"A riveting account of one of the most significant developments in contemporary warfare – the evolution and proliferation of drones. This is a very important book." – General David Petraeus, US Army (Ret.), former Commander of the Surge in Iraq, US Central Command, and Coalition and US Forces in Afghanistan, and former Director of the CIA
US forces have been training with Puma drones for years. In one photos an instructor from Training and Logistics Support Activity-West (TALSA) with class RQ20B Puma, "teaches U.S. Marines how to inspect the functionality of an RQ-20 Puma." It was taken at Camp Pendleton. This is important training. It was taken on January 24, 2018. …
The RQ-7 Shadow UAV was deployed to Alaska in 2018. It was assigned to the Unmanned Aircraft Systems platoon of D Company of the 6th Brigade Engineer Bataltion of the 4th Infantry Brigade Combat Team from the 25th Infantry Division. It was hen used at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, in Alaska. Photos a the time show …
In 2017 the US MQ-9 Reaper went on the road to be shown off. It was taken from Creech Air Force Base to the Lethbridge International Airshow on July 14, 2017. For several days people got to see it and they learned about its capabilities, maintenance and munitons. "Canada-Airmen assigned to the 432nd Wing/432nd Air …
The US had so many F-16s it turned some into target drones. No longer the era of the Firebee, the QF-16 was flown at Holloman Air Force Base in 2017 as part of the 82nd Aerial Targets Squadron. "Piloted the drone during the first flight at Holloman since the transition from QF-4 Phantoms to QF-16s."
A unit of the US Air Force decided to drill against drones in 2016 in San Antonio with the 25th Air Force. The training apparently came as a result of a real incident where a small surveillance drone was rigged with an IED so that it injured local forces that picked it up. "Due to …
Continue reading San Antonio 2016: US forces learn to counter UAVs
Back in 2016 when everyone was experimenting with how to confront the emerging drone threats, US forces at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio used a counter-UAS system with a net to snare a DJI S1000 drone. This was par of the "2016 Air Force Research Laboratory Commanders Challenge at the Nevada National Security Site, …
A video can be seen at this link of a Global Hawk being used during the ISIS war. July 14, 2016 "U.S. RQ-4 Global Hawk lands at an undisclosed location in Southeast Asia in support of Operation Inherent Resolve July 14, 2016."
A drill by the Combat Aviation Brigade’s 3rd Squadron, 6th Cavalry Regiment "became the first Army aviation unit to perform a manned-unmanned teaming tactical exercise using its own Shadow (version 2) drones during an exercise dubbed 'Operation Heavy Shadow' that was performed April 21-23, 2015 in the desert of Fort Bliss." The training used Apache …
Continue reading Manned and un-manned teaming for the first time?
In 2015 at White Sands Missile Range the US predicted the drone swarm threat. It's not clear the lessons were learned. Tthe report noted "in this season's Network Integration Evaluation taking place on White Sands Missile Range and Fort Bliss, coordinated units of remotely operated and automated aircraft will be used to represent a possible …
Continue reading The White Sands 2015 test that predicted drone swarms
Back in 2015 an industrial design team used UAVs to operate at the US Army Combined Arms Support Command a Fort Lee. Delivered and developed by the DoD the Soldier Aerial Mobility Vehicle Project foresaw UAVs delivering 800lb payloads up to 125 miles. What ever became of this project is unclear.
Drone Wars: The book 