The Thales/Elbit unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) was selected by the U.K. Defense Ministry to meet the Watchkeeper requirement in August 2005. And yet the full system won't enter service until 2010, although there are options for bringing this forward if the risks are deemed to be low. This contrasts with the original in-service date of late 2005 to mid-2006.

The delay surprised observers, as the U.K.'s requirement for intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance from persistent UAV assets has risen exponentially from the time the Watchkeeper requirement was settled, driven by operations in Iraq and, especially, southern Afghanistan.

To fill the gap, a number of solutions have been adopted. The Thales/Elbit team was contracted to provide turnkey UAV services to Iraq and Afghanistan, and deployed Hermes 450 air vehicles in July 2007 to Iraq and August 2007 to Afghanistan. As reported to the House of Commons in late 2008, operations in both theaters have been delivered by an average of 10 Hermes 450 systems. The contract specifies a number of flying hours per month from these vehicles, and on average, the Hermes 450 has flown 1,100 hr. per month in Iraq (where U.K. combat operations ceased in May) and 1,400 hr. in Afghanistan. Although the contract end date was June 2009, there are provisions for extensions until Watchkeeper enters service.

The use of the Hermes 450 as an Urgent Operational Requirement (UOR) in combat operations allowed the U.K. to define how the Watchkeeper system will continue its development. This results from the fact that Thales's Watchkeeper bid has been based around development of the Hermes 450 air vehicle.

Key changes between the Hermes 450 and the final Watchkeeper WK450 standard will be improvements to connectivity, addition of satellite communications, autonomous operations such as takeoff and landing, and new payloads. Because there are enough changes between the two systems, there has been a graduated approach to the release of Watchkeeper into service. Even after these areas are developed, there are plans to grow Watchkeeper further, for example, by arming the WK450. But all options are being considered as steady increments.

There have also been more fundamental changes to the concept of Watchkeeper operations. Originally, it was assumed that there would be a requirement for a mix of air vehicles, with a number of smaller, shorter-range models that could be launched and recovered forward in the battlespace, backed up by larger, long-endurance vehicles which would require a more developed infrastructure to operate. But as the Watchkeeper concept developed, so the short-range UAV, which was to be based on the Elbit Hermes 180, was dropped. The entirety of the Watchkeeper UAVs will be the enhanced WK450.

One reason the shorter-range option was dropped was the belief that such air vehicles fell between the categories of light tactical and micro-UAVs, while lacking the sensor and range capabilities of larger versions. The U.K. has deployed Micro Technologies' Buster UAVs, as well as Lockheed Martin's Desert Hawk I and II, spending some $20 million since 2003 on the systems.

The introduction of the Watchkeeper capability into the U.K.'s armed forces is not taking place in a vacuum. The RAF, which in the past has been less than enamored of UAVs, is now enthusiastic about the systems, and has been working alongside the U.S. Air Force operating MQ-1 Predators and MQ-9 Reapers. The newly found evangelism for UAVs came in no small part from the realization that unless the RAF got into the game, this capability area would be the preserve of the British Army.

RAF has concerns that its presence in UAVs could be imperiled, primarily as a result of budget pressures. The RAF's Predator/Reaper air vehicles have been funded by UORs, which means that if they are to be retained in the core equipment program, the service has to find money to pay back the treasury, which funds UORs. As of May, Air Command, the part of the RAF that directs the operational aspects of the service, confirmed that funds to "buy" the Predators/Reapers have not been found.

Photo credit: Thales