Read about the early years of the F-4 and its gun pod. The wikipedia article is fairly good, although short.
Those who don't learn history are doomed to repeat it.
The F-4 lesson was "everyone knew" that ever more expensive and technologically advanced munitions were the way to go, so no gun pod just drop missiles. (missiles are essentially somewhat dumb short range drones, although there's a lot of overlap in the categories...) Turned out to be a near disaster and they ended up bolting a human operated gun to the F-4. People actually died because of this design mistake. The USAF is in no hurry to kill a bunch more people with the same conceptual mistake.
I am certain that the same scenario is about to play out with drones. Maybe not tomorrow, maybe not with the USAF as the victims, but "in a decade or so" the same disaster will happen again. It is, after all, the same situation, so expecting a different outcome would be insanity.
Those who don't learn history are doomed to repeat it.
The F-4 lesson was "everyone knew" that ever more expensive and technologically advanced munitions were the way to go, so no gun pod just drop missiles. (missiles are essentially somewhat dumb short range drones, although there's a lot of overlap in the categories...) Turned out to be a near disaster and they ended up bolting a human operated gun to the F-4. People actually died because of this design mistake. The USAF is in no hurry to kill a bunch more people with the same conceptual mistake.
I am certain that the same scenario is about to play out with drones. Maybe not tomorrow, maybe not with the USAF as the victims, but "in a decade or so" the same disaster will happen again. It is, after all, the same situation, so expecting a different outcome would be insanity.