Meh ... not so sure I'd buy into that. None of the flight simulators I've used (including the MS program) are worth anything as far as actual flight training ... not realistic enough. But I'll bet they are awesome for the guys who have to fly the UAVs.
Do a google search for "Microsoft Flight Simulator as a training aid" and you'll come across hundreds of hits for how to use it as a training aid.
You might not have gotten much out of it, but did you have a full yoke, throttle, and rudder pedal control kit? Without it you are correct. You're just playing with a watered down and over compensated control set with mouse and keyboard or even a joy stick.
Even a "Flight Stick" controller leave something out if you're not using the foot pedals.
MSFS gives...
With the correct downloaded content, a full representation of the cockpit of an air craft which can teach a pilot in training where to look in a real cockpit for all the instrumentation.
With downloaded context for the correct plane, an experienced pilot can get cockpit familiarization with a new plane control layouts before getting into the real thing. Something that is a big help.
Basically it can give a user a way to get a leg up on someone who has never seen the plane at all.
What it can't do is give a "feel" for the plane. Knowing that a x-degree bank with a x-degree of climb is going to cause a loss of control, isn't going to help you feel what the plane is going to do just before you get to that point.
What the Air Force is doing, is to give a way for the pilot trainees to get more experience without tying up million dollar simulators and blowing more fuel.
Sure, you can't log 3,000 hours in MSFS and expect to get into a plane, but 30 hours can teach you where the Artificial Horizon is the first time you sit in the plane...and that's what the Air Force is betting on. Instead of millions of dollars for more simulators (which they simply cannot buy enough of to service all the pilots for as much experience as they would like) they opt for thousands of dollars to get more than they are getting.
Oh and as for most UAV's? Today many of them can be flown by a mouse and a map. Modern Marvels showcased some of the UAV's and the purely observational ones can be launched by a mouse click, given a set of waypoints by a mouse click on a map and landed by a mouse click. The damn things fly themselves nowadays.
Flying robots as it were.