Analysts Say Pentagon Lacks Vision for Unmanned Aircraft
National Defense Magazine reports that “congressional appropriators worried in 2003 that the Pentagon was mindlessly spending money on unmanned aircraft. They ordered the Defense Department to submit an ‘unmanned air systems roadmap’ to guide future investments.”
“There was growing enthusiasm for UAS, but lawmakers fretted that there was ‘no clear path toward the future,’ wrote congressional analyst Jeremiah Gertler.”
“More than a decade later, the Pentagon is again being slammed for not having a coherent plan for how to transition from the current generation of unmanned air vehicles to one better equipped to cope with enemy threats. Experts also fault the Obama administration for stunting innovation in the UAV industry. Secretive White House policies about the use of drone strikes in military operations and restrictions on drone sales to U.S. allies are impeding technological advances and possibly jeopardizing U.S. dominance in this field, analysts said.”