kill. And, the drones should be capable of things that that human pilots just can't accomplish - high g turns for example.
Self driving cars aren't better than the best drivers, but they're way above average drivers, eventually the robots will be better. Same with jets. why not start now?
Now, I'm not aware of an autonomous drone that can shoot down an f-22 with a missile, but it seems like a solvable technical challenge, especially if you're willing to throw a trillion dollars at the problem.
So anyway, for each f-22 send up 7 drones. one for each missile, and one to survive to get the kill, as long as the 6 lost drones are cheaper than the f22, you're winning, kinda.
Furthermore, pilots are expensive and take time to replace. I doubt there are even 10,000 combat pilots in the world (wag) kill off a few thousand, and the drones are against rookies. All the while, the drone software is improving and getting even tougher to kill. And, the drones should be capable of things that that human pilots just can't accomplish - high g turns for example.
Self driving cars aren't better than the best drivers, but they're way above average drivers, eventually the robots will be better. Same with jets. why not start now?