UAS Strengths and Weaknesses
There are several non-military programs in the United States that use unmanned aerial platforms developed for the Department of Defense. These platforms serve as good references to exam a military UAS missions, and then compare it to a similar civil mission or task. One of the most well-known UAS platform is the Predator B/Reaper. This platform supports military and domestic requirements. In some cases, these aerial vehicles use the same sensors as the military variant, and in other cases, specialized payloads are used for their specific mission.
National Aeronautical and Space Agency (NASA) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) are two agencies that have dedicated programs using these aerial vehicles. This work will identify the strengths and weaknesses these platforms bring to the military mission, identify how these relate to the civil mission, and discuss how they can be overcome or mitigated. Lastly, this work will discuss future cross over and correlated applications with respect to missions and tasks.
Predator B / Reaper
United States Air Force MQ-9 Reaper
The General Atomics Predator B unmanned aerial vehicle builds on the successful Predator program that evolved since the 1990s. The military variant is designed as the MQ-9 Reaper. It is modular design, capable of carrying multiple mission payload, which include electro-optical/infrared cameras, multi-mode radars, wide area motion imagery (WAMI), electronic support measures (ESM), laser designators, and various weapons (Predator B RPA, n.d.). In essence, it is a flexible UAS, and suited for a multi-mission role that can serve the military and civilian requirements.
The Reaper is capable of supporting a wide range of civil operations, such as coastal and border surveillance, law enforcement, humanitarian/disaster relief, and counternarcotics operations. It can also carry external payloads on the wings, which makes it easier to integrate specialized payloads. It can be configured with an array of other military sensors that can be dual use to support other government agencies. As such, the Department of Homeland Security and NASA have Predator B programs to support their requirements (Predator B RPA, n.d.).
NASA Ikhana Predator B Unmanned Science and Research Aircraft System
NASA commenced Predator B operations in 2006. The UAS program, named Ikhana, is used to support Earth science missions and advanced aeronautical technology development. The sensor suite varies depending on the type of data being collected within the Earth’s atmosphere (NASA Ikhana, 2015).
Ikhana has deployed to support the US Forest Service in support of wild fire suppression missions. During these missions, NASA uses the sophisticated autonomous pod mounted sensor and real-time data communications solution to provide the firefighters vital information to fight the fires. The sensor is capable of seeing through the smoke and haze, providing information on hot spot and progression of fires (NASA Ikhana, 2015).
The NASA aircraft is also used as a test bed to develop capabilities and technologies to improve the utility of UAS, such as, developing sense and avoid technologies. Ikhana also supports testing of Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) and other aviation related programs with the FAA (NASA Ikhana, 2015).
Customs and Border Protection Predator B Unmanned Aircraft System
The Department of Homeland Security operates a Predator B similar to the USAF Reaper. It serves to provide enhanced operational capabilities and increased domain awareness. The CBP priority mission for these aircraft is anti-terrorism by identifying and intercepting potential terrorists and illegal cross-border activities. The aircraft operates both overland and water. The modular payload capabilities provide mission flexibility and potential to accommodate new sensor packages to support other federal agency requirements, such as, disaster relief, and other law enforcement requirements. In the normal configuration, it carries an electro-optic/infrared camera sensor, and radar with moving target indicator. Like NASA, it also utilizes mobile ground control stations (MQ-9 Predator B, n.d.).
Strengths and Weaknesses
Military missions
The Predator aircraft evolved during a critical period in United States history. While the initial development occurred in the 1990s, they were quickly put to operational use in the aftermath of 9/11. It has evolved overtime. Predator B is capable of long endurance flights that manned aircraft cannot do. To provide the same orbit using manned aircraft, it requires several times the number of aircrafts, and a significantly larger number of crews at the operating location. These UAS reduce the manpower footprint significantly. Likewise, these unmanned aircraft require less maintenance, and logistical support than an equivalent manned aircraft program providing the same operational support.
The strength of the platform is a result of spiral develop of the original Predator. In order to carry out strike operations without support of other aircraft, the Reaper has to carry additional sensor payloads and communications systems, thus it is a bigger aircraft than the initial Predators. This design allows the warfighter to have a persistent surveillance and strike capability over a longer period of time in an operational area. The Reaper is also capable of supporting more than one ground unit at a time. This has a significant impact on the number of aircraft required for an operation. Lastly, it can operate in areas where manned aircraft would be a great risk.
It is hard to pin point any weakness in the Predator B design. It is an aerial transportation vehicle that was built to address specific operational requirements. It has successfully operated in military and non-military operations. If there are weaknesses, it may be related to using sensors and weapons for an operation that it was not designed to do. Predator B/Reaper addresses shortfalls by providing the operator a modular payload design, and has external hard points to add sensors and communication pods on the airframe wings. In this fashion, multiple requirements can be met and thus minimize any potential operational shortfall.
Civil Missions
NASA. NASA's use of Predator B for support Earth science missions and advanced aeronautical technology development permits flying longer mission profiles that are not possible in manned aircraft. Although, it carries less payload and flies lower than their Global Hawk and WB-57 aircraft, it can perform as well for most applications, at a lower cost point. Ikhana is providing invaluable support in the development of sense and avoid technologies for the integration of UAS into the National Airspace. It a good aerial vehicle for this task since it has a modular configuration to integrated additional sensors to support this research and development task. Any shortcoming that Ikhana may have with respect to NASA can be overcome by the use of their Global Hawk or one of the many manned aircraft in their inventory.
CBP Air and Maritime Branch. In standing-up DHS to address terrorist threats at our borders, Congress provided them the tools to do their mission, which includes manned and unmanned systems. In the case of UAS, they chose the Predator B. Since their core mission is law enforcement based, they also chose a similar camera and radar systems used by the military, but with less capabilities. They don’t need capabilities which require targeting quality data for weapons launch. This reduced the overall costs for their UAS. The use of electro-optic/infrared cameras and radars, as well as the datalinks, ensures the operational commanders at the Air and Maritime Operational Center in Riverside California and at JIATF South in Key West, receive information in real-time, just as military Combatant Commanders do around the globe. Like DoD and NASA, CBP has numerous manned aircraft that can fulfill missions that their Predator B cannot do.
Mitigation
Prior to the stand-up of the DHS, the Services and agencies within DoD were the executive agents for a significant number of large acquisition programs in the Executive Branch. Most aviation programs were executed by the military aviation acquisition offices, such as NAVAIR, and USAF Big Safari. This included the transfer of USAF and Navy airplanes to CBP.
Military units through authorizations in support of law enforcement activities support the departments of Homeland Security and Justice (10 U.S.C 1004, n.d.; 10 U.S.C 1024, n.d.). Even with the stand up of DHS, some of these functions are still coordinated through DoD and the Joint Interagency Task Forces. To mitigate any concerns, DHS used DoD expertise to procure, stand up and train their UAS operational units. This is consistent with their acquisition of their current fleet of Multi-Role Enforcement Aircraft (MEA) B-350 ER, and Bombardier DASH-8 manned aircraft (Aircraft and Marine Vessels, n.d.).
Future Applications: Cross Over/Correlated Missions and Tasks
At the federal level, joint military and civil operations in support of law enforcement have been ongoing since the late 1980s. During the initial stages of these operations, DoD provide most of the aerial assets as part of their statutory requirement to provide detection and monitoring of aerial and maritime transit of illegal drugs going to the United States (10 U.S.C 1024, n.d.). These included; AWACS, P-3s, F-16, special mission aircrafts, aerostats, ships and radars to name a few of these assets. Over time, the military services transferred P-3 aircraft and aerostats, as well as, modified P-3 with AWAC type capabilities. In the past ten years, CBP in particular, has purchased B-350 ER and Dash 8 aircrafts, as well as the Predators (Aircraft and Maritime Vessels, n.d.).
All these assets work together through Joint Interagency Task Force South, in coordination with SOUTHCOM, NORTHCOM, and CBP’s AMOC (Joint Interagency, n.d.). The introduction of both military UAS from the Navy and USAF, as well as, CBP’s Predator B will only increase in time. They will not only support border operations, but also operate in the Atlantic, Pacific, and Gulf of Mexico. In some case, one would expect they will also operate jointly over foreign territories, such as their manned aircraft do so today.
References
10 U.S.C. 1004. (n.d.). Retrieved October 20, 2016, from http://defenseassistance.org/programs/law.php?name=Section_1004
10 U.S.C. 124. Detection and Monitoring (n.d.). Retrieved October 19, 2016, from https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/granule/USCODE-2010-title10/USCODE-2010-title10-subtitleA-partI-chap3-sec124
Aircraft and Marine Vessels. (n.d.). Retrieved October 19, 2016, from https://www.cbp.gov/border-security/air-sea/aircraft-and-marine-vessels
Joint Interagency Task Force South. (n.d.). Retrieved October 19, 2016, from http://www.jiatfs.southcom.mil/
MQ -9 Predator B Unmanned Aircraft System [PDF]. (n.d.). Washington, DC: Customs and Border Protection.
MQ-9 Reaper. (2015, September 23). Retrieved October 18, 2016, from http://www.af.mil/AboutUs/FactSheets/Display/tabid/224/Article/104470/mq-9-reaper.aspx
NASA Ikhana Predator B. (2015, November 16). Retrieved October 18, 2016, from http://www.nasa.gov/centers/armstrong/news/FactSheets/FS-097-DFRC.html
Predator B RPA. (n.d.). Retrieved October 18, 2016, from http://www.ga-asi.com/predator-b
