Survey of the Status of Small Armed and Unarmed Uninhabited Aircraft
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Date
2021-03-02
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Abstract
The project ‘Preventive Arms Control for Small and Very Small Armed Aircraft and Missiles’
investigates the properties of ever smaller aircraft and missiles. This project report no. 1 covers
the status of aircraft worldwide, including relevant unarmed vehicles but excluding hobby aircraft.
Small and very small aircraft are defined by size: below 2 m and below 0.2 m, respectively. After an
elementary introduction into aerodynamics a technical overview is given, looking at airframe
configurations, materials and manufacturing, power and propulsion, guidance, launch and recovery,
and payloads. Future possibilities and trends are illustrated by presenting military research and
development of the technological leader, the USA. Short chapters deal with swarms and with
countermeasures. The worldwide survey has resulted in a database that contains 129 types from 27
countries. The publicly available properties are given in 26 categories. Statistical evaluations
cover several key parameters.
Description
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Keywords
UAV, arms control, database