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Advanced payloads "open the envelope" and unmanned platforms are slowly replacing manned aircraft. Only recently, the IAF equipped two of its Soval UAVs with maritime surveillance sensors and will soon operate them for the navy to replace manned patrol aircraft. "At first they will be operated parallel to the Seascan. These will gradually be phased out and the UAV will do the mission," a senior IAF source says. The air force has been operating the Seascans, modified IAI Westwind business jets, since 1978.

As technology matures, Israeli companies are working to increase the variety on UAVs they produce. In the pipeline are a system that will transform a manned helicopter into an unmanned rotorcraft and a ducted-fan unman­ned vehicle developed by Urban Aeronautics . The latter is designed to be used for medevec and supply missions in combat zones.

Miniaturisation

Shlomo Tsach, director of advanced programmes at IAI, is the man behind some of the company's UAV systems. He says that, in the coming years, efforts will be focused on shorter take-offs, lower operating costs and on a greater use of solar power and fuel cells. "The miniaturisation of the payloads also dictates the development of small UAVs," he says. "With a 10g camera with excellent quality, the capabilities are very clear."

Tsach espouses the view that the Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighter , which Israel plans to purchase, will be the last manned fighter. "UAVs will take over all the missions before this aircraft will finish its operational life."

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From uav_roadmap2005.pdf

Most of the military activities in Unmanned Air Vehicles, or in Unmanned Air Systems as they are starting to be called, is taking place in the USA, not surprisingly. The military interest in the potential of UAVs mushroomed after the extensive and very effective use made of them by the Isreali Air Force when it destroyed most of the fighter planes of the Syrian Air Force over the Bekaa Valley in the Lebanon in 1982.

From presentation by Colonel Langlois of the EDA at the Unmanned Systems Europe 2007 Conference in Cologne

Rapidly increased use of Unmanned Aircraft Systems, from a presentation "DoD UAS operations in the National Airspace System" by Fred Pease at the UAV 2007 Conference in Paris.

Above from US DoD http://www.acq.osd.mil/usd/Unmanned %20Systems%20Roadmap.2007-2032.pdf

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from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Battlefield_UAVs_ (1)

The Israelis were the prime movers in establishing the battlefield UAV as a standard military weapon. After the Yom Kippur War in the Middle East in 1972, when the Israelis suffered substantial air losses from Soviet built SAMs fired by Arab forces, the Israeli military searched for new technology to ensure they would not have the same problems in the future. This led them to cross paths with Alvin Ellis, who had been born and raised in the US and haf worked for Ryan on the Firebee and the Lightning Bugs. He emigrated to Israel in 1967 to join Israel Aircraft Industries and work on the Kfir fighter, a derivative of the French Dassault Mirage fighter but fitted with an American GE J79 engine.

The history of Ellis and the battlefield UAV tends to recall that of Reginald Denny and the target drone. Ellis liked to tinker with RC models, and after the Yom Kippur War he decided that a small drone with a TV camera might be an answer to some of Israeli's battlefield needs. He joined up with an IAI colleague named Yehuda Manor and the two put together a prototype in Manor's garage. They flew the prototype for a short time, but it crashed when one of its two engines failed. Ellis still felt the idea was good and pitched it to IAI management, but they turned him down. Undiscouraged, Ellis took the idea to Tadiran, the Israeli electronics conglomerate, and they funded a second prototype.

The prototype flew in 1973. It was just a large hobbyist's RC airplane, similar in configuration to Reginald Denny's early Radioplane drones. The new prototype was successful and led to a demonstrator named the "Owl" that was fitted with a cheap TV camera. It was demonstrated to Tadiran and military brass in early 1974. Tadiran management was sold on the idea and gave Ellis a contract to develop an operational system named "Mastiff". The Mastiff had a different configuration from the early prototypes, featuring the pusher -propeller twin-boom configuration that would become common for combat surveillance UAVs. The Mastiff was introduced in 1975, but nobody seemed interested.

Ellis did a stint back in the US in the late 1970s working on drone autopilots for American companies, while the Mastiff gathered dust. Only two were sold by 1979. The lack of activity was deceptive. The Israeli military was becoming increasingly interested in battlefield UAVs, and in response IAI management finally decided they were interested in the concept as well. Tadiran and IAI found themselves in bitter competition for military battlefield UAV contracts. The Israeli military began to buy more Mastiffs, while IAI came up with a competitor with the appropriate name of "Scout" and sold it to the military as well. The Scout, also known as "Zahavan (Oriole)", had a similar configuration to the Mastiff, with a pusher propeller and a twin-boom tail.

In June 1982, the Israelis began major military operations in Lebanon, where they were confronted by Syrian SAMs, which were heavily sited in Lebanon's Bekaa Valley. All 28 SAM sites in the Bekaa were destroyed, however, partly through the use of Sampson decoys to get them to reveal their presence, and partly through reconnaissance information obtained by the Mastiff and Scout UAVs.

Israeli battlefield UAVs had proven a great success, and soon came to the attention of the US military, particularly after the American intervention in Lebanon in 1983. This led to the US Navy's request for a battlefield UAV in 1984, and Tadiran and IAI decided, or were told to, join forces to submit a proposal for the American requirement. The result was an IAI division named "Mazlat", now "Malat".

The US military is reluctant to buy from foreign sources, so foreign companies always team up with an American company to push a sale. AAI had already worked with Tadiran to sell the Mastiff in the US, so AAI was a logical choice, and Mazlat and AAI developed the Pioneer, which won the competition. Since then, Malat has developed more advanced battlefield UAVs, and has collaborated on battlefield UAV developments with partners such as AAI.

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from Bassey’s“Unmanned Aircraft”,

published by Arthur Reid in 1979, ISBN 0 904609 32 4, page 88

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from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_unmanned_aerial_vehicles

Reginald Denny and the Radioplane

The first large-scale production, purpose-built drone was the product of Reginald Denny . He served with the British Royal Flying Corps during World War I , and after the war emigrated to the United States to seek his fortunes in Hollywood as an actor. Denny had made a name for himself as an actor, and between acting jobs, he pursued his interest in radio control model aircraft in the 1930s. He and his business partners formed "Reginald Denny Industries" and opened a model plane shop in 1934 on Hollywood Boulevard known as "Reginald Denny Hobby Shops".

The shop evolved into the "Radioplane Company". Denny believed that low-cost RC aircraft would be very useful for training anti-aircraft gunners, and in 1935 he demonstrated a prototype target drone, the RP-1 , to the US Army. Denny then bought a design from Walter Righter in 1938 and began marketing it to hobbyists as the Dennymite , and demonstrated it to the Army as the RP-2 , and after modifications as the RP-3 and RP-4 in 1939. In 1940, Denny and his partners won an Army contract for their radio controlled RP-4, which became the OQ-2 Radioplane . They manufactured nearly fifteen thousand drones for the army during World War II .

It was at the Van Nuys Radioplane factory that in 1944 that Army photographer David Conover saw a young lady named Norma Jeane, and thought she had potential as a model. This "discovery" led to fame for Jeane, who soon changed her name to Marilyn Monroe .

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