Are enlisted airmen next to pilot UAVs?

[JohnP]

Are enlisted airmen next to pilot UAVs?

By Michael Hoffman - Staff writer
Posted : Sunday Dec 21, 2008 13:18:36 EST

The Air Force is desperate for UAV pilots, yet it stands alone among the services in its policy that only officers are allowed to fly large unmanned aerial vehicles.

But next month, in a reversal of policy, 10 nonrated officers — those without aviation training — will begin instruction on flying Predator and Reaper UAVs. could enlisted airmen be next?

Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz left open the possibility immediately after he approved allowing nonrated officers to fly UAVs.

“No options are off the table, ... I don’t dismiss that as a possibility,” he said as he walked down from the stage at the Air Force Association convention in Washington, D.C., in September.

Three months later, in early December, Chief Master Sgt. of the Air Force Rodney McKinley said the option for enlisted pilots remains in play and he had “confidence enlisted airmen have the capabilities if tasked.”

Defense Secretary Robert Gates describes the demand for UAVs as “insatiable” as ground commanders in Iraq and Afghanistan have come to depend on the full-motion video and close-air support they provide.

To keep up, the Air Force has put UAVs on top of its wish list. Next year, 52 of the 93 aircraft the Air Force will purchase are unmanned.

Likewise, the demand for pilots and sensor operators grows as the Air Force looks to establish 50 Predator and Reaper orbits — round-the-clock combat air patrols — by 2012. That’s an increase of 17 orbits from the Air Force’s current total, which will require 1,100 crews of one pilot and one sensor operator. The service now has 474 crews, according to Air Combat Command.

To meet the surge in demand, the Air Force is ramping up its training pipeline, growing its training capacity from 160 new crews per year to 360 by 2010 with the opening of new training schools at Holloman Air Force Base, N.M., and March Air Reserve Base, Calif.

Critics, however, say that by restricting the UAV pilot career field to officers, the Air Force has unnecessarily limited its UAV growth potential — and point to the Army, in which enlisted soldiers fly UAVs in the war zones, track insurgents and fire on targets.

Those critics include some in Congress. The more congressional funding that goes to purchasing UAVs and training operators, the more lawmakers and their staffs are studying UAV operations.

One congressional staff member sitting in a defense authorization committee that has studied both Army and Air Force UAV pilot programs said questions arise about why the Air Force can’t have enlisted pilots.

“It’s difficult for us to come right out and say, ‘Air Force: You shall not use officers as pilots; you shall use sergeants,’” he said, asking not to be named. “But it’s perfectly obvious to everybody except senior levels of the Air Force that that’s what they need to do.”

Some critics point to enlisted UAV pilots as a potential cost-saving measure. Rated pilots, proficient after years of expensive training and flying hours, are cycled into UAV slots for two to three years at a minimum. When pilots return to manned aircraft, requalification training comes with a big price tag. It costs roughly $700,000, for example, to send F-15 pilots through a requalification course, according to a Rand Corp. report published in November.

Piloting debate

Chief Master Sgt. Bruce Garcia, 196th Reconnaissance Squadron superintendent, said he is convinced an enlisted airman could fly a UAV.

“The simple answer is yes. I don’t see why they couldn’t fly them,” said Garcia, who oversees the enlisted sensor operators who fly UAV combat missions out of March.

M.L. Cummings, a former F/A-18 pilot and director of the Humans and Automation Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, agreed.

“The Army’s enlisted program is a good illustration of that,” said Cummings, who teaches UAV ground control station design.

Air Force leaders argue that comparisons between its programs and the Army’s are misleading because enlisted soldiers fly smaller UAVs that don’t carry the same weapons load as Air Force Reapers and Predators.

But that argument has lost weight as enlisted soldiers are set to fly the Sky Warrior — a UAV that is a foot longer and can carry 325 pounds more than the MQ-1 Predator — in Iraq this summer.

Four Sky Warriors armed with four Hellfire missiles will be deployed this summer and another four will be shipped a year later, said Maj. Jimmie Cummings, an Army spokesman.

Maj. Hilton Nunez, Army UAV Division team chief, said the debate over whether a UAV pilot should have a commission is moot as long as that pilot receives the right training.

“When you look at this and say, ‘Shouldn’t an officer be doing this?’ then that’s implying that officers are smarter than enlisted folks when in fact it’s just the difference of the training,” he said.

The Army starts training its enlisted UAV pilots straight out of basic training. The pilots spend the first nine weeks in a common core UAV training before moving to training specific to the platform they will fly. Hunter and Shadow training is 12 weeks and Sky Warrior training is 25 weeks. As of October, the Army had trained 3,200 UAV enlisted operators, Maj. Cummings said.

Air Force Predator and Reaper pilots spend two to three months learning to fly UAVs at Creech Air Force Base, Nev., said Lt. Col. Lawrence Spinetta, 11th Reconnaissance Squadron commander.

However, these airmen have spent hours inside these manned aircraft cockpits conducting the “many more tasks and missions” the Air Force expects from its UAV fleet than “the Army expects of its UAV force,” Spinetta wrote in an article in the November/December issue of C4ISR Journal, a sister publication of Air Force Times.

Those aviation skills are especially useful for complex missions. Following a vehicle with a Predator or Reaper requires the pilot to maneuver the aircraft with a joystick instead of setting points on a map for the unmanned aircraft to follow, he said in a phone interview.

“Chasing vehicles through the crowded streets and urban canyons of Sadr City demands more precise control than a generic, fixed, computer-generated orbit can offer,” Spinetta wrote.

He said the Air Force also needs an officer in control when orders come to fire a Hellfire missile at that vehicle, especially at a time when UAVs are becoming more deadly. An MQ-9 Reaper can carry the same weapons load as an F-16, and an officer is needed to oversee the use of that firepower, Spinetta said.

Chief Master Sgt. Steven Hanson, superintendent of the 214th Reconnaissance Group, agreed. “An officer should be the one who carries the responsibility of crashing one of these aircraft or bombing the wrong target.”

However, Nunez argued enlisted troops armed with M-4s carry the burden of lethal force as they walk the streets of Iraq and Afghanistan every day.

But a big piece of the debate, some say, entails how enlisted flyers would be accepted in the Air Force’s culture.

It’s not that “enlisted don’t fly because they don’t have the ability. They don’t fly because pilots run the Air Force and they want to keep it that way,” Hanson said.

Col. Curt Sheldon, assistant to the director of air operations, said the Air Force wants officers to fly because it gives them that experience when they lead flying squadrons.

Having officers fly is ingrained into the Air Force culture, and in the early stages of UAV aviation that is where the service will start, he said.

“It’s not 1909, when it comes to [UAVs] but it’s darn near close,” said Gen. Stephen Lorenz, commander of Air Education and Training Command.

“When you start something new, you start with what we know and we have had officers as pilots from our beginning,” Sheldon said.

Air Force Brig. Gen. Lyn D. Sherlock, director of air operations for operations, plans and requirements at the Pentagon, was one of the key leaders to decide to open UAV piloting to nonrated officers. She said the Air Force has not yet extended the same opportunity to enlisted airmen because of the need for UAV pilots to integrate their mission with a wide range of assets and units, tasks for which the Air Force trains and develops officers.

“We need them to bring their officer expertise to our headquarters and working with our partners in the other services within the joint world,” she said at the AFA convention in September.

Loren Thompson, a defense analyst with the Lexington Institute, said the debate over enlisted or officer falls to the services’ priorities regarding quality versus quantity.

“The main driver of Army operational practice is the desire to get reconnaissance to war fighters in the field as fast as possible,” Thompson said. “The Air Force is more oriented to national- and theater-level users. It’s much more interested in getting the mission right and protecting the airframe than a quick turnaround.”

What do you think?

http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2008/12/airforce_enlisted_uas3_122108/

[Woody]

I know there is a shortage of UAV pilots .UK forces would offer full time service for any reservist with the speciality . Though it would probably be easier just to phone them up indviduially cant be that many.
The larger ones can fly through air traffic controlled space so the rules say you need a qualifed pilot at the control .No real need to be an officer though job is flying not leading .Maybe Air Force is worried its image is going to be changed from dashing pilots in leather flying jackets .To pasty geeks hunched over keyboards and monitors

[03_SHOOTER]

Why not just go to the local High School? Any kid who's any good at all with any computer game can be taught to handle UAV's.

[JohnP]

Originally Posted by 03_SHOOTER

Why not just go to the local High School? Any kid who's any good at all with any computer game can be taught to handle UAV's.

I emailed my old unit. It seems the computer geeks are taking over!

The UAV training is not much more than a great simulator with practical applications.

I think its time to re-vamp the old "High Flight" poem.

From:

"I have slipped the surely bonds of Earth,
and danced the skies on wind swept wings."

To:

"I have tripped across the BX parking lot,
and trashed the skies with World of Warcraft ease."

[HairyEyeball]

Or, just use 'government logic': Find the pimply-faced kids living on pizza and Jolt cola, tell them it's a new MMPRPG and commission them.

[Collo]

Originally Posted by HairyEyeball

Or, just use 'government logic': Find the pimply-faced kids living on pizza and Jolt cola, tell them it's a new MMPRPG and commission them.

Isn't that what they do anyway?

In all seriousness; despite the simplicity of the role; I can not see the Royal Australian Air Force give this role to an Airman position.

The RAAF is in the current process of implementing the Global Hawk into her capabilities. With the quantity of the aircraft and the budget that we have compared to the American designers; it would be a very uncharacteristic move by the Air Force to give command of these weapon platforms to Airmen or even senior Airmen.

[JohnP]

Originally Posted by Collo

Isn't that what they do anyway?

In all seriousness; despite the simplicity of the role; I can not see the Royal Australian Air Force give this role to an Airman position.

The RAAF is in the current process of implementing the Global Hawk into her capabilities. With the quantity of the aircraft and the budget that we have compared to the American designers; it would be a very uncharacteristic move by the Air Force to give command of these weapon platforms to Airmen or even senior Airmen.

In times of budget crunches and cutbacks, it is not surprising that the Air Force would give the control to the enlisted forces. In the early '80s the role for final control of close air support was given over to a traditionally officer role with strong success.

It's not too major of a problem to train an experienced airman to fly. Push up makes the houses smaller; pull down makes the houses bigger.

[Collo]

I am not saying it wouldn't be in fact; as you mentioned it would most likely be more financially viable for the Air Force (both RAAF/USAF) to employ senior Airmen in these roles.

The RAAFs' P-3C Orions currently only fly two officers on board and the remainder or plastic SNCOs in roles that some twenty years ago where held by officers. So following this trend our Air Force might do the same. As I mentioned in my previous post; I personally could not see the Air Forces reverting this role to an Airman but I'm not saying it won't happen.

[soccermark23]

You have to remember that currently when flying a UAV the crew is made up of one officer and one enlisted person. The officer is the pilot, while the enlisted member controls all sensor operations. It seems to me like it wouldn't be that far of a stretch to just go the next step and have enlisted members fly the UAVs as well. Heck they might even be able to do some sort of setup where there is one officer overseeing 3 crews of enlisted pilots and sensor operators, or something else along those lines.

[Collo]

Originally Posted by soccermark23

Heck they might even be able to do some sort of setup where there is one officer overseeing 3 crews of enlisted pilots and sensor operators, or something else along those lines.

Not a bad idea at all.

I have been silenced on the matter.