Expendable Remotely Piloted Vehicles for Strategic Offensive ...

The problem with the figure 1 view is that it is out of date since differenttypes of vehicles now overlap more than one category. New technologyoften prompts the revision of original meanings and the appearance ofnew acronyms. For example, cruise missiles were initially only capable offlying a single, preprogrammed route. Recent technologies now make itpossible to perform changes during flight, either via human or autonomousinputs. Also, drone is an older term that initially did not referto a remotely controllable vehicle. Today, Webster’s Ninth New CollegiateDictionary defines it as a pilotless vehicle “controlled by radio signals”;however, this is not always the case.Literature on unmanned aircraft (UMA) includes many different termsused to describe them. Some, such as UMA 6 and unmanned vehicle(UMV), 7 never gained wide acceptance. The most recent acronyms, UCAV(uninhabited combat air vehicle) and URAV (uninhabited reconnaissanceair vehicle), were developed “to distinguish the aircraft enabled by the newtechnologies from those now in operation or planned.” 8Classes of Aerial VehiclesThis study uses some of the more widely used terms in order to delineateclasses of aerial vehicles not having a pilot on board. For the purposeof this study, the following terms and meanings will apply.DefinitionsDefinitions are primarily author-derived and not based on any onesource. The attempt was to use terms and meanings from which thereader could logically distinguish one from the other.Aerial Vehicle. The all-inclusive term applied to a self-propelled airpowerconveyance designed to operate without a human physically residingon board but capable of being directed by a human and/or directingitself during flight. Three major categories under UAVs are drones, cruisemissiles, and RPVs.Drone. The category of UAVs possessing preprogrammed autonomousflight control capability. Drones can be recoverable or expendable.Cruise Missile. The category of UAVs designed to have preprogrammedautonomous flight control capability but may possess limited data inputand/or output interaction with a human controller to guide it. Cruise missilestraditionally carry destructive payloads and are expendable.Remotely Piloted Vehicle. The category of UAVs designed to have somedegree of interaction with a human controller via a data link but may possessautonomous flight control capability. An RPV receives data to influenceits flight and mission operations. It transmits data to provide flightsensor information, as well as mission information from any number ofinformation-gathering sensors carried on board the vehicle. RPVs can berecoverable or expendable.3