Next Corps UAV
As far back as the 1970s, South Korea toyed with the idea of developing its own drones, attempting to build the first such iteration, the Solgae, with technical assistance from Britain. The project was scrapped by the mid-1980s, but interest in UAVs was revived after the United States successfully deployed military drones against Iraq in the 1990-91 Gulf War. A new homegrown initiative by the Agency for Defense Development (ADD) and Korea Aerospace Industries eventually produced the country’s first military surveillance drone — the RQ-101 Songgolmae — in 2000, making South Korea the 10th country in the world to domestically produce UAVs for military use.
While the Heron complexes have significantly increased the capabilities of the army, their acquisition is an intermediate step to the planned purchase of a reconnaissance UAV of the corps level, which is being developed by KAI and is still designated as Next Corps UAV. This system, designed for reconnaissance, observation and data collection, will be of the same class as the General Atomics Aeronautical Systems MQ-1 Predator drone; At the moment, to arm this platform is not expected.
