Stealth Technology: History of Today’s Tactical Fighter

Stealth will be critical in the military battles of the future. Technological advancements in surface to air detection capabilities are leaping forward at an astronomical pace. However, advancements in design cannot keep up. Fighter jets rely upon stealth to avoid enemy radar detection. Aircraft without stealth capabilities simply cannot survive in the military battles of tomorrow.

Stealth Technology

Stealth technology was created to counter detection by radar. Radar sends out radio waves and measures the amount of rays reflected back. By doing this it can determine the size, distance and course of an object in the sky hit by the radio waves. Stealth aircraft are designed with surfaces that deflect radar waves to an angle adjacent from its trajectory. Simply speaking, once the waves hit the stealth aircraft, the radio waves are deflected outward rather than to the radar transmitter. This makes the stealth aircraft nearly invisible to radar.

F-117 Nighthawk

The world's first stealth aircraft was the F-117 Nighthawk. The unique design of the F-117 is actually as a result of the limitations of computers of the era. The F-117 relied heavily upon the flat surfaces to deflect enemy radar. Today, stealth aircraft are able to maintain a more aerodynamically efficient design while still maintaining advanced stealth capabilities. The F-117 was a breakthrough for its time. But it's multifaceted designed limited the aircraft aerodynamically.

Drag Versus Stealth

Today, aircraft do not have to sacrifice aerodynamics to maintain advanced stealth capabilities. The tactical fighter aircraft in production today has the lowest aerodynamic drag of any military aircraft ever made. The combined stealth capabilities and firepower of today's advanced tactical fighter make it far better adversary than any aircraft ever created.

New Generation Tactical Fighter

The F-15 was America's frontline tactical fighter for decades. However, it was not at all stealthy. Although it remains a proficient military capable aircraft, it is far outclassed by its successor, the F-22 Raptor. The F-117 is a stealthy aircraft but is limited aerodynamically and carries no air to air capability. The F-22 Raptor is not only stealthy, but carries both air to air as well as air to ground capabilities.

With the development of the F-22 Raptor, the F-15, as well as the F-117 became obsolete. The F-22 continues to be the frontline tactical air fighter of the United States as well as the most technologically advanced military fighter jet in service on the planet.

UAVs: The Future of the Air Force?

Predator UAV and Hellfire Missile

Information is the key to the conflicts of the future. Unmanned air vehicles or UAVs will provide a large part of that information while flying long-duration surveillance missions. But will be Air Force of the future have no pilots? Since the very first use of airplanes in military, planners have looked for ways to make aircraft more effective and more lethal. Once so secret their very existence was denied by the government, unmanned air combat vehicles or UAVs are now poised to take the preeminent role in 21st century air combat.

Future of UAVs
UAVs are certain to change air power in the 21st Century and it's starting to happen today. We are just beginning to see the first models on the field. Better unmanned air vehicles allow the military to do more with less and put more aircraft into the air with fewer pilots. The UAV is better served for missions that would be too risky for pilots. In the future, aircraft that have no pilots on-board will carry out the most dangerous combat missions. Today, UAVs are already taking over the role of long-duration surveillance. Losing a UAV in combat is less detrimental than losing a pilot.

Predator
One of the earliest UAVs was the Predator. Developed in the early 1990s, the prototype has been a long and enduring system that can really persist over the battlefield. In Afghanistan, Predators provided critical real-time intelligence and it was there that a Predator made an amazing transformation from surveillance to armed aerial attack craft. When the Predator destroyed a vehicle in an Al Qaeda convoy with a hellfire missile it crossed the line from unmanned air vehicle into an unmanned combat air vehicle.

Armed UAVs
Today, the new predator B can carry up to 10 hellfire missiles. Of course its primary mission is still what the military refers to as (ISR) or information surveillance and reconnaissance. The Predator serves as a satellite in that it can dwell an area. UAVs transmit important visual information to battlefield command via satellite or other data links. Once targets have been identified, and catalogued they can be disseminated through other weapons systems.

Recon Capability
The reconnaissance UAVs have multiple ways of conducting surveillance. On clear days, they use specially stabilized optical lenses that can zoom to high magnification. They use infrared at night, and under adverse conditions, they use synthetic aperture radar to peer through thick cloud cover, sandstorms or oilfield smoke. When the radar is reflected back, it can also be used to create a 3-D image of objects.

Although no word has been given whether UAVs will completely assume the role of air missions in the future; it seems that the question is increasingly weighing in on the cost of training pilots and the loss of human life over that of military hardware.