http://www.boeing.com/boeing/Features/2013/09/bds_qf16_09_23_13.page      This aint gonna help with the 911 conspiracy

We have remote controlled everything else.
Why not? I bet it's just like a video game.
What's next? AI in the F-16?

Speaking of:
Check this out.
There was a TV show called The Lone Gunmen. It followed the conspiracy nuts in a spin off of the X-Files.

This was March 4th, 2001.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rsMG2hHsLo


--Steve

This sint new technology. This is part of Operation Northwoods, proposed by the Joint Chiefs to JFK,

Guys, really,, RC stuff has been around for decades. OUR$$$ get used in wheelbarrow load after wheelbarrow load to build toys for the tyrants to use against us. Areal plane can carry cameras &radio equipment to allow a remote pilot to see whats going on & have instruments to look at. No :"standing on the edge of a cornfield with a box with switches & levers"
but sitting in a seat with a cockpit layout & a display rivaling what is to be seen if he was sitting in the planes seat,.Give ME the $$ & equipment,, servo motors to operate the switches that control the flight control surfaces, launch the missiles, shoot the guns.. Its not that hard, folks..


It is possible to create an incident which will demonstrate convincingly that a Cuban aircraft has attacked and shot down a chartered civil airliner en route from the United States to Jamaica, Guatemala, Panama, or Venezuela. The destination would be chosen only to cause the flight plan route to cross Cuba. The passengers could be a group of college students off on a holiday or any grouping of persons with a common interest to support chartering a non-scheduled flight.

   a. An aircraft at Eglin AFB would be painted and numbered as an exact duplicate for a civil registered aircraft belonging to a CIA proprietary organization in the Miami area. At a designated time the duplicate would be substituted for the actual civil aircraft and would be loaded with the selected passengers, all boarded under carefully prepared aliases. The actual registered aircraft would be converted to a drone.
   b. Take off times of the drone aircraft and the actual aircraft will be scheduled to allow a rendezvous south of Florida. From the rendezvous point the passenger-carrying aircraft will descend to minimum altitude and go directly into an auxiliary field at Eglin AFB where arrangements will have been made to evacuate the passengers and return the aircraft to its original status. The drone aircraft meanwhile will continue to fly the filed flight plan. When over Cuba the drone will begin transmitting on the international distress frequency a "MAY DAY" message stating he is under attack by Cuban MIG aircraft. The transmission will be interrupted by destruction of the aircraft which will be triggered by radio signal. This will allow ICAO radio[13] stations in the Western Hemisphere to tell the United States what has happened to the aircraft instead of the United States trying to "sell" the incident.

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwoods

Maybe so, but even if the planes are junk, the electronics required to fly them aren't. Still strikes me as a lot of money just to blow something up. I think there is more to the story than what got reported in the article.

Jerry,

I think you've misunderstood what I'm saying. I never said anything about a conspiracy.  I said I thought it was a waste of money. If the air force wants to convert these things to unmanned aircraft just for the purpose of shooting them down, then I think they are missing the boat and wasting the technology.

Imagine a squadron of these things, fully armed and operational as an offensive weapon. The current generation of drones are fine when deployed against an adversary with no air force. Against a first world power with military capacity comparable to ours however, they are worthless.

A squadron of unmanned F16s on the other hand is a whole different ball game. They could be sent on missions where there was a high probability that a significant number might not return. Missions that probably would not even be considered with manned aircraft. Operations where the loss of capture of an American pilot would prove diplomatically embarrassing. Covert operations that this country might launch in the small scale conflicts that I think will define warfare in the near future will not always be directed against places that lack air power.

I'm sure someone in the USAF has thought of this. That's what I meant when I said that I don't think the Air force is developing these planes just to use them as targets. It's a plausible story, but I doubt that it is the whole story. It's easy to understand why the Air Force would prefer that a program like I've described not be too widely known.

Please don't confuse me with the conspiracy theorists on here. I don't like or trust much about our present government. I've been pretty plain about that. But I also don't believe that this government, or any other for that matter, is capable of pulling off some the things that have been discussed in TT.

What I do believe is that we will never know everything about the JFK killing, The World Trade Center, Flight 93, The Pentagon etc. not because there was some vast conspiracy orchestrated by some nebulous "They", but because a lot of the persons who investigate such things in an official capacity, have a vested interest in suppressing some information, and promoting something else, for all sorts of reasons that may have very little to do with what really happened.

When it comes to covering ones own a** hardly anyone tells the truth if they can avoid it.

No conspiracy, just another government lie. A loaded drone might could take out a city block while one of these bad boys loaded could take out a small town. We'd be stupid to put a pilot in it. Jerry correct me if I'm wrong but I think humans pass out at 9 G's. At 9 G's the only thing that might touch it would be a heat seeking missle. The technology has been there for years. I fly RC model planes and a civilian can outfit a transmitting video camera on their RC model Plane , wear a special set of goggles with a built in receiver and fly the plane like he's in a real cockpit. Yesterday I got an email advertising a new RC model helicopter and radio with a screen on the radio where you no longer have to wear the goggles. Last year 2 guys got in trouble for flying a video transmitter equipped RC model Plane around the Statue OF Liberty. They were Iraqi's, I'm sure it was just a coincidence, no conspiracy material there. The FAA is now considering outlawing them for civilian use since the Statue OF Liberty stunt.We used video camera equipped RC Model Planes and Heli's in Iraq and Afghanistan to see what was behind the next sandune. Once the word was out people picked at me telling me to join the army and fly. They used very small heli's in towns disguised as dragonflies to see what was around the corner of the next building. Model pilots have been using the technology at least 5 years, I can buy the transmitting camera and goggles now for less than $500. The Chineese are even selling the little Dragonflies just like the Army has. Did you see that landing? those bad boys can be flown better on the ground then in the air, they're just waiting on the next war. I hate war!!!! but at least we wont be losing pilots anymore.

Midnight -
Just a couple of points.  Yes, a human can't tolerate even 9 Gs for very long.  G limits for a human are a combination of the raw G force, plus time of exposure.  The body can actually take 40 Gs in forward acceleration, but only for the briefest of time.  The P-47 of WW II actually had a 40 G cockpit - meaning that it was built to protect the pilot in a crash involving horizontal G force of 40, but only for a second or less duration.  Beyond 40, and the internal organs rip loose, hearts tear away from the aorta, etc.  But neither can the aircraft structure withstand more than 9 Gs - that's about the limit of current engineering.
Also, an F-16 is not a stealth airplane at all.  It's the last generation of fighters built without regard to their radar signature.  Just this week, the South Koreans rejected buying the most modern version because of this very fact.
So, as much as we'd like to think otherwise, the F-16 is seeing its last days, even in the most recent version, as a front line fighter.  Remember when it was designed, the design goal was a single seat, fast, and CHEAP interceptor - Cold War technology in its last iteration.