WASHINGTON — The military’s reliance on unmanned aircraft that can watch, hunt and sometimes kill insurgents has soared to more than 500,000 hours in the air, largely in Iraq, The Associated Press has learned.
And new Defense Department figures show that the Air Force more than doubled its monthly use of drones between January and October, forcing it to take pilots out of the air and shift them to remote flying duty to meet part of the demand.
The dramatic increase in the development and use of drones across the armed services reflects what will be an even more aggressive effort over the next 25 years, according to the new report.
The jump in Iraq coincided with the build up of U.S. forces this summer as the military swelled its ranks to quell the violence in Baghdad. But Pentagon officials said that even as troops begin to slowly come home this year, the use of Predators, Global Hawks, Shadows and Ravens will not likely slow.
“I think right now the demand for the capability that the unmanned system provides is only increasing,” said Army Col. Bob Quackenbush, deputy director for Army Aviation. “Even as the surge ends, I suspect the deployment of the unmanned systems will not go down, particularly for larger systems.”
For some Air Force pilots, that means climbing out of the cockpit and heading to places such as Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada, where they can remotely fly the Predators, one of the larger and more sophisticated unmanned aircraft.
About 120 Air Force pilots were recently transferred to staff the drones to keep pace with demands, the Air Force said.
In one recent example of what they can do, a Predator caught sight of three militants firing mortars at U.S. forces in November in Balad, Iraq. The drone fired an air-to-ground missile, killing the three, according to video footage the Air Force released.
The bulk of the unmanned flight hours belong to the Army’s workhorse drone, the Raven, which weighs just four pounds and is used by smaller units, such as companies and battalions, in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The Ravens, which soldiers fling into the air and use for surveillance, will rack up about 300,000 hours this year — double the time they were used last year, said Quackenbush.
The Army has a total of 361 unmanned aircraft in Iraq alone — including Shadows, Hunters and Ravens. And in the first 10 months of 2007, they flew more than 300,000 hours.
According to a new Pentagon report, the Defense Department plans to develop an “increasingly sophisticated force of unmanned systems” over the next 25 years. The effort will confront some current shortfalls, including plans to improve how well the drones can quickly and precisely identify and locate targets.
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