re: #776 Decatur Deb

And if the airship is unmanned, it wants nothing on earth more than to see groundfire signatures or a missile plume.

Yep.

What does it cost us to put it up?
What does it cost them to take it down?
What’s the null mission rate (goes out, gets no intel of use)?

Now as a groundpounder by background, I’ll tell you the advantages of version 2 of this. (Just like the predator got upgraded to the attack predator - RQ to MQ).

— It can carry a bunch of small precision guided (LJDAM) munitions for constant on-station ground support - estimated 25% of a B-52’s load - with 5 to ten day on-station loiter.
— It can act as line of sight retrans, allowing better communications security. (broadcast to balloon and bounce instead of omnidirectional broadcast, plus can boost as well as relay low power signals.)
— It can, with its huge number of sensors, provide a dedicated eye in the sky to each platoon plus forward squads in a brigade.

And all of these withOUT requiring Air Force coordination or thier habit of pre-emptiing assets for counter-air missions.