GA-ASI MQ-9 Reaper

TomcatViP said:
Haven't Reapers became already de-facto attritables?!

Similarly they are definitively checking the boxes of endurance, lifespan and open mission systems...
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They did. Though, to be fair, this is largely a signal of the utter need for a proper replacement.
Which should be balanced survivable / attritable.
 
jsport said:
How many decades of prop driven craft stealth tech were just not pursued in favor of a "relatively expensive" simple plane which is in turn detected & downed. No wonder higher losses.
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Losses be losses, but key value is I guess sensor/armed overwatch time over hostile land.

Basically, MALE is not just key enabler, it's the closest, enabling analog an air force can have to boots on the ground.
 
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Ainen said:
Losses be losses, but key value is I guess sensor/armed overwatch time over hostile land.

Basically, MALE is not just key enabler, it's the closest, enabling analog an air force can have to boots on the ground.
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MALE just describes endurance and altitude. The Reaper and many of the similar UAVs (Orion, Heron, Forepost etc.) have proven to be entirely unsuitable for modern battlefields, even less intensive ones like Ukraine or Iran.

A MALE UAV can be persistent, survivable and contribute through both ISR and strike. The Reaper just isn't survivable and thus not persistent in permissive environments. And while the turkey shoot that has taken a toll on the Reapers has not killed any pilot or weapons operator, losing such a number of fairly expensive assets is still not acceptable. A more survivable platform would ultimately be more expensive, but in turn much less likely to be engaged and subsequently shot down.

So trying to whitewash the patchy record of the Reaper in recent months is certainly a decision, not one that's particularly logical or one I'd take, but a choice nonetheless. One has to think that the US will have to come to the realization that the platform needs a next generation replacement. An example of survivable MALE ISR is the RQ-170 of which only a single airframe was lost over it's entire service record while being operated near and in highly permissable environments.
 
EmoBirb said:
MALE just describes endurance and altitude. The Reaper and many of the similar UAVs (Orion, Heron, Forepost etc.) have proven to be entirely unsuitable for modern battlefields, even less intensive ones like Ukraine or Iran.
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I don't think that's the case. They suffer heavy losses, sure(though heavy usually means ~even exchange with AD, who sees opponent first - wins), but they enable control. No drones, no control.

US/Israel could compete over control over Iran as long as they had MALEs to do so.
Ukraine mostly proves that a force too institutionally inert to accept drones can't maintain control even when it has absolute and uncontested air dominance. It just doesn't know what to do with it.
 
Ainen said:
I don't think that's the case. They suffer heavy losses, sure(though heavy usually means ~even exchange with AD, who sees opponent first - wins), but they enable control. No drones, no control.

US/Israel could compete over control over Iran as long as they had MALEs to do so.
Ukraine mostly proves that a force too institutionally inert to accept drones can't maintain control even when it has absolute and uncontested air dominance. It just doesn't know what to do with it.
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They really don't enable control, they enable real-time reconaissance and give you the added capability of engaging targets of opportunity. I don't know what leads you to that conclusion, but a lowly Reaper isn't the eye of Sauron, it's a set of fairly capable optical sensors mounted to a very large, very fragile, yet somehow still rather expensive airframe.

You cannot effectively establish control through such UAVs when they are easily engaged and caught off guard by mobile fireteams and SAM units at ranges exceeding the range of the weapons carried by the drone. Persistent reconaissance is the bread and butter of these prop-driven, straight wing MALE drones, but you cannot effectively be persistent when you have to either work outside your desired perimeter or be immediately engaged and shot down otherwise, with essentially zero countermeasures to prevent that.

MALE ISR drones have their merits, but they have to be either much cheaper and more expendable. Meaning you can maintain persistent coverage of a given area simply by sending new drones in when some are lost, an eventuality that's planned for and accounted for by design (unlike the Reaper). Or you deploy a more expensive, more formidable system that is by default far more survivable but not expendable, example being the RQ-170 for example or CH-7. These systems can be persistent ISR assets because they can operate within a permissive environment due to having measures in place, like reducing their radar or thermal signature, that make targeting and shooting them down significantly more difficult.

But the layout popularized by the MQ-9 and MQ-1 is not suitable for modern near peer and definitely inadequate for peer conflicts. Suitable for low intensity conflicts, COIN, narco-ops and domestic surveillance, but in any near peer scenario they've proven to be obsolete.
 
EmoBirb said:
They really don't enable control, they enable real-time reconaissance and give you the added capability of engaging targets of opportunity.
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This is definition of armed overwatch though. Infantry strong point with some arty overall does same thing.
EmoBirb said:
You cannot effectively establish control through such UAVs when they are easily engaged and caught off guard by mobile fireteams and SAM units at ranges exceeding the range of the weapons carried by the drone.
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But we saw that over and over. And yes, they were taking heavy casualties. But as long as they were in the air - entire countryside was suppressed.
Moreover, we saw on more than a few occasions, that MALEs can in fact outlast air defenses on their own - whomever ends first.
EmoBirb said:
But the layout popularized by the MQ-9 and MQ-1 is not suitable for modern near peer and definitely inadequate for peer conflicts.
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While VLO ones certainly will be better, for now persistent ISR is done as it is.
Iran has more air defenses than most countries in the world(other than big 3 really), and it's conventional war fighting capability is built more resilient than anyone period (including even China, which isn't nowhere as fortified).
Yet, for a period of time, it still worked against it.
 
https://www.ga-asi.com/ga-asi-completes-first-flight-of-mq-9b-with-aew-pods

SAN DIEGO – 21 May 2026 – General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. (GA-ASI) flew its MQ-9B Remotely Piloted Aircraft for the first time with Airborne Early Warning (AEW) pods. The much-anticipated AEW capability is being provided through a partnership with Saab. Once the AEW sensor, named LoyalEye, is made available to MQ-9B operators and new customers, it will deliver persistent and cost-effective air surveillance capabilities in regions where it is currently unavailable.

GA-ASI conducted a validation flight of MQ-9B using AEW radar pods on May 19 from GA-ASI’s Desert Horizon flight operations facility in Southern California using a company-owned aircraft. The flight signaled the first step in a development process that is expected to take several months and culminate with a full-capability demonstration later this year.
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EmoBirb said:
And while the turkey shoot that has taken a toll on the Reapers has not killed any pilot or weapons operator, losing such a number of fairly expensive assets is still not acceptable.
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You do know that Reapers are only about 6-10mil per bird, right? per most recent docs, 19.86mil per bird in 2025 dollars. Not counting any fancy sensors like air radars. Ground stations cost about 4.34mil each in 2025 dollars.

The 30-50mil price quoted is for an entire system of 4 birds, the control stations, and a satcom link. edit: That price is from about 2010, it seems.

The US regularly shoots missiles that cost as much as a Reaper!
 
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Scott Kenny said:
You do know that Reapers are only about 6-10mil per bird, right?

The 30-50mil price quoted is for an entire system of 4 birds, the control stations, and a satcom link.
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Nope, it's actually per bird. System(2 planes, 2 control stations) is way over that.
Your number right now is more a bayraktar one.
 
Scott Kenny said:
You do know that Reapers are only about 6-10mil per bird, right?

The 30-50mil price quoted is for an entire system of 4 birds, the control stations, and a satcom link.

The US regularly shoots missiles that cost as much as a Reaper!
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Even if that was the case (I'm aware of differences between cost per system and cost per airframe, similar to how a SAM system consists of multiple components not only the launcher and it's missiles).

For such a drone that is not acceptable. Losing several millions for impact repeatedly is not the same as expending munitions on targets. Not to mention that unlike a missile, being destroyed is not the desired outcome for the drone, it's not accounted for in it's design, cost and procurement. It is not an expendable asset, because expendable assets are in the tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of dollars range, not in the two figure multimillion dollar bracket. While more expensive, more sophisticated drones bring vastly higher survivability to the table in order to justify their cost and high value nature (the very opposite of expendable).

The Reaper has no place in near peer and peer warfare, it's consistent attrition and comparable lack of battlefield impact were proof of this, and that's a very recent example. Unfortunately even COIN against low-income insurgents will become less and less viable as cheap, easily conceiled or man portable anti-air systems become more prevalent. At one point the question becomes why one chooses a very expensive and vulnerable drone when you can instead use vastly cheaper ISR drones and utilize them for targeting of either cheap strike drones or long range munitions like MLRS.

It makes for a nice MPA in litoral areas though.
 
EmoBirb said:
Even if that was the case (I'm aware of differences between cost per system and cost per airframe, similar to how a SAM system consists of multiple components not only the launcher and it's missiles).

For such a drone that is not acceptable. Losing several millions for impact repeatedly is not the same as expending munitions on targets. Not to mention that unlike a missile, being destroyed is not the desired outcome for the drone, it's not accounted for in it's design, cost and procurement. It is not an expendable asset, because expendable assets are in the tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of dollars range, not in the two figure multimillion dollar bracket. While more expensive, more sophisticated drones bring vastly higher survivability to the table in order to justify their cost and high value nature (the very opposite of expendable).
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When your drone is the same price as missiles, your drone is expendable.

In 2015, the cost per airframe for the USAF was 14.5mil, ground stations were 3.17mil.
So in 2025 dollars, cost per airframe should be ~19.86mil, ground stations ~4.34mil. So I missed a bit (bleeping inflation), my apologies.

One Reaper is currently worth about 4 Tomahawks or JASSMs. Or a single SM3 Block 1B.


EmoBirb said:
The Reaper has no place in near peer and peer warfare,
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This I happen to agree with.

An unstealthy drone without chaff, flares, MAWS, DIRCM, or jammers has no business attempting Long Endurance missions over the front lines. If the enemy tried it, we'd spend a PAC2 or SM2 on every single drone they tried to put up.

Make a TACIT BLUE drone. The airframe is no longer sight-sensitive so who cares that we have some 600 of them flying around and doing JSTARS things while stealthy. Make sure the EOTS eyeball is in a stealthed enclosure. Fit the drone with MAWS and DIRCM, maybe jammers too, because the job it does is important enough to have protection of that sort, too.
 
Oh my goodness. I have to laugh. About 25 years ago a very smart man, who has since taken off on runway 27, said that once we get past UAS being the panacea to world hunger, we would find them as expensive as manned platforms and the politicians would howl at their loss as much as they have about manned platforms. We will end up putting ASE on them and making them even more expensive. I wonder if I will be alive when it becomes cheaper to put a human in the platform.
 
The people on this thread complain more about MQ-9 losses than the DOD does lol

When you intentionally oversaturate yourself with a specific capability, losing a fair amount doesn't pack the same punch as if the buy was kept at an exotic level. Y'all are seriously overreacting. The MQ-9 is an incredible, potent ISR asset that is extremely good at what it does in the right environment. I don't think anyone in a position of knowledge claimed it was survivable in a peer competition. The aircraft was designed and developed to serve in a COIN role and it has done it with excellence for decades.

maybe jammers too
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American MQ-9s fly with the RDESS-SOAR jamming pods right now. They are operational.
 
yasotay said:
Oh my goodness. I have to laugh. About 25 years ago a very smart man, who has since taken off on runway 27, said that once we get past UAS being the panacea to world hunger, we would find them as expensive as manned platforms and the politicians would howl at their loss as much as they have about manned platforms. We will end up putting ASE on them and making them even more expensive. I wonder if I will be alive when it becomes cheaper to put a human in the platform.
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MQ-9 does things that no manned platform can without relief crew and bunks to sleep in. It's getting old though, and I bet a newer platform with the same capabilities made by the likes of Anduril would be half the price.
 
Very true and that's a new paradigm* in warfare that has emerged recently: professionalization of combatants in the late 1990's was though to pull away the pressure of death and maimed soldiers away from the public, opening more latitude for strategic initiative and political choices. Today, Long range fire able to bypass FLOT and saturate defenses bring back civilians in the crosshair as their only legitimate targets (you can't have saturation and efficient precision targeting unless you are on the top of the game in weapon design).

Mass conscription is then inevitable (but can be tailored to home defense).

Regarding the MQ-9, just look at the percentage of total strikes: the MQ-9 is not only an ISR, it's one of the primary Strike-Bomber of the US military**.

*not so new in fact
**Same in France, where Reapers strikes amounted to over 50% of all air strike in their late African campaigns, despite being on of the less numerous type deployed.
 
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GA-ASI showed off an MQ-9B with four of their sonobuoy pods with RTX's SeaVue radar pod. Pretty impressive wing loading they've been able to accomplish with this. I'm curious how badly it cuts into the range, though.
 

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Forest Green said:
Probably earlier footage.

https://twitter.com/x/status/2060131345263890854
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Well the iranians certainly shot something down judging by the wreckage washed up on the shore of qeshm island.
https://twitter.com/x/status/2060669836834029743
Interestingly it now appears the us forces have started using the old MQ-1s,judging by irans shootdown of one on the 31st of may,& centcoms admission that it was of theirs.
Maybe they`re running out of MQ-9s?
HJtizn3WMAIrzZD
 
Sineva said:
Interestingly it now appears the us forces have started using the old MQ-1s,judging by irans shootdown of one on the 31st of may,& centcoms admission that it was of theirs.
Maybe they`re running out of MQ-9s?
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The Army and 160th SOAR(A) flies MQ-1C Gray Eagles which are heavily modernized and upgraded variants of the original Predator A. They are, for all intents and purposes, not even the same as the original MQ-1. These replaced the OH-58D Kiowa.
 
Scott Kenny said:
Even if the range is cut in half, that's still a 10 hour flight.
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Twice is quite likely an underestimation. Payload forces the aircraft lower and lower, and it bites way worse than "just" drag/weight.
 
Ainen said:
Twice is quite likely an underestimation. Payload forces the aircraft lower and lower, and it bites way worse than "just" drag/weight.
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Base MQ9B endurance is 40hrs according to GA-ASI. Presumably that's clean at high altitude, SeaGuardian with the Seaspray radar has '30+' though that might include sonobuoy pods as well.
 
TorpedoJ said:
Base MQ9B endurance is 40hrs according to GA-ASI. Presumably that's clean at high altitude, SeaGuardian with the Seaspray radar has '30+' though that might include sonobuoy pods as well.
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The SeaGuardian endurance number does not include the sono pods. When I worked with CBP MQ-9Bs with the SeaVue (not Sea Spray), the book included the hours similar to that without pods.
 
Sineva said:
Interestingly it now appears the us forces have started using the old MQ-1s,judging by irans shootdown of one on the 31st of may,& centcoms admission that it was of theirs.
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Yep, likely what it was, they're being phased out anyway, probably why they're getting used. About $4m each, so Kh-101 price range.
 
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Forest Green said:

“Obsolete and Outdated”: U.S. Army Axed MQ-1C Gray Eagle Drone​

https://defencesecurityasia.com/en/obsolete-and-outdated-u-s-army-axed-mq-1c-gray-eagle-drone/

U.S. Army Outlines MQ-1C Replacement Plan​

https://aviationweek.com/defense/aircraft-propulsion/us-army-outlines-mq-1c-replacement-plan
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I mean, they are completely non-stealthy and utterly undefended. No chaff/flares, no RHAW or MAWS, no jammers, and terrible situational awareness. They're not much better than the dumber end of modern target drones.

At this point, my demand to the UAV makers is "we need a STOL drone that is LO. It will carry an LPI ground-surveillance radar and at least one EOTS eyeball, optionally any air-launched weapon in the Army arsenal. Self-protection measures beyond LO are expected, but contractor can select their preferred configuration."

Think TACIT BLUE with an EOTS eyeball or three in terms of CONOPS.

If it's entirely unarmed, the USAF won't complain about it.

LO STOL is something that the Usual Suspects haven't produced in the open yet.
 
Forest Green said:

“Obsolete and Outdated”: U.S. Army Axed MQ-1C Gray Eagle Drone​

https://defencesecurityasia.com/en/obsolete-and-outdated-u-s-army-axed-mq-1c-gray-eagle-drone/

U.S. Army Outlines MQ-1C Replacement Plan​

https://aviationweek.com/defense/aircraft-propulsion/us-army-outlines-mq-1c-replacement-plan
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One of these articles is behind a $1,750 paywall and the other is a random 'asia' source I don't think anyone has ever heard of. The MQ-1C fulfills the army's light armed reconnaissance role since the cancellation of FARA. It serves dual-purpose missions within JSOC and Army military intelligence brigades. If it's being phased out, it's on the same track as the MQ-9 which is the preliminary steps to figuring out what the service might, possibly think it wants the replacement to be. Saying the drone is being used in combat theaters because it is being phased out is a misnomer and objectively incorrect.
Scott Kenny said:
I mean, they are completely non-stealthy and utterly undefended. No chaff/flares, no RHAW or MAWS, no jammers, and terrible situational awareness. They're not much better than the dumber end of modern target drones.
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As with the MQ-9, the MQ-1C carries a jamming pod.
 
Scott Kenny said:
Still no chaff or flares unless that's part of the pod. And it only took what, 20 years of running the things before they started using jammers.

So it's still not a whole lot better than a freaking target drone.
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I know where you're coming from. I genuinely believe it is a doctrine issue rather than an ignorance issue (or I suppose the two go hand-in-hand). Look at the F-15EX; the DAF intentionally opted to not buy the MAWS for it when every other country that flies it (Qatar, for example) has had it installed.

As I am sure you and many others in this thread are aware, GA-ASI sells a self-protection pod (SPP) which contains two chaff & flare buckets, Leonardo's DAIRCM (AN/AAQ-45) and BAE's AN/ALR-69(V) RWR. For years, GA-ASI pushed this pod for the MQ-9 and every single time the DAF said no. I don't know what it is but someone high up the food chain in procurement believes we don't need it. I don't know how they still have a job, but it is what it is.
 
Air Superior said:
One of these articles is behind a $1,750 paywall and the other is a random 'asia' source I don't think anyone has ever heard of. The MQ-1C fulfills the army's light armed reconnaissance role since the cancellation of FARA. It serves dual-purpose missions within JSOC and Army military intelligence brigades. If it's being phased out, it's on the same track as the MQ-9 which is the preliminary steps to figuring out what the service might, possibly think it wants the replacement to be. Saying the drone is being used in combat theaters because it is being phased out is a misnomer and objectively incorrect.

As with the MQ-9, the MQ-1C carries a jamming pod.
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A quick Google reveals dozens of sources saying the same.
https://nationalinterest.org/blog/b...rone-faces-retirement-from-the-army-mc-121625
https://thedefensepost.com/2025/08/14/us-gray-eagle-shadow/
https://defensescoop.com/2025/12/16/army-svtol-drone-group-4-uas/
 
Scott Kenny said:
Even if the range is cut in half, that's still a 10 hour flight.
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Indeed....but the area it covers as a result of its slow speed is not huge. Great for loitering over a choke point, but only really useful as an adjunct for a manned MPA like Poseidon.

Could make it very useful as a carrier borne ASW platform though....
 

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