16 

Unmanned Aerial 

Vehicles: 

Implications for Military 

Operations 

David Glade, Lt Col, USAF 

July 2000

Occasional Paper No. 16 

Center for Strategy and Technology 

Air War College

Air University 

Maxwell Air Force Base
Unmanned Aerial Vehicles: 

Implications for Military Operations 

by 

David Glade, Lt Col, USAF 

July 2000 

Occasional Paper No. 16 

Center for Strategy and Technology 

Air War College 

Air University 

Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama 
Unmanned Aerial Vehicles: 

Implications for Military Operations 

David Glade, Lieutenant Colonel, USAF 

July 2000 

The Occasional Papers series was established by the Center for 

Strategy and Technology as a forum for research on topics that reflect 

long-term strategic thinking about technology and its implications for U.S. 

national security. Copies of No. 16 in this series are available from the 

Center for Strategy and Technology, Air War College, 325 Chennault 

Circle, Maxwell AFB, Montgomery, Alabama 36112. The fax number is 

(334) 953-1988; phone (334) 953-2985 

Occasional Paper No. 16 

Center for Strategy and Technology 

Air War College 

Air University 

Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama 36112 
Contents Page 

Disclaimer i

Acknowledgments ii

Abstract iii

Author iv

I. Introduction 1 

II. Defining Aerial Vehicles 3 

III. Evaluating Aerial Vehicles 9 

IV. Military Roles for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles 17 

V. Conclusions 21 

Notes 25
Disclaimer 

The views expressed in this publication are those of the author and 

do not reflect the official policy or position of the Department of Defense, 

the United States Government, or of the Air War College Center for 

Strategy and Technology. 
Acknowledgments 

I would like to express my appreciation to my Air War College

faculty advisors Dr. William C. Martel and Col (Ret) Theodore C. Hailes 

for their invaluable encouragement and editorial assistance. I would also 

like to express my thanks to my wife for her constant support and 

encouragement. 
Abstract 

The development of uninhabited aerial vehicles (UAVs) could 

potentially revolutionize how military force is used in the future. While 

the early operational experiences with UAVs show great promise, their 

full range of capabilities is largely unknown. However, it is clear that 

these technologies will enable military forces to use aerospace power more 

efficiently, which means at lower cost and with less risk to the humans

who pilot aircraft. 

The broader question is the wisdom of using unmanned aerial 

vehicles for employing lethal force, and in particular which air power 

missions are best accomplished by uninhabited, piloted, and autonomous 

vehicles. The corollary is to examine the essential roles of human pilots or

operators in aerospace operations in the twenty-first century. Since it is 

common to draw distinctions between vehicles with an on-board pilot, 

vehicles with off-board operators, and autonomous vehicles, this study 

explores the essential role of pilots and contrasts it with the roles of 

remotely piloted and autonomous vehicles. 

The assumption is that piloted, remotely piloted, and autonomous 

vehicles have advantages and disadvantages in military operations, and 

that these vary in strategic significance for different levels of conflict. 

Since it is essential for the U.S. defense establishment to consider the 

strategic and technological implications of these types of aerial vehicles, 

this study is devoted to addressing the issues raised by the new generation 

of aerial vehicles. 
The Author 

David B. Glade, Lieutenant Colonel, USAF, is the Acting Chief of 

the Air Force Superiority Mission Area Team in the Requirements 

Directorate of the Headquarters of the Air Combat Command at Langley 

Air Force Base in Virginia. A flight test pilot, he was the deputy chief of 

test and evaluation for the F-22 System Program Office at Wright

Patterson AFB in Dayton, Ohio, where he was responsible for planning 

the ground and flight test program for the Air Forces F-22 fighter. He

served as an experimental test pilot at Edwards AFB, where he flight 

tested all models of the F-15, including certifying the F-15E for terrain 

following operation in weather, testing a ground collision warning system, 

and numerous radar, flight control, weapons, and engine tests. He also 

served as the chief F-15 instructor at the USAF Test Pilot School. His 

operational assignments include a tour at Mountain Home AFB, Idaho, as 

a flight examiner in the EF-111A, and a tour at RAF Lakenheath, United 

Kingdom, as chief of aircrew training in the F-111F. Lieutenant Colonel 

Glade is a member of the Society of Test Pilots and a member of the Air 

Forceís acquisition corps. A distinguished graduate of the U.S. Air Force 

Academy, Undergraduate Pilot Training, and the USAF Test Pilot School; 

he graduated with distinction from the College of Naval Command and 

Staff, and earned a Bachelor of Science Degree from the U.S. Air Force 

Academy, a Master of Science Degree from the department of Mechanical 

and Aerospace Engineering at Princeton University, and a Master of Arts 

Degree from the U.S. Naval War College. He co-authored a published 

paper that assesses flying criteria for fighter aircraft. 
Unmanned Aerial VehiclesÖ1 

I. Introduction 

The development of uninhabited aerial vehicles (UAVs) raises the 

possibility that states will be able to conduct military operations in a more 

efficient and less risky fashion than was the case when aircraft were 

piloted by humans. While the United States has gained experience in

recent military operations with UAVs, notably in Kosovo in 1999, the

U.S. defense establishment has not fully explored how this technology will 

influence the nature and conduct of future military operations. As a result 

of numerous technological developments, it is possible that the United 

States will be able to build military systems, including UAVs, which can 

conduct military operations without human intervention. This prospect 

raises significant questions about the nature of military operations in the

future and how these technologies will influence international security. 

When the United States Air Force Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) 

conducted a study in 1996 on the role of UAV technologies in military 

operations, its principal conclusion was that UAVs would enhance the 

ability of the United States to project military power.1 The equally

important conclusion was that these vehicles could perform the tasks that 

pose increasing difficulties for manned aircraft, of which attacking 

chemical warfare/biological warfare (CW/BW) facilities and suppressing 

enemy air defenses are the most important examples. The SAB study 

concluded that because UAVs are more survivable than manned aircraft, 

this technological development has profound implications for the military 

forces that the United States will design and deploy in the future. 

The prospect of building unmanned air vehicles is not new by any 

standard. For most of the twentieth century, states have investigated the 

feasibility of building unmanned aerial vehicles and their potential value

in military operations. A principal reason for the interest in UAVs was the 

desire to reduce the risk to humans in combat, but it also was to perform

military missions in a more efficient and less costly fashion than has 

historically been the case with manned vehicles. A related reason was that 

freeing machines from the limitations imposed by humans would increase 

their performance. From the beginning, the hope has been that unmanned 

air vehicles would be less expensive to develop and manufacture than 

manned aircraft, and that UAVs will reduce the demand for the supporting 
2Ö Unmanned Aerial Vehicles 

facilities and manpower that modern aircraft require. As a result of 

technological advances in flight control, data and signal processing, offboard sensors, communications links, and integrated avionics, unmanned 

aerial vehicles are now a serious option. The hope, as yet unconfirmed, is 

that uninhabited aerial vehicles may be able to perform the most 

dangerous military missions, including attacking chemical or biological 

facilities, fixed and mobile targets, and other aircraft, which would 

represent a revolution in military capabilities. 

There are far more than technological advances that are accelerating 

the development of UAVs. With the end of the Cold War, the United 

States spends less on defense, but is more likely to be involved in 

peacekeeping and humanitarian operations than in major theater wars. In 

addition, U.S. security will depend on rapidly deploying mobile forces 

rather than relying on large forces that are based overseas. In all of these 

operations, the political climate in the United States places great emphasis 

on minimizing casualties, specifically when U.S. vital interests are not at 

stake. If the United States can employ technology to minimize the 

exposure of American military personnel in the lesser contingencies that 

will dominate American military operations for the foreseeable future, 

U.S. policymakers will have much more flexibility in responding to crises 

and challenges. 

A number of technological factors suggest that unmanned weapon 

systems will be important in future military operations. To understand 

how the technology behind the development of UAVs is changing the 

nature and conduct of military operations, this paper examines the role of 

three categories of air vehicles in military operations: aircraft that rely on 

traditional pilots, vehicles that are operated by pilots at remote locations, 

and vehicles that operate autonomously. After considering the advantages 

and disadvantages of these categories of aircraft, the technological 

implications of using UAVs in military operations will be considered. 
Unmanned Aerial VehiclesÖ3 

II. Defining Aerial Vehicles 

As there are several different types of air vehicles, the first step is to

define these terms with precision. According to the U.S. Department of 

Defense, an unmanned aerial vehicle is ìa powered, aerial vehicle that 

does not carry a human operator, uses aerodynamic forces to provide 

vehicle lift, can fly autonomously or be piloted remotely, can be

expendable or recoverable, and can carry a lethal or non-lethal payload.î2

This definition also includes aerodynamic drones and remotely piloted 

vehicles (RPVs), although RPVs are designed to be recoverable.3

However, this definition excludes ballistic or semi-ballistic vehicles,

artillery, and cruise missiles, the latter of which is viewed as nuclear

delivery systems in accordance with various arms control treaties. 

Using these terms, UAVs may be manned or unmanned, remotely 

piloted or operate in an autonomous fashion, and in the case when control 

is exercised by a remote pilot, control may be continuous or episodic. In 

some cases, autonomous vehicles follow preprogrammed courses and lack 

the capacity for re-targeting, while in other cases autonomous UAVs will 

follow preprogrammed courses and can be rerouted or re-targeted.4 In 

military terminology, vehicles are reusable, while weapons are 

expendable. In addition, UAVs have shorter life spans than manned 

aircraft, and can suffer attrition in military operations,5

 which means that 

they will survive for a relatively small number of sorties until failures, 

accidents, or hostile action destroy them. The loss rate for aircraft and 

UAVs is an important concept that influences the cost-effectiveness of 

UAVs and manned vehicles.6

Categorizing Air Vehicles 

One way to understand the nature of unmanned vehicles, as a military 

instrument is to develop a framework that traces the development of

manned and unmanned air vehicles, assesses the technological state-ofthe-art in aircraft and computer technologies, and extrapolates how these 

developments may influence their use in military operations. 
4Ö Unmanned Aerial Vehicles 

The simplest approach is to divide aircraft into manned and 

unmanned vehicles, and then to further sub-divide unmanned vehicles into 

those that are remotely operated and autonomous. This framework rests 

explicitly on the human role in perceiving and influencing events during 

the operation of air vehicles. If manned aircraft use direct human presence 

to directly perceive events and conditions around the vehicle, remotely 

operated vehicles keep the human presence at a distance. The critical 

factor that distinguishes between aircraft and UAVs is the amount of 

information that is available to the human flying a UAV. The 

technological and operational communities have invested considerable 

resources in using visual and data displays to provide information to the 

human about conditions in and around the vehicle. The problem is that 

these technologies have been inadequate because the human operator is 

deprived of significant information about the vehicleís performance, 

which includes attitude, vibration, and sound, among others. In the case of 

vehicles that are operated only periodically by a human, such as the 

Global Hawk UAV, the operator must make decisions with significantly 

less information about the vehicle than an on-board pilot. The concept of 

the information that is provided to a remote operator has significant 

implications for UAVs, principally because it directly increases the 

combat effectiveness, cost, and complexity of these vehicles.7

If we turn to the case of autonomous vehicles, the human presence 

exists at a distance, is confined to receiving information about the vehicle, 

and does not exercise direct control over the vehicle. By their nature, 

humans lose control of autonomous vehicles once it is launched, which 

implies that human operators do not control the operation of autonomous 

vehicles, and that available information about the status of the vehicles is 

quite limited. Once these limitations are understood, autonomous vehicles 

may be well suited to attacking targets whose location is precisely and 

accurately known. The value of this assumption diminishes, however, in 

the case of searching for mobile targets, of which SCUD missiles and 

command and control centers are prominent examples. One fundamental 

reason for the development of these vehicles is the desire of the U.S. 

military to destroy what is known as time critical targets, especially when 

these vehicles are missiles that may be armed with weapons of mass 

destruction. 
Unmanned Aerial VehiclesÖ5 

Perhaps the best way to differentiate between aerial vehicles is to 

consider the role of human presence, which can be immediate or distant, 

and can involve large or small amounts of information about the vehicleís 

operation. However, the information provided to the human operator is not

the same for all types of piloted aircraft, For example, while the MiG-23 

and F-15 are both manned fighter aircraft, F-15 pilots have greater visual 

perception than MiG-23 pilots as a result of the larger and less restrictive 

canopy. To cite another example, the F-15 pilot has vastly more tactical 

information than the pilot of the World War II era P-51 Mustang fighter, 

principally because the F-15ís radar greatly extends the pilotís ability to 

perceive events in the air and on the ground. 

In principle, all unmanned vehicles possess some degree of 

automation. An interesting problem, however, is that completely 

autonomous operations create unexpected situations, which was 

reaffirmed during tests of the Global Hawk UAV.8 Not surprisingly, the

price of automation is to significantly increase the cost of engines, 

hydraulics and electrical systems, and avionics systems to the point where

these are more expensive than the less automated counterparts that are 

controlled by humans. 

Categorizing Military Operations 

The roles of UAVs can vary widely based on the difficulty of the 

military operation that is to be conducted. The simplest military operations 

involve attacks against fixed ground targets, while the more challenging 

operations involve attacks against mobile ground targets and other air 

vehicles. As one would expect, an attack against fixed targets is the 

simplest because it is relatively easy to find targets whose location does 

not vary and which can be assessed with great accuracy. However, an 

attack against air targets is more difficult because the targetís mobility 

makes it more difficult to find and destroy the target, and further because

the targetís ability to maneuver makes it more difficult to prosecute an

attack. Even when an air target has been located, the simplest form of 

attack is the unobserved attack in which the target is not aware that it is 

under attack. By contrast, an observed attack against a highly 

maneuverable target with an experienced pilot is most difficult. Consider, 

for instance, the case of an unobserved attack from behind a large bomber, 
6Ö Unmanned Aerial Vehicles 

which would be simpler to conduct than an attack against an opposing 

fighter whose experienced and well-trained pilot is aware that an attack is 

underway and will take active measures to defeat the attack. 

Another type of attack are those against enemy targets that are out of 

contact with friendly forces, which are simpler than attacks in which 

enemy targets are relatively near friendly forces. The principal reason for 

the difficulty of conducting this type of attack is the high-level of 

coordination that is necessary if vehicles are to avoid destroying one 

another, which is known as fratricide. A basic rule of military operations is 

that the difficulty of combat situations increases as the number of enemy 

threats increases, and that this rule has important implications in air-to-air 

and air-to-ground operations when friendly and enemy targets are 

interspersed throughout the battlespace. Ideally, all of the aircraft in one 

area belong to the enemy, while the aircraft in other areas belong to 

friendly forces, but the reality is that in modern military operations enemy 

and friendly aircraft will be mixed in the same area. The problem becomes 

even more complex in operations other than war when friendly, enemy, 

and neutral combatants are scattered throughout the battlespace. 

These concepts have several important implications for UAVs. First, 

human pilots have a vastly greater ability to understand and respond to the 

conditions in combat around the vehicle than the human who operates the 

vehicle from a distance. Second, the number and type of threats, degree of 

mobility of targets and threats, and the degree of sorting that is necessary 

to separate arid classify threats directly influences the success with which 

UAVs can be used in military operations. Third, despite these limitations, 

technology has matured to the point where it will be possible to gradually 

shift combat functions from piloted to remotely piloted vehicles and 

eventually to autonomous vehicles in a migration that may transform the 

nature of war. 

Automation. However, the success of this shift will depend in large 

measure on the ability to develop technologies that will automate many of 

the functions that humans perform in military operations. In essence, a 

vehicle is said to be autonomous when it can conduct operations without 

human intervention. To cite an example from the current generation of 

automated fighters, the F-117 can ìcomplete an entire mission, from 

wheels-up to wheels-down, with no intervention by the pilot except 

consent to weapons release.î9 The vehicles that are being conceived by 

industry will include varying degrees of control, in which the remote 
Unmanned Aerial VehiclesÖ7 

operator identifies the target and the UAV plans and executes a

coordinated attack. A truly autonomous vehicle would not require any 

form of human intervention. 

The military value of UAVs will depend on the ability to automate

many of the functions that have historically been performed by humans, 

which ranges from guiding a vehicle to delivering ordnance against 

military targets.10 The simplest form of automation is the radio-controlled

model airplane, while a more complicated autonomous aerial vehicle is the 

World War II V-1 ìBuzz Bomb,î which performed tasks in a fixed 

sequenceóas does a modem cruise missile that is guided by GPS. The 

most complex example of automation is a UAV that relies on a rule-based 

or expert system to detect, identify, and attack mobile targets.

Fundamentally, the essence of automation is to use rules to guide 

decision-making, but this is a highly complex problem in war. This 

complexity is illustrated by the air campaign during the Persian Gulf War, 

which involved roughly 2,600 allied aircraft of at least 41 different types 

and 950 opposing enemy aircraft of 17 types, of which at least 6 types of 

aircraft shared common features with allied aircraft. All of these aircraft 

could be attacked by various air-to-air weapons, 16,000 surface-to-air 

missiles in 10 types, and 7,000 anti-aircraft guns.11 For automation to

succeed in military operations, a computer must be able to sort though 

large numbers of choices and make good decisions about the use of lethal 

force in a reliable and timely fashion.12 At present, the problem is that 

rule-based decision-making has not reached a sufficient level of reliability 

to permit autonomous vehicles to make the kinds of decisions in war in 

which humans could have high confidence, especially when failure can

result in the deaths of hundreds or thousands of innocent civilians. 
8Ö Unmanned Aerial Vehicles 
Unmanned Aerial VehiclesÖ9 

III. Evaluating Aerial Vehicles 

This paper thus far has focused on understanding the differences 

between piloted, unmanned, remotely piloted, and autonomous vehicles. 

This discussion now turns to a consideration of the advantages and 

disadvantages of these vehicles in the context of how technological 

advances are altering the role of air vehicles in military operations. 

Characteristics of Piloted Vehicles

While there are many ways to characterize modem piloted aircraft, 

speed, range, altitude, and payload are among the more important when 

examining the differences between piloted and unpiloted vehicles. Beyond 

that, however, the most fundamental characteristic is that piloted vehicles 

rely on the presence of humans to detect and respond to changes in the 

vehicleís operation. While human sensors have their own limitations and 

shortcomings, it is still true that the current state of non-human sensors is 

not sufficiently developed to replace their human counterparts. Aircraft

have historically relied on pilots because technology has not been able to 

assess the operation of the aircraft without the presence of a human. The 

human can deal with the condition of the aircraft, including unusual 

vibration that may indicate structural damage or impending engine failure. 

The value of humans, which technology has not yet replaced, is the ability 

to absorb and analyze larger volumes of more diverse and ambiguous

information than any machine. A related characteristic is that piloted 

aircraft are designed for longer lifetimes than their unpiloted counterparts, 

principally because the human payload is considered to be intrinsically 

valuable. 

Perhaps the most important characteristic of piloted aircraft is their ability 

to deliver weapons that can be used to attack a wide array of targets. In 

terms of targeting, modern tactical aircraft can carry a number of 

munitions that can produce wide-area as well as precise effects, and do so

at standoff distances that range from thousands of meters to thousands of 

kilometers. The trend in recent years has been to increase the accuracy of 

munitions, which permits designers to reduce the size of the warhead. 
10Ö Unmanned Aerial Vehicles 

Finally, while conventional aircraft require long runways and large 

numbers of supporting personnel, facilities, and supplies, the shift toward 

weapon systems that employ some degree of automation will reduce our 

reliance on the infrastructure that is commonly associated with military 

organizations. 

Advantages. The most significant advantage of piloted vehicles is 

their ability to use humans to sense events within and outside the vehicle, 

which is known in military jargon as ìsituational awareness.î A related 

advantage of the reliance of humans is that no two pilots react the same in 

every situation, which in military operations involves how humans 

identify threats and targets, make decisions in unfamiliar and ambiguous 

situations, and function in an analytic and creative fashion. The advantage 

of human pilots is that they are able to adapt to new and different 

circumstances, make decisions on the basis of incomplete or ambiguous 

information, and deal with unexpected situations, such as damage or 

malfunction. One condition that distinguishes piloted vehicles from their 

automated counterparts is that the latter cannot possess these human 

qualities. While piloted vehicles use electronic devices, such as radio, 

radar, radar warning, and electronic countermeasures, to supplement the 

pilotís senses, the most fundamental characteristic of piloted vehicles is 

that the human makes critical decisions about the use of lethal force. 

The principal advantage of piloted vehicles is that people are able to 

solve problems that machines cannot, and further humans can tolerate 

greater confusion than machines and make decisions that computers 

cannot. Even in the first decade of the twenty-first century, we have not 

reached the stage where humans are freed from the responsibilities of 

supervising machines in war.13

For the U.S. Air Force Scientific Advisory Board, the concept of 

human control over the critical functions that are executed during combat 

operations is the most important of piloted vehicles. The SAB argues that 

human controllers have unique abilities that we have yet to replicate in 

machines, and which will represent a decisive advantage in combat as long 

as humans can think, synthesize, and comprehend faster than machines.14 

While unmanned vehicles can conduct military operations with minimal 

risk to humans, the tradeoff is a reduction in the ability of such vehicles to 
Unmanned Aerial VehiclesÖ11 

make decisions in military operations. Until UAVs can perform this 

function, their role in military operations will remain quite limited. 

Disadvantages. The principal disadvantage with piloted aircraft is that 

the human physiology imposes fundamental limits on the performance of 

the aircraft. At the same time, the presence of humans in aircraft increases 

their complexity and cost, and piloted vehicles are more vulnerable 

because they are larger than most UAVs, and hence more susceptible to 

attack than the smaller UAVs. A final disadvantage is that piloted aircraft 

are vulnerable to political exploitation. There are several recent cases in 

which the loss of an aircraft created political difficulties for the United 

States, including the loss of aircraft in the raid against Libya in 1986 

(Operation Eldorado Canyon), Bosnia in 1995, and the loss of an F-117 

over Serbia in March l999. 

Characteristics of Unmanned Vehicles 

UAVs fall into two distinct groups of remotely piloted and 

autonomous vehicles. This section examines the general characteristics of 

UAVs, while the subsequent discussion focuses on the unique 

characteristics of autonomous vehicles. A useful concept for

distinguishing between these types of vehicles is to remember that 

remotely operated vehicles remove the operator from the vehicle, while 

autonomous vehicles remove the operation of the vehicle from the control 

of the human operator. 

By virtue of their range, persistence, and altitude capabilities, UAVs

enhance the ability to project military power, as demonstrated by the

Predator and Global Hawk UAVs, whose endurance is far greater than that 

of piloted vehicles. For these reasons, UAVs can accomplish tasks that are 

increasingly difficult for manned aircraft, of which attacking chemical and 

biological warfare facilities and suppressing enemy air defenses are 

emerging as critical problems. At the same time, UAV technologies are 

Teaching the level of technological maturity where they are able to inflict 

devastating damage on many targets. 

In historical terms, extending the range or distance between the target 

and the person who is responsible for using the weapon were significant 

factors in the development of UAVs. The use of UAVs began with 
12Ö Unmanned Aerial Vehicles 

German experiments with guided weapons in WWII including the V-1 

Buzz Bomb. This approach parallels the modern tactic of using highaltitude piloted aircraft or low-altitude cruise missiles to deliver ordnance. 

The development of UAVs for photo reconnaissance was spurred in the 

early 1960s by the downing of the U-2 aircraft that was piloted by Francis 

Gary Powers in May 1960 and the downing of a U-2 during the Cuban 

Missile Crisis. Furthermore, UAVs were used for photographic, 

communications, and electronics reconnaissance, surveillance, and 

electronic combat in the Vietnam War, and by Israel for photographic and 

electronic reconnaissance as well as decoys during the 1973 Yom Kippur 

War and 1982 Lebanon operation.15 More recently, the U.S. Army, Navy, 

and Marine Corps used the Pioneer UAV for tactical reconnaissance, 

surveillance, and target acquisition during the Persian Gulf War.16 

In operational terms, UAVs can operate at altitudes that exceed 

70,000 feet and can carry optical sensors and radar.17 The development of 

new warhead technologies allows UAVs to deliver compact weapons that 

can inflict significant damage against fixed and moving targets. While 

these technologies can be used with manned aircraft, the interesting 

possibility is that UAVs could be used to locate and destroy mobile 

targets, in particular because of recent successes with the development of 

automatic target recognition software.18 

Advantages. The principal advantage of UAVs is their ability to 

reduce the risk to humans, and thus to provide cost-effective military 

options that can be used when political or environmental conditions 

prohibit the use of manned systems. The other advantages of UAVs are 

the ability to free the aircraft from the humanís inability to withstand 

acceleration, (g) forces, and fatigue, and to eliminate the myriad systems 

that sustain human life in the cockpit, and that increase the weight, 

complexity, and cost of piloted aircraft. Once freed from these limitations, 

UAVs can be more maneuverable, enjoy longer endurance or loiter times, 

and be less observable than their piloted counterparts. The principal 

operational advantage of UAVs is their ability to fly close to highly 

defended targets, which in the case of nuclear, biological, and chemical 

(NBC) targets, creates significant risk for pilots. 

Disadvantages. The primary disadvantages of UAVs are their need 

for large bandwidth communications, vulnerability to jamming, and low 
Unmanned Aerial VehiclesÖ13 

survivability in military operations. While it is commonly assumed that 

UAVs are relatively inexpensive in comparison with manned aircraft, the 

current generation of UAVs is relatively expensive to develop and build.

However, this cost advantage may be overstated if the expected operating 

costs of the Global Hawk UAV are roughly half the operating cost of U-2 

aircraft. While the Global Hawk cannot perform all of the U-2ís missions, 

it is interesting if UAVs are less expensive to operate.19 For now, the 

production costs for UAVs are relatively high because these systems 

typically involve small production runs, and the avionics and weapons

used by UAVs are quite sophisticated and expensive. An important 

concern is that the losses of UAVs could be prohibitively expensive if 

large numbers were lost in military operations. A second problem with 

UAVs is their need for sufficient bandwidth to permit the remote operator 

to maintain an adequate data link with the vehicle. And the need for large 

bandwidth increases their vulnerability to jamming. 

A third problem is that UAVs have unique survivability problems.

The most notable are that UAVs are not technologically sophisticated 

enough to warn the operator that the vehicle is under attack, cannot 

operate in adverse weather, and have a low level of reliability, which 

reduces the role of UAVs in military operations.20

Characteristics of Remotely Operated Vehicles 

Since RPVs have a remote operator, these vehicles are smaller, have 

greater operational endurance, are less expensive than piloted vehicles

with comparable capabilities, and rely on sensors and communication 

links to inform the operator of the condition of the vehicle. The current 

approach is to use RPVs for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance

missions, and some thought has been given to using RPVs in air combat 

missions to protect other fighter aircraft or high-value assets, such as the

Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS). However, the ability of 

RPVs to perform these missions will require these vehicles to have the 

autonomous functions that typically increase their development and 

acquisition costs. 

Advantages. The principal advantage of remotely operated vehicles is 

their ability to use human reasoning, and that the vehicle is less expensive
14Ö Unmanned Aerial Vehicles 

than its piloted counterpart. RPVs can be smaller, lighter, have greater 

endurance than piloted vehicles, and can be stealthy depending on the 

design of the aircraft and its communication system. However, while 

RPVs enjoy many of the advantages that are associated with human 

decision-making, these vehicles are limited by the fact that aircraft must 

rely on the sensors and time delays that exist when the aircraft and the 

operator are in different locations. 

The operational advantage of RPVs is their ability to maneuver more 

adeptly than piloted vehicles. In addition, the rule is that RPVs are less 

detectable than aircraft because their smaller size makes them less 

observable. The roles of the remote operator are similar to the ability of 

the pilot, which is to make decisions in the presence of incomplete or 

unambiguous information, deal with unexpected circumstances, and take 

measures to protect the vehicle. To be successful, however, the operator 

must have access to timely information about threats to the vehicle, be 

able to identify that an attack is contemplated or in progress, and take 

measures to protect the vehicle. The problem is that the current generation 

of RPVs, as exemplified by the Predator UAV, does not have the 

technological sophistication to perform these measures. 

Disadvantages. The principal disadvantage is that the operator is 

fundamentally unaware of the tactical situation around the vehicle, which 

translates into a greater probability that the mission will fail or the vehicle 

will be lost. At present, RPVs are susceptible to the loss of the electronic 

link with the human operator, which has catastrophic implications for 

failure of the mission or the loss of the vehicle. A general rule is that 

military systems that rely on distributed sensors are quite vulnerable to 

failures of the communication links. Another important disadvantage with 

RPVs, which tends to be ignored or diminished, is that the distance 

between the vehicle and the operator causes a time delay, which makes 

RPVS less responsive in combat. Finally, the RPV operator often does not 

have the same degree of situational awareness as the pilots in manned 

vehicles. 
Unmanned Aerial VehiclesÖ15 

Characteristics of Autonomous Vehicles 

As noted earlier, autonomous vehicles can perform their functions 

without a human operator, and as a result tend to be smaller and less costly 

than piloted vehicles. The fact that autonomous vehicles are smaller than 

remotely operated vehicles reflects the absence of communications 

systems and their relatively simple guidance systems, and gives

autonomous vehicles significantly greater operational endurance. While 

the current generation of autonomous vehicles is limited to performing 

intelligence and surveillance missions and attacking fixed targets, the 

expectation is that technological advances will reach the point where 

autonomous vehicles will be able to attack mobile targets, such as missile 

launchers or command and control vehicles. 

Advantages. The primary advantage of autonomous vehicles is their 

ability to work faster, more precisely, and more reliably than human 

operators. While the value of autonomous vehicles increases as the 

complexity of the task increases, the performance of autonomous vehicles 

depends fundamentally on artificial intelligence. However, the present 

generation of computers does not have sufficient reasoning power to make 

the right targeting decisions in military operations.

21

The cost of autonomous vehicles relates directly to their capabilities. 

For now, autonomous vehicles with simple guidance systems cannot adapt 

to changing conditions on the battlefield as it flies toward the target. 

Military commanders, however, will want relatively inexpensive vehicles 

in the arsenal that are equipped with complex sensors, can interact with 

other systems, and are able to react to rapidly changing situations. At 

present, the United States does not have the technological capability to 

build autonomous vehicles that can perform even relatively simple 

missions. 

Autonomous vehicles have an advantage in terms of their endurance 

or when they are operating in the presence of nuclear, chemical, or

biological weapons.22 Mother advantage with autonomous vehicles is 

derived from the fact that these vehicles are freed from the constraints that 

we imposed by the need for long runways or large fuel supplies, and thus

can be dispersed to a large number of small airfields. Finally, autonomous 
16Ö Unmanned Aerial Vehicles 

vehicles can be sufficiently small that they are difficult to observe and 

destroy. 

Disadvantages. The primary disadvantage with autonomous vehicle is 

that human controllers have very little information about how the mission 

is succeeding or how the vehicle is performing. While autonomous 

vehicles could be used to provide bomb damage assessment in much the 

same fashion as weapons that are guided with electro-optical sensors, the 

current state of the technology does not permit the present generation of 

autonomous vehicle to provide this information. 

A significant disadvantage with autonomous vehicles is that the 

system may be susceptible to ambiguities or simple programming errors 

that cause it to attack friendly forces and cause collateral damage in areas 

that contain civilian non-combatants. The broader disadvantage with 

purely autonomous systems is that computers cannot make decisions 

without humans to supervise their behavior.23 In terms of cost, 

autonomous vehicles that possess sophisticated artificial intelligence or 

expert systems will be expensive, complex, and prone to behave in ways 

that an adversary could recognize and exploit. In general, these machines 

cannot adapt to or exploit the factors that are essential to success in 

combat. 

A reasonable assumption is that autonomous vehicles are not able to 

analyze the events or display the freedom of action that is essential for 

success in military operations. Autonomous vehicles cannot replicate the 

human ability to understand the nuances that make the difference between 

success and failure in war.24 Autonomous vehicles cannot demonstrate 

initiative, but must rely on the expert systems or artificial intelligence that 

in itself is a product of lists of explicit rules and contingencies. These 

systems will lack the human ability to adapt and behave in unpredictable 

ways, which will increase their vulnerability to enemy actions. One reason 

for this limitation is that expert systems do not react well to information 

that operates at the edge of their ìknowledge,î known as ìbrittleness,î 

which increases their vulnerability to enemies who can use deception or 

ambiguity to confuse the autonomous vehicle.25 Given the sheer number of 

objects that highly automated systems may encounter and number of 

decisions that must be made correctly and rapidly, the problem is the 

relative ease with which an adversary could exploit autonomous vehicles 
Unmanned Aerial VehiclesÖ17 

IV. Military Roles for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles 

Manned aircraft has dominated the twentieth century, but 

technological advances are leading to the development of UAVs that will 

be able to perform military missions that once were reserved for piloted 

aircraft. There are a number of roles that UAVS could perform in future 

military operations. 

Transportation. While it is very unlikely that UAVs will transport

passengers in the near future, a more realistic possibility is that UAVs 

could transport cargo, especially in the relatively small quantities that 

would apply in tactical situations. The current state of technology may be 

sufficient to create remotely piloted or autonomous helicopters that are 

capable of delivering supplies and ammunition to troops in the field, as 

long as specific instructions and restrictions guide these UAVs. 

Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance. A more practical is to 

use UAVs for intelligence, reconnaissance and surveillance option

missions, which would take advantage of the fact that UAVs have long 

loiter times, can be positioned flexibly near potential targets, and are small 

and relatively difficult to detect. The long endurance of UAVs is 

particularly important for surveillance when these operations could be 

conducted over days. In this sense, UAVs could relieve manned platforms

of the need to maintain the high operational tempo for the extended 

periods that are the norm in modern military contingencies. 

The U.S. military in surveillance missions uses a number of UAVs. 

The U.S. Air Force has used the Global Hawk for surveillance missions, 

and the U.S. Army and Navy developed the Outrider UAV for tactical 

reconnaissance.26 The Congressional Budget Office recommended that 

UAVs should be bought in order to reduce the Armyís purchase of 

Comanche reconnaissance helicopters, which would save several billion 

dollars.27 Meanwhile, the U.S. military is developing UAVs that can fly 

autonomously and broadcast real-time information, which the U.S. Army 

will use for reconnaissance, jamming, chemical or biological detection, 

and placing remote sensors on the battlefield.28

Attack Fixed Targets. The U.S. military has developed UAVs that

demonstrated the ability to launch weapons against air defense sites. As
18Ö Unmanned Aerial Vehicles 

early as 1972 a Ryan Lightning Bug drone successfully launched an 

AGM-65 Maverick electro-optical missile against a radar control van.29 It 

is conceivable that UAVs could detect whether states are involved in 

manufacturing or storing weapons of mass destruction, and attack those 

facilities. The U.S. Air Force Scientific Advisory Board suggested that to 

attack these facilities, the United States should develop ìdual-equippedî 

UAVs with multi-spectral sensors and weapons. This surveillance UAV 

would fly in concert with UAVs that are armed with precision, guided 

penetrating weapons or weapons, which employ kill mechanisms that 

prevent the spread of these materials. UAVs can be used to attack highvalue, fixed ground targets in military operations. Once military 

commanders give the location, type of target, and desired weapons effects 

to the UAV, it would determine the proper way to attack the targets with a 

remote operator or some form of automation. 

Attack Mobile Targets. The concept of attacking mobile targets with 

UAVs is quite popular, and involves using sensors on high-altitude, longendurance UAVs in conjunction with aircraft. The fundamental problem 

with using UAVs is the difficulties of detecting and identifying targets in 

modem combat operations. For now, the problems of finding and 

destroying the right targets in combat operations mitigate against using 

UAVs for attacking mobile targets. If equipped with surveillance and 

reconnaissance sensors as well as munitions, low observable UAVs that 

operate at high-altitudes for long periods could be used to detect theater 

and cruise missiles. The relatively long endurance of these vehicles, when 

coupled with the ability to detect and identify targets, could make 

remotely operated UAVs a viable option for this mission. 

Air-to-Air Combat. In the foreseeable future, technology will permit 

UAVs to conduct offensive and defensive combat operations against 

aircraft, cruise missiles, and ballistic missiles. If military commanders 

could use advanced UAVs to intercept aircraft, they would be able to shift 

manned aircraft to other combat missions. If we look to the longer term, it 

may be technologically feasible to develop UAVs that can replace the 

current generation of combat aircraft with vehicles whose performance 

and survivability exceeds that of piloted vehicles. Furthermore, UAVs 

could be used to attack facilities that produce or store weapons of mass 

destruction as well as attack critical fixed and moving targets.30 While 
Unmanned Aerial VehiclesÖ19 

some form of remotely piloted vehicle may be valuable in air combat, 

many concepts that rely on degrees of automation, exceed current 

technological capabilities. 

Combat Support Missions. A related idea is to use UAVs for the 

electronic support operations that are performed by strike aircraft and 

bombers, which involves using UAVs in conjunction with aircraft to target 

and jam fire-control radars. This category of UAV could function as a 

decoy that duplicates the radar, infrared, and radio signatures of fighter 

aircraft to increase their survivability. Once UAVs detect the location of 

enemy air defenses and transmit that data to manned attack aircraft, these

or other UAVs could deliver weapons to destroy enemy air defenses, as 

noted earlier. 

Summary. It is inevitable that technological developments will permit 

UAVs to assume many military roles. For this reason, it is essential for the 

United States to use the investment in UAV technology to increase the 

cost effectiveness of weapon systems while reducing the risk to humans in 

combat. However, the prudent option for the United States is to maintain 

significant capabilities in manned aircraft until computers and sensors 

have reached the point where they are capable of making the decisions in 

war that historically were controlled by humans. 
20Ö Unmanned Aerial Vehicles 
Unmanned Aerial VehiclesÖ21 

V. Conclusions 

The U.S. military faces numerous concepts for how UAVs should be

used in military operations, but the fact is that many of these concepts rest 

on speculation about how UAV technologies might work. Given the

present state of technology, there are significant problems that limit our 

ability to use unmanned vehicles, especially those that rely on automation 

to make decisions in combat. By most standards, automation is the critical 

technology that will determine whether UAVs will be able to function 

effectively in military operations. It is not enough to say that because the 

current generation of cruise missiles use inertial navigation systems, 

automated terrain-comparison, or Global Positioning System (GPS)

technologies, that the U.S. military has reached the point where UAVs can 

assume a dominant role in military operations?

31 The reality is that the 

development of UAVs has been slowed by the problems associated with 

building autonomous machines that can perform human functions, of 

which making decisions in combat about the use of lethal force are 

probably the most difficult. 

There is no doubt that recent technological advances have increased 

the military value of UAVs. For example, control systems have been 

perfected to the point where the operator needs far less experience with 

operating vehicles, and can focus on delivering weapons. Nor is it clear 

that UAVs will be less expensive to operate than their manned 

counterparts. While one study suggested that the Global Hawk UAV may 

be less expensive to operate than the U-2 aircraft, there are considerable 

uncertainties about how much it will cost to operate UAVs. For example, 

the U.S. Air Force discovered during the 1999 Balkans campaign that it 

was more expensive to operate the Predator UAV than it had anticipated.32

Finally, the military must understand that there will always be cases 

in which unmanned vehicles cannot fulfill the missions performed by 

manned aircraf.33 The fundamental technological problem with UAVs is 

their limited ability to deal with ambiguity in military operations. Whether 

in major wars or peace enforcement operations, military commanders

routinely make mistakes when identifying friendly and enemy forces as 

well as civilians. A notable example was the failure to 
22Ö Unmanned Aerial Vehicles 

realize that civilians were crossing a bridge in Kosovo at the same time as 

military forces, which were attacked by NATO aircraft.34 The problem is 

that command and control bunkers may shelter civilians or surface-to-air 

missile systems may be located in urban areas, which if attacked by 

mistake will kill innocent civilians. To pass the threshold where UAVs can 

be used extensively in military operations, UAVs must demonstrate a level 

of automation that can deal with this ambiguity, but this standard still 

exceeds our technological capabilities. Until remotely operated UAVs 

have the sensors and computers that can resolve the ambiguities that exist 

in combat, the U.S. military will not be able to rely on automated systems. 

This is not to say that technology will never create automated systems that 

can guide UAVs on military missions. But the danger is that as the volume 

of information grows which increases the pressure to make decisions more 

quickly, human operators may become so overloaded that they willingly 

abdicate control to automated systems. 

A related question is whether the development of UAVs will lead the 

technological obsolescence or extinction of piloted aircraft, and hence of 

the U.S. Air Force. The counter argument however, is that if the U.S. Air 

Force fails to adapt to rapid technological change, its role will diminish in 

any case.35 Nevertheless, it is conceivable that the reliance on machines 

could accelerate the demise of an era in which humans play a decisive role 

in the use of air power. 

These technological developments should not obscure the fact that 

piloted, remotely piloted, and autonomous aerospace vehicles can make 

significant contributions to military operations, and that military 

organizations must consider how these technologies will change the 

doctrinal foundations of military power. The U.S. military must adapt to 

technological change if it is to preserve its ability to prevail in military 

operations. And this, rather than the presence of human operators, is the 

ultimate military and technological test of success. 

As technological advances increase the lethality of weapons on the 

modern battlefield, it is inevitable that UAVs will reduce the risks to 

humans in combat. It is illusory, however, to believe that technological 

progress will completely erase the need for placing humans in harmís way. 

If there is a fundamental constraint on the development of UAVs, it is that 

technology promises to find purely unmanned solutions to combat but 

cannot deliver on that promise. Political and military authorities should 
Unmanned Aerial VehiclesÖ23 

approach with caution the prospect of a world in which automated systems

select military targets and employ lethal ordnance. Let us imagine the

dangers of a situation in which an autonomous vehicle that is armed with 

missiles mistakenly attacks a school bus, which is filled with children 

because the automatic target recognition software concluded that the

ìtargetî was the transported-erector launcher that carried a SCUD missile. 

This problem can be compounded if one considers that the automatic

target recognition system might fail to ìrealizeî that the mobile missile is 

parked in a schoolyard. 

While automation can assist humans, we have not reached the point 

where technology will allow automated systems to make decisions about 

the use of lethal military force. If the objective behind the development of 

UAVs is find technological solutions for saving human lives in combat, it 

should not divert the technological community from finding better ways to 

integrate humans and machines into the most effective system for making 

the best possible decisions in war 
24Ö Unmanned Aerial Vehicles 
Unmanned Aerial VehiclesÖ25 

Notes 

1. United States Air Force Scientific Advisory Board, Report on 

UAV Technologies and Combat Operations (Volume 1: Summary), SABTR-96-01. November 1996. 

2. Joint Publication 1-20, Department of Defense Dictionary of

Military and Associated Terms, March 23, 1994, as amended through 

April 15, 1998, pp. 138, 369, and 459. 

3. Author interview with Edward E. Huling, III, and Major James

D. McCormick, Reconnaissance Systems Program Office, Aeronautical 

Systems Center, November 24, 1998. 

4. Brian T. Kehl and Michael D. Wilson, Manned Versus 

Unmanned Reconnaissance Air Vehicles: A Quantitative Comparison of 

the U-2 and Global Hawk Operating and Support Costs, 

AFIT/GCA/LAS/98S-7 (Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, OH: Air Force 

Institute of Technology Thesis, 1998). 

5. United States Air Force Scientific Advisory Board, Report on 

UAV Technologies and Combat Operations (Volume 1: Summary), SABTR-96-01, November 1996, pp. 4-6. 

6. See William Wagner, Lightning Bugs and Other Reconnaissance 

Drones (Fallbrook, CA: Aero Publishers, 1982). See also Christopher A. 

Jones, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs): An Assessment of Historical 

Operations and Future Possibilities (Maxwell AFB, AL: Air Command 

and Staff College, March 1997), p. 11, 

7. In terms of cost, the least expensive weapon is a dumb bomb, the 

next more expensive option is an expendable cruise missile or a precision 

standoff weapon that is delivered from manned platform, and the most 

expensive option is a precision weapon that is delivered by a reusable

vehicle that is remotely piloted or autonomous. 

8. ìGlobal Hawk 2 Flight Sets Stage For Airborne Sensor Tests,î 

Aviation Week & Space Technology, November 30, 1998, p. 32. 

ìOperators had one unexpected event. While on approach, the Global 

Hawk was told by the Edwards [Air Force Base] tower that heavy traffic

required it to hold. The aircraftís flight plan was suspended, and the UAV 

25
26Ö Unmanned Aerial Vehicles 

was put into a holding pattern [by the remote operator] at 5,000 ft. until it 

was permitted to land. It then conducted an autonomous landing.î 

9. Bill Sweetman, ìPilotless Fighters: Has Their Time Come?î 

Janeís International Defense Review, June 1997, pp. 57-61. 

10. Stan Gibilisco, ed., The McGraw-Hill Illustrated Encyclopedia of 

Robotics & Artificial Intelligence (New York, NY: McGraw-Hill, Inc., 

1994), p. 406. For reference, there are at least eight levels of automation,

ranging from manually operated tools and manipulators, machines that 

perform a series of tasks in a fixed sequence, programmable manipulators, 

numerically controlled robots, sensate robots or robots that incorporate 

any type of sensor, adaptive robots that compensate for changes in their 

environment, smart robots with artificial intelligence, and smart 

ìmechatronicî or mechanical-electronic systems that can control a fleet of 

robots or robotic devices. 

11. James P. Coyne, Airpower in the Gulf (Arlington, VA: Air Force

Association, 1992), pp. 19-35. 

12. Gibilisco, p. 62. 

13. Ibid., p.23. 

14. See United States Air Force Scientific Advisory Board, Report 

on UAV Technologies and Combat Operations (Volume 1: Summary), 

SAB-TR-96-01, November 1996, pp. 4-3, which noted that, ìHumans can 

learn to perform control functions and can thus adapt to unexpected inputs 

and demands. Humans can also reason effectively under conditions of 

uncertainty and perform higher order integration tasks.î See John R. 

Boyd, Patterns of Conflict, December 1986 briefing, who argued that ìto 

win, we should operate at a faster tempo or rhythm than our adversariesó

or, better yet, get inside adversaryís Observation-Orientation-DecisionAction time cycle or loop.î 

15. Dana Longino, Role of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles in Future 

Armed Conflict Scenarios (Maxwell Air Force Base, AL: Air University 

Press, 1994), pp. 1-6. 

16. Christopher A. Jones, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs): An 

Assessment of Historical Operations and Future Possibilities,

AU/ACSC/0230D/97-03 (Maxwell AFB, AL: Air Command and Staff 

College, March 1997), p. 5. 

17. Report on UAV Technologies and Combat Operations, op. cit., 

pp. 4-1, 4-2. 

18. Ibid., pp. 2, 3-2 to 3-4. 

19. See Kehl and Wilson, pp. 51, 81, 88. 
Unmanned Aerial VehiclesÖ27 

20. Report on UAV Technologies and Combat Operations, p. 4-2. 

21. Gibilisco, pp. 23, 25, 81. 

22. Report on (UAV Technologies and Combat Operations, pp. 3-2, 

4-2. 

23. Gibilisco, p. 23. 

24. Boyd, Patterns of Conflict 

25. Daniel Crevier, AI: The Tumultuous History of the Search for 

Artificial Intelligence (New York: Basic Books, 1993), p. 207. 

26. Author interview with Lieutenant Colonel Paul Geier, U.S. Air 

Force UAV Battlelab, November 17, 1998. 

27. David A. Fulghum, ìU.S. Army Debates Tactical UAV 

Requirements,î Aviation Week & Space Technology, November 23, 1998, 

p. 50. 

28. David A. Fulghum, ìMiniature Air Vehicles Fly Into Armyís 

Future,î Aviation Week & Space Technology, November 9, 1998, p. 37 

29. Jones, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, p. 13. 

30. Report on UAV Technologies and Combat Operations, p. 4-3 

31. See ìGallery of USAF Weapons,î Air Force Magazine Vol. 81, 

No. 5 (May l998), p. 155. 

32. David A. Fulghum and Robert Wall, ìPentagon Budget Up, But 

Research Withers,î Aviation Week & Space Technology, February 8, 

1999, p. 28, 

33. See Kehl and Wilson, pp. 51, 81-88. 

34. ABC News, June 1, 1999. 

35. See Carl H. Builder, The Masks of War: American Military 

Styles in Strategy and Analysis (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins 

University Press, 1989); Carl H. Builder, The Icarus Syndrome: The Role

of Air Power Theory in the Evolution and Fate of the U.S. Air Force (New 

Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 1994).

27
Center for Strategy and Technology 

The Center for Strategy and Technology was established at the Air 

War College in 1996. Its purpose is to engage in long-term strategic 

thinking about technology and its implications for U.S. national security. 

 The Center focuses on education, research, and publications that 

support the integration of technology into national strategy and policy. Its 

charter is to support faculty and student research, publish research through 

books, articles, and occasional papers, fund a regular program fo guest 

speakers, host conferences and symposia on these issues, and engage in 

collaborative research with U.S. and international academic institutions. 

As an outside funded activity, the Center enjoys the support of institutions 

in the strategic, scientific, and technological worlds. 

 An essential part of this program is to establish relationships with 

organizations in the Air Force as well as other Department of Defense 

agencies, and identify potential topics for research projects. Research 

conducted under the auspices of the Center is published as Occasional 

papers and disseminated to senior military and political officials, think 

tanks, educational institutions, and other interested parties. Through these 

publications, the Center hopes to promote the integration of technology 

and strategy in support of U.S. national security objectives. 

 For further information on the Center for Strategy and Technology, 

please contact: 

Grant T. Hammond, Director 

Theodore C. Hailes, Deputy Director 

John P. Geis II, Director of Operations 

Air War College 

325 Chennault Circle 

Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama 36112 

(334) 953-6996/2985/5579 

(DSN 493-6996/2985/5579) 

Email: Grant.Hammond@maxwell.af.mil

 Ted.Hailes@maxwell.af.mil

John.Geis@maxwell.af.mil
Titles in the Occasional Papers Series 

1 

Reachback Operations for Air Campaign Planning and Execution

Scott M. Britten, September 1997 

2 

Lasers in Space: Technological Options for Enhancing U.S. Military 

Capabilities 

Mark E. Rogers, November 1997 

3 

Non-Lethal Technologies: Implications for Military Strategy 

Joseph Siniscalchi, March 1998 

4 

Perils of Reasoning by Historical Analogy: Munich, Vietnam, and the 

American Use of Force Since 1945 

Jeffrey Record, March 1998 

5 

Lasers and Missile Defense: New Concepts for Space-Based and GroundBased Laser Weapons 

William H. Possel, July 1998 

6 

Weaponization of Space: Understanding Strategic and Technological 

Inevitables

Thomas D. Bell, January 1999 

7

Legal Constraints or Information Warfare

Mark Russell Shulmann, March 1999 

8 

Serbia and Vietnam: A Preliminary Comparison of U.S. Decisions to Use 

Force 

Jeffrey Record, May 1999 
9 

Airborne and Space-Based Lasers: An Analysis of Technological and 

Operational Compatibility 

Kenneth W. Barker, June 1999 

10 

Directed Energy and Fleet Defense: Implications for Naval Warfare

William J. McCarthy, February 2000 

11 

High Power Microwaves: Strategic and Operational Implications for 

Warfare

Eileen M. Walling, March 2000 

12 

Reusable Launch Vehicles and Space Operations 

John E. Ward, Jr., March 2000 

13 

Cruise Missiles and Modern War: Strategic and Technological 

Implications 

David J. Nicholls, March 2000 

14 

Deeply Buried Facilities: Implications for Military Operations 

Eric M. Sepp, March 2000 

15 

Technology and Command: Implications for Military Operations in the 

Twenty-First Century 

William B. McClure, July 2000