At long last, the US Navy can now operate its emerging MQ-25 Stingray refueler drone from the deck of an aircraft carrier, a defining if not historical development enabling carriers, Carrier Strike Groups and Carrier Air Wings to project power and attack through a much different and more expanded maritime warfare posture.
An interesting essay from Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) shows the MQ-25 drone operating from the deck of the USS George H.W. Bush (CVN 77) using what the service described as the “world’s first Unmanned Air Warfare Center (UAWC).”
The MQ-25 will now operate from a carrier-based drone-flight command and control center in development for many years, a system engineered to take on the complex challenge of taking-off and landing an unmanned system from the deck of an aircraft carrier. Certainly manned jets have been “flying the ball” of the freshnel lens and glide-sloping successfully onto carrier decks for years, yet engineering an unmanned system capable of doing the same has required a high-tech, long-and-complex Naval developmental journey. Years ago when refining take-off-and-landing drone technology with the pioneering X-47B, Navy engineers explained that successfully engineering a drone to manage the host of variables fundamental to ship-landing was quite complex. For instance, operating a drone from a carrier-deck requires an ability to engineer algorithms and navigational technologies able to account for varying sea-states, weather conditions and speeds historically well-navigated by pilots flying manned-aircraft. As far back as 2014, the US Navy demonstrated it was capable of doing this for the first time with Northrop’s X-47B demonstrator drone, yet the service has spent years refining and improving the technology to the point where an MQ-25 can now be operated successfully from a carrier-integrated, on-deck drone command and control center.
MQ-25 Stingray
The merits of the MQ-25 have been both known and established, and they are quite substantial; The MQ-25 Stingray, in development now for many years, brings an ability to launch a refueler from a carrier. This can, in effect, double the combat radius and dwell time for critical carrier-launched fighter jets such as F/A-18s and 5th-Gen aircraft such as the F-35. The overall range of an F-35C, for example, is listed at roughly 1,300 miles, so extending that attack range well beyond 2,500 miles enables the Navy to project 5th-generation attack air power from distances greater than 1,000 miles off shore.
Extending the range of carrier-launched aircraft is extremely significant for well-established tactical reasons, as it means 5th-gen aircraft can hold key target areas at risk from thousands of miles off the coast, ranges potentially beyond the reach of China’s well-known and highly touted Carrier Killer anti-ship missiles. The Chinese DF-21D and DF-26, for example, are often cited in Chinese government backed newspapers as being successfully tested as “carrier-killer” missiles able to hit carriers at ranges out to 1,000 and 2,000 miles off shore.
Much has been made of this, as some have suggested that the existence of weapons of this kind could potentially make carriers less relevant or even obsolete, should they need to operate at ranges from which they cannot successfully project power. The MQ-25, however, changes this as it could refuel an F-35C in the air roughly 1,000 miles away from a carrier deck. While there would clearly be uncertainty regarding the extent to which Chinese carrier-killer missiles could truly destroy carriers, given the increasingly advanced stages of evolving layered ship defenses, the ability to operate and attack from greater distances offshore gives carrier commanders a much greater and more flexible range of maritime warfare options. Simply put, a Carrier Air Wing using an MQ-25 could attack mainland China, coastal areas and protect the South China Sea from ranges beyond the reach of China’s carrier killer missiles. This is a specific strategic and tactical answer or solution to the much discussed “anti-access/area-denial” problem confronting US Navy power projection in the Pacific.
