Plan to own 1,000 units in the US, invest 80 trillion won
Joint operation in the air with B-21 etc.
Autonomous flight and combat, the evolution of drones
The appearance of the ‘Ghost Bat’ MQ-28, an unmanned fighter jet developed by the US Boeing company / Reuters Yonhap News
It was discovered that the US military is developing an unmanned fighter jet based on artificial intelligence (AI) that can form in the air and attack enemies along with strategic bombers such as the B-21.
According to the Wall Street Journal on the 3rd (local time), the US Department of Defense plans to select two companies this summer to produce Cooperative Fighter Aircraft (CCA) with such functions. Already, US military companies such as Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, General Atomics, and Anduril are competing to win business orders. It is a type of ‘mini-fighter’ capable of joint action and is an advanced version of an unmanned attack aircraft (drone) that has already been commercialised. Through this, the US military intends to strengthen checks on China in the South Pacific and elsewhere.
The US Air Force plans to own 1,000 cooperative combat aircraft in the medium to long term, and plans to invest a total of $6 billion (about 80 trillion won) for this purpose.
These unmanned cooperative fighters are expected to escort piloted F-35 fighters and B-21 bombers, attack targets with directly mounted weapons, and serve as airborne reconnaissance and communications centers. It replaces the role of ‘wingman’ who escorts the main fighter aircraft.
Boeing previously unveiled the MQ-28 ‘Ghost Bat’ unmanned fighter and signed a supply contract with the Australian Air Force. The overall length of the Ghost Bats is 11.7m, which is about a quarter less than the F-16 fighter (15m overall length). Anduril released a prototype image of the ‘Fury’ unmanned fighter in development, and General Atomics, developer of the ‘Reaper’ (MQ-9) unmanned aerial vehicle, showed a rendering image of the ‘Gambit’ series a new drone based on AI. Until now Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman have kept their development programs secret.
The development of such unmanned cooperative fighter jets represents the development of flight software that uses AI to create programs capable of thousands of hours of combat and flight. The technology that allowed combat aircraft to be controlled on the ground has evolved to the next level, ushering in the era of autonomous flight and combat.
The US military currently estimates the target production price of unmanned AI fighter jets to be $20 million to $30 million (about KRW 26 billion to KRW 40 billion), and the defense industry predicts that the price per unit can be reduced to less than $10 million (KRW 13 billion) in the future This is very cheap compared to the F-35 fighter jet, which costs $100 million (130 billion after to win) the unit, or the B-21 bomber, which costs $750 million (1 trillion won).
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