X-47B to Practice Landing on an Aircraft Carrier, in Parallel With CN's J-15

choi

on Its Carrier


理查德·帕克, 未来无人机让太平洋难太平.  纽约时报中文网, May 14, 2013 (available now)
http://cn.nytimes.com/opinion/20130514/c14parker/

, which is transalted from

Richard Parker, Pilotless Planes, Pacific Tensions; How the new era of superdrones could destablize East Asia. New York Times, May 13, 2013 (op-ed).

Quote:

"THIS week the Navy will launch an entirely autonomous combat drone — without a pilot on a joystick anywhere — off the deck of an aircraft carrier, the George HW Bush. The drone will then try to land aboard the same ship, a feat only a relatively few human pilots in the world can accomplish.

"in addition to conventional bombs, successors to this test plane could be equipped to carry a high-power microwave, a device that emits a burst of radiation that would fry a tech-savvy enemy’s power grids, knocking out everything connected to it, including computer networks that connect satellites, ships and precision-guided missiles.

"At present, the United States-China relationship is really just about economics [and nothing else]. As long as that relationship remains vibrant, confrontation is in neither country’s interest. But should that slender reed snap * * *

Note:
(a) Northrop Grumman X-47B
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northrop_Grumman_X-47B
(first flew in 2011)
(b) "A single hunter-killer pairing of a Triton reconnaissance drone and a P-8A Poseidon piloted anti-submarine plane can sweep 2.7 million square miles of ocean in a single mission."
(i) Northrop Grumman MQ-4C Triton
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northrop_Grumman_MQ-4C_Triton
(under development; expected to enter service around 2015)
(ii) Triton (mythology)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triton_(mythology)
(messenger of the sea; "Like his father, Poseidon, he carried a trident. However, Triton's special attribute was a twisted conch shell, on which he blew like a trumpet to calm or raise the waves")