Unmanned strike

The Russian Air Force is interested to have new unmanned aircraft in its inventory, said Gen. Maj. Oleg Barmin, the service’s chief of armaments, in August. He explained that together with the fifth generation fighter, being developed now by Sukhoi, the Air Force plans to take into service a new unmanned combat aerial vehicle (UCAV) that will be capable to use the same weapons as the future aircraft.
Among Russian aircraft designers only MiG Corp. is known to be involved in the development of UCAV. Two years ago it showed a full-scale engineering mock-up of a strike UCAV dubbed Scat. But since that time no progress was reported on the program.
Meanwhile Sukhoi General Director Mikhail Pogosyan said that a new unmanned combat aircraft could be the first joint product of a unified MiG and Sukhoi. The two companies are moving towards a merger to form the single Combat Aircraft unit within UAC. Pogosyan says that discussions have already been held with the Russian Ministry of Defense regarding its operational concepts for UAVs, and Sukhoi is working on some relevant designs. "As soon as we have the Ministry’s final perspective," says Pogosyan, "we will demonstrate our results."