MoD AI projects list shows UK is developing technology that allows autonomous drones to kill

Peter Burt and Chris Cole
Omniscient graphic: ‘High Level Decision Making Module’ which integrates sensor information using deep probabilistic algorithms to detect, classify, and identify targets, threats, and their behaviours. Source: Roke

Artificial intelligence (AI) projects that could help to unleash new lethal weapons systems requiring little or no human control are being undertaken by the Ministry of Defence (MoD), according to information released to Drone Wars UK through a Freedom of Information Act request.

The development of lethal autonomous military systems – sometimes described as ‘killer robots’ – is deeply contentious and raises major ethical and human rights issues.  Last year the MoD published its Defence Artificial Intelligence Strategy setting out how it intends to adopt AI technology in its activities.

Drone Wars UK asked the MoD to provide it with the list of “over 200 AI-related R&D programmes” which the Strategy document stated the MoD was  working on.  Details of these programmes were not given in the Strategy itself, and MoD evaded questions from Parliamentarians who have asked for more details of its AI activities.

Although the Defence Artificial Intelligence Strategy claimed that over 200 programmes  are underway, only 73 are shown on the list provided to Drone Wars.  Release of the names of some projects were refused on defence, security and /or national security grounds.

However, MoD conceded that a list of “over 200” projects was never held when the strategy document was prepared in 2022, explaining that “our assessment of AI-related projects and programmes drew on a data collection exercise that was undertaken in 2019 that identified approximately 140 activities underway across the Front-Line Commands, Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl), Defence Equipment and Support (DE&S) and other organisations”.  The assessment that there were at least 200 programmes in total “was based on our understanding of the totality of activity underway across the department at the time”.

The list released includes programmes for all three armed forces, including a number of projects related to intelligence analysis systems and to drone swarms, as well as  more mundane  ‘back office’ projects.  It covers major multi-billion pound projects stretching over several decades, such as the Future Combat Air System (which includes the proposed new Tempest aircraft), new spy satellites, uncrewed submarines, and applications for using AI in everyday tasks such as predictive equipment maintenance, a repository of research reports, and a ‘virtual agent’ for administration.

However, the core of the list is a scheme to advance the development of AI-powered autonomous systems for use on the battlefield.  Many of these are based around the use of drones as a platform – usually aerial systems, but also maritime drones and autonomous ground vehicles.  A number of the projects on the list relate to the computerised identification of military targets by analysis of data from video feeds, satellite imagery, radar, and other sources.  Using artificial intelligence / machine learning for target identification is an important step towards the  development of autonomous weapon systems – ‘killer robots’ – which are able to operate without human control.  Even when they are under nominal human control, computer-directed weapons pose a high risk of civilian casualties for a number of reasons including the rapid speed at which they operate and difficulties in understanding the often un-transparent ways in which they make decisions.

The government claims it “does not possess fully autonomous weapons and has no intention of developing them”. However, the UK has consistently declined to support proposals put forward at the United Nations to ban them.

Among the initiatives on the list are the following projects.  All of them are focused on developing technologies that have potential for use in autonomous weapon systems.  Read more →

US military drones set to fly from UK from 2024

Chris Cole
Top: US RQ-4 Global Hawk, bottom: US MQ-9 Reaper

The US Air Force (USAF) has applied to the UK’s air regulator, the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), to change airspace rules to allow RQ-4 Global Hawk and MQ-9 Reaper drones to fly from RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire.

The application for Global Hawk flights envisages them beginning in 2024.  A recent update of the Reaper application states that while “the USAFE requirement for MALE RPAS at RAF Fairford remains” it is temporarily pausing the process while it reassesses how to comply with the current regulatory framework.  While nominally described as an ‘RAF’ base, Fairford is wholly operated by the US Air Force.

Currently, drones that fly beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) are not allowed to fly in the UK unless in segregated airspace. The USAF, through the Ministry of Defence (MoD), is seeking to put in place segregated corridors to allow these drones to transit through UK airspace.  The RAF is currently going through the same process to enable it to fly the UK’s new ‘Protector’ armed drones from RAF Waddington in Lincolnshire.  The USAF may be awaiting the CAA’s decision in this case (due very soon) before proceeding with its application to fly Reaper drones.

According to one document submitted to the CAA, the “working assumption” by the USAF is that the corridors would be activated 2-3 times per week but they are “exploring activation periods that exceed these assumption, both in frequency and time periods of utilisation.”  The proposal is that the drones would take off and land overnight: “all activations will be between 1 hour after sunset and 1 hour before sunrise unless in extremis.”

Lack of oversight

If this change is agreed there will be very little chance of the public  knowing when or where these US drones will be used operationally.  While the government has said previously that combat operations from US bases in the UK are subject to “joint decision” in reality the government has little say or control over operations from US bases as the framework under which they operate  – the 1951 Status of Forces Agreement – gives jurisdiction to the US, not the UK.

This is a very significant move.  While the war in Ukraine will no doubt be at the forefront of people’s thinking in regard to this development, the US uses drones – surveillance and armed – to enable it undertake air strikes right across the globe, both in areas of armed conflict, but also beyond for so-called ‘targeted killings’. The UN, many individual states and international law experts have condemned the use of drones for these unlawful operations describing them as extrajudicial killings which undermine global peace and security.  Read more →

Taking off but falling short: Assessing the environmental impact of the UK’s spaceport ventures

Timothy Parker
The UK’s seven prospective Spaceports

If you’ve been following UK aerospace news in any way, it’s likely you’ve come across the LaunchUK programme – the UK government funded scheme to turn Britain into a hub of modern commercial space activity. The reasons for this are plenty, but put most simply, the UK’s geography makes it an ideal candidate for orbital launches from Europe. It is at a relatively high altitude, allowing for easy access to low earth orbit, and it is surrounded by the ocean, reducing the danger of something going wrong above population centres.

The UK Space Agency has provided support to seven individual projects to set up spaceports – launch sites for satellites – some of which have seen more success than others. Last year, for example, Spaceport Cornwall saw its first (and only) attempted launch, carried out by now-bankrupt Virgin Orbit. Other projects are underway (to varying degrees) to launch small satellites from sites in Shetland, the Outer Hebrides, Sutherland, Argyll, Ayrshire and Snowdonia.

At the same time as this investment in space infrastructure, the UK is also committed to expanding its military presence in space. Over the past two years, for example, we have seen the setting up of UK Space Command, the publication of a Defence Space Strategy and the announcement of several new military development programmes in this area. Indeed, just as a small rocket could be used to launch weather satellites, so too could it be used to launch military surveillance equipment into orbit – for example, the BAE-manufactured Azalea satellite cluster, which is planned to enter operations in 2024.

The aim of this blog post however, is not to look back at the history of the UK’s spaceport programme. Rather, it is to evaluate the situation as it stands at the moment, and to suggest how things might be developing in the coming months. Some of the projects mentioned above are relatively easy to assess. Spaceport Snowdonia, for example, appears to have stalled entirely, and the projects at Prestwick Airport and Machrihanish (Ayrshire and Argyll) are only in their very early stages. Planning for Prestwick Spaceport is in its pre-application phase, and Spaceport Machrihanish has submitted no formal applications as yet, despite having received over £700,000 in UK government funding.

The real developments are happening further north. SaxaVord Spaceport, located at the Lamba Ness peninsula on the remote island of Unst in northern Shetland, is expected to be the next spaceport to be able to carry out launches, and following the failure of Virgin Orbit, is now scheduled to be the site of the first satellite launch from the UK. It is also planned to be the first new spaceport in Europe able to conduct vertically launched orbital flights.

Environmental impact ignored

As it stands, construction is mostly completed, with the site now consisting of three launch pads, with the concrete and steel now laid out and the launch stool erected for the first. Deals have been signed with private companies, most notably with Rocket Factory Augsburg, to go ahead with launches later this year, and with HyImpulse, which has now conducted seven engine tests on the site. SaxaVord CEO Frank Strang has suggested that the final hurdle – gaining a license from the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) – may be cleared as soon as August 2023, after which orbital flights from Shetland may well become a reality by the end of 2023.

Herma Ness, the northernmost headland of Unst, is a National Nature Reserve. The creation of SaxaVord Spaceport will have significant impact.

Yet this is not without issue. There are several factors that appear to have been neglected, if not ignored in their entirety. The first, and perhaps the most obvious problem, is the matter of environmental impact. SaxaVord’s site has been constructed a mere three kilometres from Hermaness National Nature Reserve – one of the UK’s largest seabird colonies, with over 100,000 breeding. By SaxaVord’s own admission in a consultation response for the CAA, launches will cause significant noise levels of around 85 decibels in parts of the protected area, which is equivalent to the noise of traffic on a busy road – and, according to the Environmental Impact Assessment created for the project, can be expected to have implications for wildlife.  Read more →

Small drones, big problem. Two new reports examine the rise and rise of armed ‘one-way attack’ drones 

Chris Cole
From top: Israeli Harop, Iranian Shaded 136, Polish Warmate.

Over the past few years  – and particularly in the on-going war in Ukraine – we have seen the rise in use of what has become known as ‘kamikaze’ or  ‘suicide’ drones.  Two new excellent reports have just been released which examine these systems.  ‘One-Way Attack Drones: Loitering Munitions of the Past and Present’ written by Dan Gettinger, formerly of the Bard Drone Center and ‘Loitering Munitions and Unpredictability’ by Ingvild Bode & Tom Watts,  examine between them the history, current use, and growing concern about the increasing autonomy of such systems.

A drone by any other name…?

Firstly, to address the elephant in the room: are these systems ‘drones’?

Naming has always been a keenly fought aspect of the debate about drones, with sometimes bitter conflict over whether such platforms should be named ‘unmanned aerial vehicles’ (UAVS), ‘remotely piloted air systems’ (RPAS) or ‘drones’. ‘Drones’ has been the term that has stuck, particularly in mainstream media, but is regularly used interchangeably with UAV (with ‘unmanned’ being replaced in recent years by ‘uncrewed’ for obvious reasons).  While many in the military now accept the term ‘drone’ and are happy to use it depending on the audience, some continue to insist that it belittles both capabilities of the system and those who operate them.

Whichever term is used, a further aspect of the naming debate is that an increasing number and type of military aerial systems are being labelled as ‘drones’.  While all these systems have significant characteristics in common (aerial systems, unoccupied, used for surveillance/intelligence gathering and/or attack), they can also be very different in terms of size and range; can carry out very different missions; have different effects; and raise different legal and ethical issues.

One type of such system is the so-called ‘suicide’ or ‘kamikaze’ drone  – perhaps better labelled ‘one way attack’ drone.  There are several different categories of this type of drone, and while they are are used to carry out remote lethal attacks and therefore have significant aspects in common with the much larger Reaper or Bayraktar drones, they are significantly different in that they are not designed to be re-used, but rather are expendable as the warhead is part of the structure of the system which is destroyed in use. Importantly, while loitering munitions are a sub-set of ‘one way attack’ drones, not all one-way attack drones are loitering munitions.

Dan Gettinger’s report ‘One-Way Attack Drones: Loitering Munitions of the Past and Present’ helpfully sets out a history of the development of these systems and identifies three sub categories: anti-radar systems, portable or ‘backpackable’ systems and Iranian systems.  He has compiled a helpful dataset of over 200 such systems (although not all are currently in operation). All of these, he argues, can be traced back to “the transition from the era of jet-powered target drones to that of remotely piloted vehicles.” Read more →

Tribunal upholds MoD refusal to disclose details of UK Reaper drone missions outside of Op Shader

Chris Cole
Click to read Decision Notice

Fifteen months after hearing our appeal, an Information Tribunal handed down its decision this week rejecting our arguments that basic details about the deployment of armed Reaper drones outside of Operation Shader (Iraq/Syria) by the UK needed to be released to enable public and parliamentary oversight over such deployments.

Both Clive Lewis MP and Baroness Vivienne Stern, Vice-Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Drones and Modern Conflict had submitted statements to the Tribunal supporting our appeal.  Clive Lewis argued that  the refusal to answer these questions about the deployment of Reaper is “a serious backward step in terms of transparency and accountability.”   Baroness Stern stated:

“Despite repeated attempts by myself and colleagues to attain even the most basic information about the UK’s drone deployments, policy, and commitments, Parliament has not been provided with the accurate and timely information needed to meaningfully carry out its constitutional scrutiny role. Whilst certain details must be kept secret in order to ensure operational and national security, the current trend of withholding information about the use of drones purely because it is seen as an “intelligence” asset, as well as withholding vital information on the UK’s growing military capabilities and commitments is deeply concerning and unjustified.”

While insisting that it was neither confirming nor denying the deployment, the MoD argued against the release of the information on three broad grounds . As the Decision Notice states:

“the MOD’s key concern about the release of the requested information was that it could lead an adversary to infer the absence or presence of UK personnel. In his [The MoD’s witness’] opinion were the locations to be released or inferred from a combination of requested data and already published material (the “mosaic effect”), there would be an elevated risk to any potential personnel in that location and an increased risk of hostile acts against them.”

A second concern was

“there would be an increased risk to any nation hosting the Reaper operations as an adversary may target a hostile act at the host nation rather than the UK which may be a more difficult target. Thereby undermining the UK’s relationship with that nation and undermining military operations conducted from that location.”

Finally, and most concerning from a scrutiny and oversight point of view the MoD argued (again quoting Decision Notice)

“The effectiveness of operations conducted using Reaper outside Operation Shader in future depend, in part, on a greater degree of ambiguity as to the employment of Reaper in order to be successful. It is important to retain a degree of ambiguity regarding the full extent of Reaper operations now in order to maintain this flexibility in the future. “

Drone Wars argued strongly that the information requested –  a single figure of the number of sorties undertaken outside of Operation Shader and their broad, geographic location (i.e. ‘The Middle East’) – was not capable of causing the prejudice alleged.  We also pointed out to the Tribunal that the MoD has previously released the number of sorties undertaken outside of Operation Shader (In response to our questions about the targeted killing of Naweed Hussain in 2018) without any of the prejudice or harm suggested, but that seems to have been ignored by the tribunal.  Read more →

Cyborg Dawn?  Human-machine fusion and the future of warfighting

Peter Burt
Click to open report

Soldiers who see in the dark, communicate telepathically, or fly a drone by thought alone all sound like characters from in a science fiction film.  Yet research projects investigating all these possibilities are under way in laboratories and research centres around the globe as part of an upsurge of interest in the possibilities of human enhancement enabled largely by expanding knowledge in the field of neuroscience: the study of the human brain and nervous system.

In order to help in understanding the possibilities and hazards posed by human enhancement technology, Drone Wars UK is publishing ‘Cyborg Dawn?‘, a new study investigating the military use of human augmentation.

Human enhancement –  a medical or biological intervention to the body designed to improve performance, appearance, or capability beyond what is necessary to achieve, sustain or restore health – may lead to fundamentally new concepts of warfare and can be expected to play a role in enabling the increased use of remotely operated and uncrewed systems in war.

Although military planners are eager to create ‘super soldiers’, the idea of artificially modifying humans to give them capabilities beyond their natural abilities presents significant moral, legal, and health risks.  The field of human augmentation is fraught with danger, and without stringent regulation, neurotechnologies and genetic modification will lead us to an increasingly dangerous future where technology encourages and accelerates warfare.  The difficulties are compounded by the dual use nature of human augmentation, where applications with legitimate medical uses could equally be used to further the use of remote lethal military force.  There is currently considerable discussion about the dangers of ‘killer robot’ autonomous weapon systems, but it is also time to start discussing how to control human enhancement and cyborg technologies which military planners intend to develop.  Read more →