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Comment by wongarsu | Hacker News Reader

The F-35 was designed with the capability to be later converted to remote operation, turning it into a drone (they call it a remotely piloted aircraft).

Of course whether the F-35 platform makes sense for that role is a different question. There are probably great niches for a drone F-35 (e.g. targeting anti-air installations), but Ukraine shows that having lots of $1000-$100,000 drones might be more valuable on the battlefield than one $75,000,000 drone.

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The cheap drones work well in Ukraine where the adversaries are locked into attrition fights with largely static positions at short ranges. But those drones lack the range, speed, and sensors necessary to be effective in a potential conflict with China around the first island chain. The US military is currently pivoting to focus on that scenario.

If you're trying to defend the beaches of Taiwan or the Philippines, cheap drones sound like a great asset. If you're trying to project power into Chinese mainland less so.

A big reason why the US will continue to prefer drones measured in tons instead of grams is that cheap drones are most useful when you have boots on the ground, which the US likes to avoid. But with the budgets available it's not like they have to choose between F-35 sized drones and Dji Mini sized drones, they can just get both.

The Loyal Wingman concept seems to lend itself to small squadrons of f35 and f15ex command planes managing much larger groups of drones that are actively running radars and using AESA arrays for command and control.

Those drones seem to look more like cheaper loitering weapons platforms than F35s but who knows what happens when the other side isn't so stupid.

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