An
avionics specialist checks out an MQ-9 Reaper before it prepares to fly
from Creech Air Force Base, 2008. Photo: U.S. Air Force
The Air Force says it needs to
scale back
buying its flying deadly robots while it gets enough human beings in
place to operate them and interpret the surveillance data they collect.
Congress decided that the flyboys might need more cash, just in case.
The Pentagon asked Congress for only around $4 million for the MQ-1
Predator drone and about $1.7 billion for the next-generation MQ-9
Reaper over the next year. The House Armed Services Committee, which on
Tuesday finished
its version of next year’s defense bill
(.pdf), decided that wasn’t enough for either program. If the
committee’s version of the bill makes it through the legislative
process, the Air Force will get about $23 million more for the
Predators, and an extra $180 million for the Reapers.
To be clear, that cash isn’t necessarily for extra flying robots, and
there are lots of legislative hurdles to overcome before this bill
becomes law. The Air Force
stopped buying new Predators in 2010
and upgraded to Reapers. Chances are the new Predator cash is for
replacement sensors or spare parts. And about $26 million worth of cash
for the Reapers, similarly, is for spare parts. But the committee also
wants to give the Air Force nearly $159 million for 12 new Reaper
planes.
That’s not all. The committee also boosted funding for the Hellfire
missiles the drones carry — to $61 million, some $13 million more than
the Pentagon asked.
The additional drone cash comes at a strange time for the Air Force’s
operation of the machines. Over the next five year
WIRED s, the “combat air
patrols” that the drones fly — teams of up to four Predators or Reapers —
will
rise from 61 to 65,
with what Defense Secretary Leon Panetta called a “surge capacity” of
up to 85. But the Air Force actually asked to cut its drone cash, in
order to make sure it’s got
enough human beings trained to operate the drones — and, more urgently, get a better handle on the onslaught of video and other surveillance data they collect.
The word from Air Force Secretary Michael Donley is that the Air
Force plans on holding the number of Predator and Reaper “combat air
patrols,” or CAPs — flights of up to four drones at a time — static for
about five years once they hit 65 CAPs, in order to give the humans a
breather. It’s not clear whether an infusion of extra drone cash will
affect that decision.
The drones aren’t the only program the House Armed Services Committee
is beefing up. It’s adding $115 million for “advanced procurement” of
Navy destroyers and $778 million for the Virginia-class submarine —
consistent with the Republican-controlled House’s complaint that
the Navy isn’t building enough ships for its ambitious strategy in the Pacific. GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney wants to go even further,
vastly expand shipbuilding
by as much as $7 billion per year. If Romney has a notion to supersize
America’s unmanned air force, so far he’s kept those plans to himself.
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