Expendable Remotely Piloted Vehicles for Strategic Offensive ...

7. “Report: Military Crashes Down,” on-line, Internet, Air Force News, 6 February 1996.The General Accounting Office (GAO) found that the cost is still high despite the numberof military air crashes declining from 309 in 1975 to 76 in 1995. Number of deaths fromair crashes dropped from 285 in 1975 to 85 in 1995.8. On 1 February 1996, an F-14A crashed in a Nashville, Tenn., residential neighborhoodkilling both crewmen and three civilians on the ground. On 18 February, an F-14Dplunged into the Pacific off southern California, killing both crewmen. Four days later, anF-14A crashed in the Persian Gulf, but fortunately both crewmen ejected safely and wererescued. In August 1995 two Tier 2 Predator UAVs were lost over Bosnia within four days.9. “DOD’s Use of Remotely Piloted Vehicle Technology Offers Opportunities for SavingLives and Dollars,” GAO survey (Washington, D.C.: GAO, 1981), 19. A questionnaire wassent to 85 people experienced in the RPV technology field, and 77 responded. Those thatconducted the survey acknowledged it “may not be an unbiased forum of views on RPVs,but constituted the most knowledgeable source of information that the GAO could identify.”The original chart displayed the results on a scale from 1.00 (major disadvantage) to3.00 (major advantage). In order to allow for a greater margin of error (in bias and opinion),this author took the results and displayed them according to three ranges: 1.00 to1.66 represented “major disadvantage,” 1.67 to 2.33 represented “counterbalancing advantage/disadvantage,”and 2.34 to 3.00 represented “major advantage.”10. Ibid. Pilot risk was given a numerical score of 3.00, and recovery was 1.32.11. GAO survey, 19. For the representative RPV in table 6, all those surveyed unanimouslygave it a perfect 3.00 (major advantage) rank score.12. Lee B. Kennett, The First Air War: 1914–1918 (New York: Free Press, 1991), 221.This was a statement made in 1939 by the Air Staff to British Army leaders. It referencedthe 30 percent losses per day suffered during “trench flights” in November 1917.13. “Airpower and the 1972 Spring Invasion,” USAF Southeast Asia monograph series,vol. 2, monograph 3, ed. A. J. C. Lavalle (Washington, D.C.: Department of the Air Force,1985), 35–43.14. Lt Col Steve Turner, quoted in William L. Smallwood, Strike Eagle: Flying the F-15Ein the Gulf War (McLean, Va.: Brassey’s, 1994), 117.15. S. L. A. Marshall, Men Against Fire: The Problem of Battle Command in Future War(1947; reprint, Gloucester, Mass.: Peter Smith, 1978), 204, as referenced by Conrad C.Crane, Bombs, Cities, and Civilians: American Airpower Strategy in World War II (Lawrence,Kans.: University Press of Kansas, 1993), 48.16. Womack and Steczkowski, 2–15.17. F-117 cost from Richard P. Hallion, Storm Over Iraq: Air Power and the Gulf War(Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1992), 294; B-2 cost from John A. Tirpak,“With the First B-2 Squadron,” Air Force Magazine, April 1996), 38.18. TLAM cost from Hallion, 250; Predator cost from Air Force Link, on-line, Internet,available at http://www.dtic.dla.mil/airforcelink/photos/c0196_predat7.html.19. Col William E. Krebs, “Did We Err in the Development of Remotely Piloted Vehicles(RPVs)?” Research Report no. MS 018-79 (Maxwell AFB, Ala.: Air War College, 1979), 10.20. Ibid., 55.21. James Canan, “Steady Course for Unmanned Aircraft,” Air Force Magazine, March1991, 87.22. GAO study, 3.23. Maj Ronald L. McGonigle, “Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) on the Future TacticalBattlefield—Are UAVs an Essential Joint Force Multiplier?” (Fort Leavenworth, Kans.:8 December 1992), 33. Various sources assert that RPVs eliminate the need for life supportand redundant systems.24. Tirpak, 41.25. Krebs, 10; and GAO survey, 3.26. Ibid., 26.60