NL-Outsidethebox [confederation]

It makes me laugh when our military leaders say we are prepared for any eventuallity with regard to operations in Afganistan.

Just of the top of my head i can come up with two things we could do to ensure the safety of our troops in Afganistan not to mention some of my more recent posts with reference to winning hearts and minds and combating the negative publicity and counter espionage efforts of the insurgents and the Muslim community as a whole.

One thing we could do immediately is put an eye in the sky for every ground patrol either with helicopters shadowing each and every ground patrol to view the ground in front of each patrol for suspect individuals and locations. This eye in the sky would also be able to track or Identify any threats if an attack were to take place. Another added bonus of having a helicopter shadow any ground patrols would be immediate medical aid and evacualtion if any thing were to happen requiring immediate evacuation.

Another thing that could be done would be to add jamming either to the ground patrol section or the eye in the sky part of any patrol because alot of the IED's (Improvised Explosive Deices) of late are being set of using remote means like Radio frequency or cell phone activation. So if we were to use Jamming in and around our patrols this would remove this means of activation for IED's.

At one time Canada had developed the sentinel a remote controlled observation device that was intended to shadow ground troops and give them an eye in the sky to view terrian in advance to our troops. We only see these Sentinels now in Museums and military buildings on display.

CL-227 Sentinel The Sentinel, known familliarly as "the flying peanut" due to its apprearance, is an unmanned aerial drone used for multi-service close- and short-range intelligence g athering. The aircraft is vertical take-off and landing capable. It is designed for rapid and simple deployment and one- or two-man flight operation. The Sentinel is not armored; special emphasis is placed on survivability through low thermal, visual, aud ible and radar signatures. Developed by Canadair, the Sentinel is used by the Canadian Army as well as by various services in other countries, such as the United States and Israel.

This is just one example of UAV I would think a UAV blimp would actually have a longer endurance time but be less durable. All in all the best possible scenario would be a manned helicopter escort IMHO. But that would require money and commitment which Canadians aren't willing to pay for nor support sadly.

Update:http://www.sfu.ca/casr/101-uav6.htm

Ok I stand corrected apparently they have something like this in use in Afghanistan. It's called the Sperwer and from what I've read it is quite the rig albeit low on endurance. The launch is exactly what I would want being in the army same goes for it's recovery.

I am really at a loss as to why they chose a two stroke engine for the power plant though. I know two strokes have a great power to weight ratio but they are terrible on fuel meaning low air time as well they are very loud if you want to get the real power from a two stroke because they run in power ban.

Just about all ultralights nowwadays use the RX7 Rotary engine as their power plants the power to weight ratio should be comparable to two strokes. While they are not a true 4 stroke because it is a wankel style engine the power from one of these RX7/RX8 now is somewhere in the range of 200HP.
Oh well can't have it all.