The new powered version of MALD is three meters (9.5 feet) long, and its pop-out wings give it a 1.55 meter (five foot) wingspan. The 130 kg (285 pound) decoy is powered by a small turbojet engine that gives it a speed of up to 1000 kilometers an hour, for 45 minutes at 11,000 meters (35,000 feet), or 20 minutes at 1,000 meters (3,100 feet). It can be programmed to fly a specific course to try and get enemy air defenses to open up, so the enemy weapons can be spotted and destroyed. MALDs are also designed to be used in swarms to overwhelm enemy air defenses. The new MALDs cost nearly $300,000 each. The MALD J is more expensive and about five percent heavier.
Obviously, it would be useful for a major war against a capable opponent. We use fewer aircraft because of smart weapons, but the result is that with fewer aircraft dropping bombs, each one lost is a bigger chunk of our hide. MALD has a decent range, too, which will help keep our planes safe by allowing the missile to be fired well out of anti-aircraft missile range and perhaps too far away from enemy fighters to react in time.
It is also useful for smaller opponents in a limited clash. In these cases the problem isn't that the enemy could destroy enough of our aircraft to prevent us from carrying out the mission. But in these cases, the perception is that we should be able to carry out a mission without any losses at all. And any losses become a reason to judge the mission a failure by some. Note that against Libya, we didn't lose a single airman in the long air war. Granted, Libyan air defenses were pretty feeble and we mostly took them down in the first day. But against a better prepared but small enemy, we couldn't be sure of knocking out their air defenses in the first moments of war.
Or, we might need to strike targets before we are sure we've cleared the path by knocking down the enemy air defense systems.
These are just some of the capabilities that our air force brings to a fight. It is too easy to think that air power is just about the combat planes at the pointy end of the spear. Air power is a system of planes, pilots, strategy, tactics, supporting systems, logistics, reconnaissance, and damage assessment. Even with many of our combat planes getting a little long in the tooth, our air power system remains supreme.
