The Ministry of Defence recently lifted the curtain off its prototype unmanned combat air vehicle (UCAV), where it is a concept design for a long-range strike plane which took a good three million man hours (!) to roll out. Touted to be a “truly trailblazing project”, flight trials are expected to begin from early next year onwards. It makes us wonder whether unmanned vehicles and robotic soldiers will be the ones fighting urban warfare as well as seeing action in battlefields in the future. Not only are machines able to be more extreme in their movement since they can pull multiple Gs, even to points where the human body cannot take it. How will pilots earn their wings in the future without getting a real taste of combat?
Filed in ..