USFK to fly attack drone in event of war
Gray Eagle combat drone
By Jun Ji-hye
The United States Forces Korea (USFK) will deploy U.S. Army Gray Eagle combat drones in the event of a war on the Korean Peninsula, officials said Wednesday.
“In wartime, the USFK 2nd Infantry Division will operate the Gray Eagle,” an official at the ROK-U.S. Combined Division told reporters on condition of anonymity.
The move is part of countermeasures against North Korea’s latest nuclear test conducted on Jan. 6.
The USFK is operating two types of reconnaissance drone here, the Raven at the battalion level and the Shadow at the brigade level. Combat drones are not currently deployed.
The Gray Eagle Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) is capable of high-definition surveillance. It can carry four Hellfire air-to-ground anti-armor missiles, allowing it to hit key facilities in North Korea.
“It would take about a day for Gray Eagles to arrive on the peninsula from the U.S. mainland, if transported by a C-17 transport plane,” another military official noted.
Measuring eight meters in length with a 17 meter wingspan, the MQ-1C Gray Eagle has an endurance of up to 25 hours, an operating altitude of up to 25,000 feet and payload capacity of over 1,000 pounds, according to manufacturer General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. (GA-ASI).
The combat drone was used in exercises in August 2015 at Gunsan Air Base in North Jeolla Province.
At the time, the Gray Eagle UAS streamed video and metadata via a line-of-sight data link directly to a U.S. Army AH-64 Apache helicopter from extended distances. The Apache subsequently was able to re-transmit the imagery to a One System Remote Video Terminal (OSRVT), allowing ground forces to view the video, according to GA-ASI.
Then, field commanders were able to receive both live Gray Eagle streaming video and the re-transmitted video sent by the Apache. Once the Gray Eagle was airborne, U.S. ground forces passed contact reports and target coordinates to operators in the aircraft’s One System Ground Control Station (OSGCS). The operators were then able to direct the Gray Eagle’s sensors to positively identify and track targets, GA-ASI added.
Following the exercise, some observers raised the possibility that the USFK was planning to deploy the Gray Eagle permanently on the peninsula.
A USFK official refused to elaborate on details, only saying “We don’t comment on the USFK’s operational capabilities.”
In the wake of the North’s fourth nuclear test, Seoul and Washington have continued to discuss the additional dispatch of U.S. strategic assets, according to Defense Ministry spokesman Kim Min-seok.
On Jan. 10, the U.S. flew a B-52 Stratofortress strategic bomber over South Korea in a show of force aimed at deterring the repressive state from further military provocations.
Observers say the next move from the U.S. forces would be to send the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan, F-22 Raptor stealth fighters or B-2 stealth bombers.
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