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August 10, 2020 | International, Aerospace, C4ISR

A human F-16 pilot will fight against AI in an upcoming contest

WASHINGTON ― An artificial intelligence algorithm will face off against a human F-16 fighter pilot in an aerial combat simulation in late August, the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency announced Aug. 7.

The simulation — the third and final competition in DARPA's AlphaDogfight Trials — will take place Aug. 20. The event will be virtual due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

The AlphaDogfight Trials was created to demonstrate advanced AI systems' ability in air warfare. Eight teams were selected last year to participate in the final competition that runs from Aug. 18-20. The competition is also part of DARPA's Air Combat Evolution, or ACE, program, which was started in 2019, and seeks to automate air-to-air combat as well as improve human trust in AI systems to bolster human-machine teaming.

“We weren't able to host the finals at AFWERX in Las Vegas as we'd originally planned with fighter pilots from the Air Force Weapons School at nearby Nellis Air Force Base,” Col. Dan Javorsek, program manager in DARPA's Strategic Technology Office, said in a statement. “We are still excited to see how the AI algorithms perform against each other as well as a Weapons School-trained human and hope that fighter pilots from across the Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps, as well as military leaders and members of the AI tech community will register and watch online. It's been amazing to see how far the teams have advanced AI for autonomous dogfighting in less than a year.”

The eight teams are Aurora Flight Sciences, EpiSys Science, Georgia Tech Research Institute, Heron Systems, Lockheed Martin, Perspecta Labs, PhysicsAI and SoarTech.

On the first day of the competition, the teams will fly their respective algorithms against five AI systems developed by the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab. Teams will face off against each other in a round-robin tournament on the second day, with the third day featuring the top four teams competing in a single-elimination tournament for the championship. The winner will then fly against a human pilot.

“Regardless of whether the human or machine wins the final dogfight, the AlphaDogfight Trials is all about increasing trust in AI,” Javorsek said. “If the champion AI earns the respect of an F-16 pilot, we'll have come one step closer to achieving effective human-machine teaming in air combat, which is the goal of the ACE program.”

https://www.c4isrnet.com/battlefield-tech/it-networks/2020/08/07/a-human-f-16-pilot-will-fight-against-ai-in-an-upcoming-contest/

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  • Airpower Demands Drive Air-Launched Cruise Missile Evolution

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    Tony Osborne Thirty years ago, news cameras shot shaky imagery of long tubular missiles flying across the Baghdad skyline. They were a mix of Raytheon Tomahawks launched from U.S. Navy warships in the Arabian Sea and Boeing AGM-86 Air Launched Cruise Missiles, released from Boeing B-52s in the final moments of their flights, closing in on targets in the city center with a precision never seen in previous conflicts. The missile firings were the opening shots of one of the most successful air campaigns in history. Within 39 days the air assault had rendered Iraq's armed forces ineffective, ruined the country's economy and helped prevent the conflict from drawing in neighboring states. 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Loitering munitions and attritable UAVs—including those being developed as additive capabilities for future combat aircraft—use similar technologies, as do air-launched decoys such as Raytheon's Miniature Air-Launched Decoy and proposed systems from MBDA and Saab. The term “cruise missile” also has been hijacked and associated with shorter-range standoff weapons and even anti-ship missiles, although some have a limited land-attack capability. Even the UK's new MBDA Spear 3 weapon recently was described by the company as a mini cruise missile. The cruise missile's precursors date back more than a century. Curtiss-Sperry's Aerial Torpedo took a converted biplane, fitted it with remote controls and filled it with explosive, although it was never used in anger. Then just 25 years later, during World War II, Hitler's Germany launched thousands of V-1 pulsejet-powered flying bombs against the Allies, including more than 1,000 launched from modified Heinkel He.111 bombers. 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