With rapid advances in the fields of robotics and artificial intelligence, UAVs are increasingly becoming more versatile. And while the DRDO is taking steps to design and develop different types of UAVs, some of the private industries also need to invest in this rapidly growing aerial platform.

For knowing afar of the evils that are brewing, they are easily cured. But when for want of such knowledge, they are allowed to grow until everyone can recognise them; there is no longer any remedy to be found.
—Machiavelli, The Prince, 1513

The last quarter of 2011 has been a trying period for the American unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) operations in and around the Afghanistan-Pakistan (AF-Pak) region. The botched identification and resultant fratricide of 24 Pakistani soldiers on November 26, 2011, has raised serious questions on fusion of behemoth of information that various sensors are gathering in the ‘areas of interest’. The US-Pak acrimony that has followed has resulted in the US having to vacate the Shamsi Air Base in West Pakistan, which was vital for the UAV operations, flown by both the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the US armed forces.

Then came the downing of RQ-170 Sentinel, a flying wing shaped stealth UAV with a full motion video (FMV) payload, by the Iranian air defence on December 4, 2011. The Iranians claimed to have spoofed the GPS feed in the Sentinel’s navigation system, a new cause of worry for the US. An Iranian engineer wrote in the Christian Science Monitor, “By putting noise jamming on the communications, you force the bird into autopilot. This is where the bird loses its brain.” Apparently, once it loses its brain, the UAV relies on GPS signals to get home. By spoofing GPS, Iranian engineers were able to get the drone to “land on its own where we wanted it to, without having to crack the remote-control signals and communications.”

FMV is the key to activity based intelligence analysis, a discipline which had helped reveal the Abbottabad residence of Osama bin Laden. The worry now is whether the Iranians, with or without the help from Chinese, would be able to reverse engineer this technologically advanced platform, which also incorporates a number of stealth features. Having left behind at Abbottabad the damaged Blackhawk helicopter with many new stealth characteristics; the US is worried of losing this important technological edge to others and in particular to the Chinese.

The Flood of Information

Too much of information (TMI) is what the US military commanders are saying about the explosion of data being collected by thousands of UAVs. As UAVs provide valuable information, over the years, the US military has been asking for more and more of them to be sent to the Afghanistan-Pakistan region. In 2009, the American UAVs alone generated 24 years worth of video, if watched continuously. In 2011, this figure is expected to grow many times. All this information needs to be processed so that it is useful for the commanders in the field. The software that can archive and retrieve information when needed and display it on a user-friendly interface is the key for timely action. As Lt General David A. Deptula, erstwhile USAF Deputy Chief of Staff for ISR, said recently, “We are going to find ourselves in the not too distant future swimming in sensors and drowning in data.”

The key therefore is in data fusion, which involves the combining of data, such as UAV video, with a geographical information system (GIS), which adds location and time data to the images gathered by UAVs. To accomplish this, the raw data has to be combined with metadata flowing out of the information of multi-sensor fusion. To support such complex activity of looking for the needle in a haystack, new softwares are becoming available such as the General Dynamics’ Quarterback Information Fusion and Story Maker Fusion system. There are other sensors besides UAVs collecting information about the battlespace. To bring together a number of ground, air and sea-based sensors, as well as human intelligence in a usable format; will be a huge challenge as these systems proliferate.

As the Indian Air Force (IAF) transforms itself into the real time ‘sensor to shooter’ paradigm, there is a pressing need to develop smart technologies which will automate the process of archiving, tagging, retrieving, managing, and displaying UAV videos and info gathered by increasingly sophisticated sensors. Possibly, the Indian software industry will need to play this important role.

Anticipatory Style of Operations

The RQ-170 Sentinel, equipped with FMV sensor, was a key element in the Osama bin Laden raid in Pakistan. Perhaps the most important lesson that emerged from the raid was how much of its planning relied on activity-based intelligence. Osama bin Laden was never seen, but frequent visits by important people, revealed that he was there. Much of the information was gathered by the FMV sensor system and the data was analysed by the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency.

With the Ministry of Home Affairs putting together the National Intelligence Grid (NatGrid), prolonged analysis of activities especially near some of the vital areas and vital points, will assist in gathering the activity based intelligence. This will considerably help in a proactive strategy to fight varied spectrum of warfare including terrorism. It would also be a great tool for the Special Forces in planning their operational missions.

Chinese UAV Programme

Unmanned aviation has been around in China since the late 1950s, when surplus fighter aircraft were modified as target drones, but the development of a specifically built unmanned aerial system for intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) duties, is relatively new. Even more recent is the adaption of several platforms to carry air-tosurface weapons, with some reports suggesting such use in the troubled Uyghur region.

In the early days of development, the Chinese are known to have received Israeli technology, but after complaints from the United States that some of this technology had actually originated in the US, China has had to rely upon other sources including reverse engineering of the western platforms. On a related note, it was believed that China was able to decipher some of the sophisticated technologies and software onboard the EP-3 signals reconnaissance aircraft that was forced to land on Hainan Island during the 2001 Sino-American “spy plane” incident.

The domestic research has however taken firm root in China, as evident from the development of ASN-211, a small ‘flapping wing’ platform, weighing only a quarter of a kilogram, emulating a bird in flight. Then there is the Qingdao Helicopter Manufacturing Corporation with their V-750 helicopter UAV.

The Chinese have also developed the high altitude long endurance (HALE) version ASN-229A, which is a reconnaissance and attack UAV with twin-boom design. This UAV can carry two underwing AR-1semi-active missiles with a ceiling of 30,000 ft and an endurance of around 20 hours. The CASC CH-3 canard-configured UAV is reported to be capable of carrying a 65 kg multi-purpose bomb. Then there are most recent designs, the Soaring Dragon and Sky Wing high altitude UAVs, which are expected to perform similar functions to the American RQ-4 Global Hawk, in terms of longrange surveillance. Further proof of the Chinese UAV industry coming of age is evident by the recent export promotions of some of the designs to Brunei, Malaysia and Pakistan.