US Military News, Reports, Data, etc.

Sinnavuuty

Captain
Registered Member
You haven't grasped the real situation.

Trump and Hegseth no longer want fat officers and generals to increase the lethality of the strongest army on the planet and in history.

To do this, they need to completely change the diet of their military personnel, forcing them to go to food banks, where they can control the diet of their fat military personnel.

Anyone with a waist circumference larger than 38 will not receive food.

These three soldiers here would not receive any food:
Capturar.JPG
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:D:D:D
 

Shocktrooper262

Just Hatched
Registered Member
It's hard to imagine that while we've been discussing the funding issues facing the nuclear arsenal upgrades, F-47 and FA-XX before, and now the Pentagon needs to diverting R&D funds for food. How could this even happen?


I've been saying since 2020 that the US is in the late 1980-90s [feeling] of the Soviet Union + a 1930s perspective on Japan. The US banked on everyone staying 20-30 years behind in tech, and every time someone mentioned the rise of China it was:

"Oh don't worry- they can't actually make anything! It'll be like fighting them in Korea, but this time without those damn liberals holding us back" The US spent too much time hoping that the Neoliberal idea of history being over *would be real* so we spent 20+ years proving it wasn't really over.

Everything designed to modernize the force was overbudget, overtime and well short of what would be required- but that was fine because bombing random people in Afghanistan didn't require the F-35. So we simply let LM do whatever they wanted because we didn't need the 5th gen for replacement of the F-16s/A-10s/F-15s.

Now, enter 2020-2025 and everything's actually broken/needs replacement and none of the programs do anything but funnel improvements and trillions away from the people*, all while we ignore the millions of Americans who live in physically horrid conditions. Instead the US is pushing to fight the culture war, because half the country wants the other half dead.

(I apologize for the rant, and have cut down on how much of my hate got typed lol)

*Go look at the cope going on in the US about how we can simply just replace China's REE and REE refinement by being [American].
 

CaribouTruth

Junior Member
Registered Member
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UH-60 Black Hawk Cargo Drone With Clamshell Nose Breaks Cover​

The new U-Hawk can lug thousands of pounds of cargo internally that would never fit in a standard Black Hawk, and launch scores of its own drones and munitions.

u-hawk-black-hawk-drone-clamshell-nose.jpg

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If I had a nickel every time Lockheed hyped an announcement for it to turn out to be a drone this year, I would have 2 nickels.

Interesting capability nonetheless.
 

SlothmanAllen

Senior Member
Registered Member
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UH-60 Black Hawk Cargo Drone With Clamshell Nose Breaks Cover​

The new U-Hawk can lug thousands of pounds of cargo internally that would never fit in a standard Black Hawk, and launch scores of its own drones and munitions.

u-hawk-black-hawk-drone-clamshell-nose.jpg

______________________
If I had a nickel every time Lockheed hyped an announcement for it to turn out to be a drone this year, I would have 2 nickels.

Interesting capability nonetheless.
If you can take existing Black Hawks and turn them into an UH-60 then this is a very smart idea. The US Army has thousands of Black Hawk helicopters.

Furthermore, one could imagine a similar modification for the CH-47 Chinook of which there are several hundred in service.

This would allow a smart reuse of already existing manned systems into very capable unmanned platforms.
 

HighGround

Senior Member
Registered Member
If you can take existing Black Hawks and turn them into an UH-60 then this is a very smart idea. The US Army has thousands of Black Hawk helicopters.

Furthermore, one could imagine a similar modification for the CH-47 Chinook of which there are several hundred in service.

This would allow a smart reuse of already existing manned systems into very capable unmanned platforms.
Plus existing production lines.

I imagine it also helped with software development since Blackhawk flight characteristics are very well understood. I'm not super stoked with this tbh. IMO, we get a worse product than a ground-up design, but this is probably the best way to get more drone capability that we actually need into the force.

Wouldn't be a bad idea to test these out in Ukraine.
 

CMP

Captain
Registered Member
Plus existing production lines.

I imagine it also helped with software development since Blackhawk flight characteristics are very well understood. I'm not super stoked with this tbh. IMO, we get a worse product than a ground-up design, but this is probably the best way to get more drone capability that we actually need into the force.

Wouldn't be a bad idea to test these out in Ukraine.
I'm willing to bet they'll be too expensive for anyone to want to use Ukraine as the testing ground. I would just imagine the price of a brand new Black Hawk and then double it for the "drone/automated" version.
 

SlothmanAllen

Senior Member
Registered Member
I'm willing to bet they'll be too expensive for anyone to want to use Ukraine as the testing ground. I would just imagine the price of a brand new Black Hawk and then double it for the "drone/automated" version.
I doubt that as I suspect they would want to offer this as a modification to the existing global Black Hawk fleet (many thousands of airframes). Sikorsky (Lockheed) lost the Future Long-Range Assault Aircraft (FLRAA) competition to Bell's V-280 (MV-75). So I would guess they are under pressure to keep the Black Hawk production line viable for the foreseeable future.

Sikorsky has been testing unmanned Black Hawk's for a number of years now, so I think this was kind of the next logical step.

A Black Hawk has been flying with the GE-T901 developed under the Improved Turbine Engine Program (ITEP) since May. So the improved engine and this modification would make a potent upgrade for existing airframes and keep the Black Hawk as a viable platform.

Though I don't think you are wrong that these will not get tested in Ukraine. I just think that likely has more to do with this currently being a company funded demonstrator as opposed to a program of record. Outside of that, I feel like they can do a lot of useful testing within the United States.
 

CMP

Captain
Registered Member
I doubt that as I suspect they would want to offer this as a modification to the existing global Black Hawk fleet (many thousands of airframes). Sikorsky (Lockheed) lost the Future Long-Range Assault Aircraft (FLRAA) competition to Bell's V-280 (MV-75). So I would guess they are under pressure to keep the Black Hawk production line viable for the foreseeable future.

Sikorsky has been testing unmanned Black Hawk's for a number of years now, so I think this was kind of the next logical step.

A Black Hawk has been flying with the GE-T901 developed under the Improved Turbine Engine Program (ITEP) since May. So the improved engine and this modification would make a potent upgrade for existing airframes and keep the Black Hawk as a viable platform.

Though I don't think you are wrong that these will not get tested in Ukraine. I just think that likely has more to do with this currently being a company funded demonstrator as opposed to a program of record. Outside of that, I feel like they can do a lot of useful testing within the United States.
I still think we're going to be looking at a price point of no less than $40 million to $50 million each. Meanwhile, my prediction is China will have superior automated heli/drone lift capabilities for no more than 1/10th of that price.
 

SlothmanAllen

Senior Member
Registered Member
I still think we're going to be looking at a price point of no less than $40 million to $50 million each. Meanwhile, my prediction is China will have superior automated heli/drone lift capabilities for no more than 1/10th of that price.
I had a hard time looking it up, but apparently a new Black Hawk can cost anywhere from $15-20 million depending on configuration and number of airframes ordered. You could be right that the price could be that high, but I doubt it given the limited information I was able to find.

I cannot speak to what Chinese production cost for a unmanned UH-60 / Z-20 capable aircraft would be.
 

Heliox

Junior Member
Registered Member
I don't quite see the point of making a tactical cargo drone in this size. We know helos are very vulnerable operating near the LOC. It will need to leverage it's unique flying abilities to fly very close to terrain to mask itself - capabilities which translated to drones leads to very expensive sensor and software requirements.

The advantage that drone tech allows is not quite being leveraged here. Drones allow for scaling of platform numbers without the associated cost of aircrew to man those platforms. Being able to field 20 drones with the combined lift capability of a single medium-lift helo makes detecting and targeting the supply run a lot more difficult. Leveraging on this and the simple fact of expendability, the smaller drones can be made simpler, fly higher without complicating terrain avoidance and defence suites capabilities. For non-granular, large cargos, you can always default to your manned platforms?
 
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