Cheerful or not

The Drone Delusion || House of Marathon

Drones are emblematic of America’s reliance on advanced technology in warfare and have become the principal instrument in the nation’s fight against terrorists. While unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) technology is a few decades old, they have become indispensable to American military operations. The manpower-intensive nature of counterinsurgency and stability operations in Afghanistan and Iraq have increased the requirement for the unique intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities provided by drones by several orders of magnitude in just under a decade. Moreover, armed drone strikes have become central to American counter-terrorist operations in Afghanistan-Pakistan. In the parlance of national security practitioners, drones constitute an “asymmetric” advantage for the United States — a unique means of warfare available primarily to one side in a conflict.  Indeed, the success achieved by drone strikes, in tandem with the American surge in Afghanistan and the killing of Osama bin Laden in July 2011, have convinced national decision-makers that Al Qaeda is within “strategic defeat.” The conviction would be welcome if it was indeed based on more than the impressive technological of remotely piloted vehicles. As many practitioners will caveat, the enemy has a vote, and in the face of overwhelming American military strength, it will readily employ its own asymmetric advantages. When American drones are contrasted with enemy stratagems, the alleged advantage evaporates. Ascribing strategic advantage to drones exaggerates their effectiveness and obscures needed changes in the way the United States approaches contemporary security challenges.

F-16 pilot was ready to give her life on Sept. 11 || Washington Post

For years, Penney, one of the first generation of female combat pilots in the country, gave no interviews about her experiences on [September] 11 (which included, eventually, escorting Air Force One back into Washington’s suddenly highly restricted airspace).

But 10 years later, she is reflecting on one of the lesser-told tales of that endlessly examined morning: how the first counterpunch the U.S. military prepared to throw at the attackers was effectively a suicide mission.

“We had to protect the airspace any way we could,” she said last week in her office at Lockheed Martin, where she is a director in the F-35 program.

Penney, now a major but still a petite blonde with a Colgate grin, is no longer a combat flier. She flew two tours in Iraq and she serves as a part-time National Guard pilot, mostly hauling VIPs around in a military Gulfstream. She takes the stick of her own vintage 1941 Taylorcraft tail-dragger whenever she can.

Breaching Defense Contractor Data || Aviation Week

Then-Defense Secretary Robert Gates’s prediction in 2009 that China would have no stealth aircraft in 2020 and only a handful in 2025 had started to look optimistic—but was contradicted by U.S. Air Force Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Phillip Breedlove’s Senate testimony in July. China, he said, can close the technology gap faster than expected because of “the way they’re intruding into the nets of our manufacturers and our government.” Breedlove added: “When they say they’re going to build 300 [J-20s] in the next five years, they will build 300 in the next five years.”

China has made rapid progress in other areas….  These advances are emerging 5-6 years after cybersecurity professionals detected what came to be dubbed the advanced persistent threat, or APT—in other words, reducing the time taken from conceptual design of a military system to prototyping.

The APT was barely mentioned in public until last year. Even now, few people in industry or government call it what it is—a massive campaign of cybernetwork exploitation (CNE) originating in China.

Inside Afghanistan’s Deadly Copter War || Danger Room

When the helicopters crested the summit in the exceptionally thin air, Maj and the other pilot, Chief Warrant Officer 2 Adam Rickert, would have to monitor their tab data and balance competing power requirements. Too much throttle and there wouldn’t be enough resources to cool the engine, resulting in a meltdown. Too little throttle and the Kiowa wouldn’t get there in time.

Maj knew he would have to slow the bird down to about 70 painstaking knots over the mountains (max cruising speed is about 100 to 110) in order to get there in one piece. The trip would take 20 minutes, which is close to forever when troops are in contact. They began their ascent.

For the 33-year-old former infantryman, it was one of the worst feelings in the world. The flight felt like it took “forever,” he said.

“As you balance your temperature and pressure limits trying to get there as fast as possible,” explained Maj. “You know you’re their lifeline and when you’re fighting the winds, you can’t get enough airspeed, you can’t get there fast enough … it’s really emotionally wrecking.”

The Bounty Hunter Kiowas carefully navigated over the mountain range as the platoon nervously held its position in the qalat. Armored vehicles with crew-served weapons had moved as close as 300 feet from our position, but we would have to cross open ground to get to them. With two men hobbled by shrapnel, it was prudent to wait for air cover before making the attempt.

Adding an edge of fear to the situation was the fact that we had insufficient men to set wide security. If the insurgents realized which home we were in, they could throw more grenades into the residence’s open courtyard, almost certainly killing some of the men, and conceivably injuring everyone in the small space. The wait was tense.

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Once the route was deemed clear, the birds positioned themselves for a show of force: The pilots would make a series of passes with rockets and .50-caliber machine guns aimed into the countryside to further intimidate any potential attackers.

“What we try and do is get rockets out there and show that we’re not afraid to shoot,” said Maj. “Tricky part is finding a target area that best serves the purpose with sound effects, but gives you no collateral damage, no human bodies, no hurt flocks of sheep and total containment of shrapnel.”