Kotarski: Are drones a viable alternative to the F-35?

By: /
30 May, 2012
By: Kris Kotarski
Columnist for the Calgary Herald

Absolutely.

“How do you get a single-engine, low-range, low-payload, low-manoeuvrability aircraft that is being optimized for close air support . . . to operate effectively in the North?” asked retired colonel Paul Maillet, an aerospace engineer and former CF-18 fleet manager this April (http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/04/25/f-35-a-serious-strategic-mismatch-for-canadas-north-retired-colonel-says/).

You don’t, or at least you don’t do so without sacrificing plenty of hours in the air due to pilot fatigue and routine maintenance. With drones, pilot fatigue is much less of an issue. And maintenance?

Here’s what we know in 2012:

The Pentagon estimates it will cost about $30,000 per hour to operate the F-35. (http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/02/26/us-lockheed-fighter-idUSTRE81P0RV20120226) Of course, Pentagon cost estimates tend to be revised in only one direction. Meanwhile, thanks to an audit by Homeland Security Department’s inspector general, we also know that each Predator drone costs about $3,000 an hour to patrol the U.S.-Mexico border. (http://articles.latimes.com/2012/apr/28/nation/la-na-drone-bust-20120429) Considering how quickly drone technology is advancing, this number has the potential to go down.

What about other, non-surveillance uses? Rob Huebert, professor at the University of Calgary’s Centre for Military and Strategic Studies, has argued that countering Russian, long-range bomber patrols close to Canadian airspace is reason enough to choose the F-35 because “unfortunately, F-35s seem to be the only thing that anybody in the West is producing that meets that type of a need.” (http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Politics/2012/03/15/19508901.html)

That may be true today, but then there is little risk of Canadian-Russian dogfights over the arctic at present time. And in the near future? A number of military experts have speculated that the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter could be the last manned fighter plane ever produced (the U.S. Air Force said in 2011 that it has trained more drone pilots than fighter and bomber pilots combined), and drone technology is only getting better each year. Canadian military goals are far less expansive than those of the U.S. (and should remain so), and because drones cannot help but be more flexible and less costly for military budgets, they are certainly a viable alternative to the F-35.

Before you click away, we’d like to ask you for a favour … 

Journalism in Canada has suffered a devastating decline over the last two decades. Dozens of newspapers and outlets have shuttered. Remaining newsrooms are smaller. Nowhere is this erosion more acute than in the coverage of foreign policy and international news. It’s expensive, and Canadians, oceans away from most international upheavals, pay the outside world comparatively little attention.

At Open Canada, we believe this must change. If anything, the pandemic has taught us we can’t afford to ignore the changing world. What’s more, we believe, most Canadians don’t want to. Many of us, after all, come from somewhere else and have connections that reach around the world.

Our mission is to build a conversation that involves everyone — not just politicians, academics and policy makers. We need your help to do so. Your support helps us find stories and pay writers to tell them. It helps us grow that conversation. It helps us encourage more Canadians to play an active role in shaping our country’s place in the world.

Become a Supporter