A Bell 360 Invictus CG helicopter, which was one of the candidates for the US’s suddenly canceled next-generation reconnaissance attack helicopter project./US Bell Corporation
On the 8th (local time), the US Army announced that it would cancel the next-generation Future Attack Reconnaissance Aircraft (FARA) project, in which $2 billion (2.6 trillion won) had already been invested.
This is considering the increasing importance of unmanned aerial vehicles (drones) in the war in Ukraine and the war between Israel and Hamas, and the Japanese Ground Self-Defense Force canceled the additional introduction of manned attack helicopters and decided to introduce an aerial -crew. vehicles such as the MQ-9 ‘Reaper’ unmanned attack aircraft It is interpreted as being in accordance with the decision. It is noted that such a move by the United States and Japan has many implications for Korea, which is pursuing a project to mass produce light armored helicopters (LAH) by spending 5.75 trillion won by 2031.
The FARA project selects successor models such as the already retired OH-58D ‘Kiowa’ reconnaissance helicopter, and since 2019, the S-97 Sikorsky ‘Raider ‘Invictus’ has been competing. So far, $2 billion has been invested, and an additional $5 billion (6.6 trillion won) was to be invested in mass production.
According to US media reports, including the US military media outlet ‘Breaking Defense’, US Army officials told some reporters before announcing the sudden cancellation of the project that the reason for ending the FARA project was that it reflects the state of modern warfare. George, US Army Chief of Staff “We are learning from the battlefield, especially in Ukraine, that aerial reconnaissance has fundamentally changed,” said the chief in a press release. He also emphasized, “The range of unmanned systems and sensors and weapons carried in space is wider, more far-reaching and cheaper than ever before.”
Radar-X. Sikorsky, which was one of the applicants for the US next generation reconnaissance and attack helicopter project (FARA) which was suddenly cancelled.
“The US Army has no plans to begin another effort to dispose of the manned Kiowa helicopter, as it has done in the past,” said Laney, commander of the US Army Futures Command. “Instead, Kiowa will act as an armed scout that operates in advance. other units in war zones.” “To do this, we will invest elsewhere, particularly in the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) aspect.”
Due to rising costs, the US Army will also stop new production of the UH-60V, which extends the life of the UH-60 ‘Black Hawk’ by 10 years, after this year, and will produce the attack AH-64 ‘ Apache’ helicopters and a turbine improved UH-60 helicopter. It was also decided to postpone the production of an ITEP engine. It has also been decided to phase out the older Shadow and Raven unmanned reconnaissance aircraft currently in operation.
Instead, the US Army decided to introduce the new UH-60M and CH-47F Block II ‘Chinook’ and continue to pursue the next generation Future Long Range Attack Aircraft (FLRAA) project. The FLRAA project is a mega-scale project worth tens of billions of dollars to replace about 1,400 US military attack helicopters and some Apache attack helicopters, and Bell’s V-280 ‘Valor’ was selected in 2022.
The US Army plans to use the budget secured by canceling the FARA project to introduce new reconnaissance and attack drones. It is known that ‘Mojave’, which can take off and land a short distance, is attracting attention as a new reconnaissance attack drone.
A domestically produced light armed helicopter (LAH) that has begun mass production to replace older 500MD helicopters. /KAI
Mojave is an unmanned aerial vehicle being developed by US General Atomic (GA-ASI), famous as the maker of ‘Reaper’, widely known as a ‘killer drone’. Last year, a short-distance takeoff and landing test was successfully carried out in the California desert and on the British aircraft carrier Prince of Wales. The take-off distance in the desert was only 175m and the landing distance was only 100m.
Our Army has also been pursuing the Light Armored Helicopter (LAH) project since 2001 to replace older 500MD helicopters. Starting with the decision to request the small armed helicopter in 2001, it went through exploratory development (2011-2012), initial test evaluation (2019-2020), etc., and was deemed provisionally suitable for combat in December 2020. The first mass production decision was made in 2022. It was taken down. It is expected to be mass-produced between 2022 and 2031 at a cost of 5.75 trillion won, but as the role of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) increases in modern warfare, some have raised questions about their effectiveness.
KAI (Korea Aerospace Industries), which mass-produces small armed helicopters, plans to overcome limitations through a complex manned and unmanned system (MUM-T) that operates small unmanned aerial vehicles (for reconnaissance and suicide ) together in helicopters. A military source said, “Our military also needs to pay close attention to the decision of the United States and Japan to rapidly increase the share of unmanned aerial vehicles by taking advantage of lessons learned from the Ukraine War and to revisit existing projects .”
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