Official: Fighters should be used for spying

[unhappycamper]

Official: Fighters should be used for spying
By John Reed - Staff writer
Posted : Sunday Dec 20, 2009 11:41:43 EST

The Air Force’s intelligence chief wants to use the stealthy, sensor-laden F-22 Raptor to collect information because spying isn’t about specific platforms.

Lt. Gen. David Deptula made his case for a different use of the fighter during a speech before the Air Force Association, a civilian aerospace group that promotes air power and national defense.

“If I was king for a day, I’d get rid of these traditional, industrial-age labels” — the Pentagon-wide aircraft designation system that puts the F in F-22 — and use each aircraft for a wider variety of missions, said Deptula, deputy chief of staff for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance.

Deptula was firm in lobbying for the F-22 as an ISR tool, saying the jet that officials have called a “Hoover vacuum cleaner of information” could “absolutely” replace intelligence planes such as the RC-135 Rivet Joint, but pointed out a technical challenge — getting the data off the fighter jet quickly.

Right now, the F-22 can share data only with other F-22s, using Intra-Flight Datalinks that can swap data undetected while over enemy territory. At last year’s Joint Expeditionary Force Experiment, though, an F-22 shared IFDL data with several older fighter jets using a modified Northrop Grumman Battlefield Airborne Node data translator.


Rest of article about this $355 million dollar wonder at: http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2009/12/airforce_deptula_121909/



unhappycamper comment: It looks like they're trying to get the F-22 into the 'game'.

[NecklyTyler]

1. Translation:

The Air Force is struggling to find a mission for a useless aircraft built for a mission that has not been required sense the disintegration of the former Soviet Union

[unhappycamper]

2. Yupp. n/t