For those heralding UAVs as the future, there were discussions in the intel community quite a while ago about their vulnerabilities. I don't see a future in UAVs due to those vulnerabilities.
Interesting article: Iran's Alleged Drone Hack: Tough, but Possible | Danger Room | Wired.com

I doubt that the Iranians did this independently; they almost certainly had help from a more cyber-savvy country.

 

Pakistan?

 

The GH has a wingspan about that of a 727, and flies up to 65,000', with a mission time of a couple of days.

I was recently reading about a new UAV, with the wingspan of about a 747, that flies up to about 85,000', and has a mission time of about 12 days. Trying to find more info now, but so far no luck....read about it some months ago.

cliff
HSV

 

...and half the mission payload of a U-2.

HH

 

Which is half the mission payload of a WB-57F (RB-57F) with a systems operator to run all of it. Actually the "F" has a 1,000 lb higher payload but the cubic space available in the "bomb bay" is "big." In the 1960s we carrier a camera that was the size of a VW.

 

That's an impressive payload (sts), but it's not always about the size of the sensor. These aren't bombs, these are intelligence platforms. Bigger and better cameras (especially film cameras) were the sensor of choice during the cold war when strategic intelligence reigned supreme, but tactical intelligence is a whole different animal.

Sometimes what the COCOMs need is persistent SA that may or may not be imint. There is usually value in the traditional imagery analysis after the flight's over, but in today's wars the decision-makers more often need to know what's going on right now for days on end. They all have their place, but it's usually about the right tool at the right time, not the biggest tool for a short duration of time.

 

...which can now be handled with a camera the size of a VW...carburetor.
...then transmit the image across the globe with a 3 second delay.

wait, what were we talking about again?

 

Whats a carburetor???

 

U-2 does both imint and sigint, simultaneously, real time...and has for 35+ years. GH killed itself by over-promising and under-delivering for over a decade. It never reached parity with the U-2 and that's why it was chopped.

HH

 

Huey, read the posts. My post was clearly a reference to ftroop and his picture of an imint payload.

As for the rest of my post, you missed the days on end part. The U-2 has great sensors, but not the persistence that the commanders need in today's counter-insurgency limited boots on the ground conflict. Virtual presence beats no presence. Simultaneous, persistent, re-taskable near real-time SAR, IMINT, and SIGINT can be invaluable to a COCOM.

I am not a fan of the GH, it is a mis-managed under-performing asset. However, if BAMS can do what they intend to, most of those limitations will be eliminated. Regardless, my posts have never been a my plane vs your plane argument; it's effects and deliverables. Given time, engineers can make an RPA that approaches U-2 fidelity with RPA endurance and range. They will nevet make a U-2 approach RPA endurance or range. That's not advocacy, it's realism.