The Israel Air Force, battling manpower shortages and budget restraints, has been building a fleet based on unmanned aircraft systems.
Officials said the Air Force has been rapidly building a UAS fleet at the expense of manned aircraft. They said the Air Force has reached a point in which more than 50 percent of flights were conducted by UAS as part of reconnaissance and other missions.
“In recent years, there have been more UAS than manned sorties in the Israel Air Force,” [Res.] Brigadier General Ophir Shoham, Director of the Defense Ministry’s Research and Development Directorate, said.
Officials said Israel has been developing UAS for a range of missions. They said the platforms have saved on fuel, pilot training, maintenance while achieving a greater level of stealth.
“Within a few years there will be a number of operational missions of a known character that we will be able to carry out with a small number of unmanned devices,” Shoham told the Israeli daily Haaretz.
Officials said the use of UAS would increase as the military was ordered to cut its budget. They said the Army, Navy and Air Force would conduct reconnaissance mostly through UAS, which would eventually also fulfill logistics and combat requirements.
Western diplomatic sources said Israel was also employing combat UAS, meant to fire light air-to-ground missiles. In 2013, an Israeli official confirmed the use of combat UAS, and Shoham said he envisioned the use of unmanned platforms that could both conduct reconnaissance as well as fire missiles.
“We will witness this in the foreseeable future,” Shoham said.
Photo: Heron – UPI/Debbie Hill
Source: World Tribune