Today’s Sun calls for the deployment of British drones to attack ISIS in Iraq and Syria. Rupert Murdoch thus joins a small but vocal chorus (including Liam Fox and Jack Straw) calling for the UK to join in with US airstrikes.
Over the past few weeks many commentators and campaigners and indeed senior politicians and military officials have argued, as the PM David Cameron did again on Radio 4 this morning that there is no simple military solution to the crisis in Syria/Iraq. Indeed, as many have stated, military intervention in Iraq help to create ISIS and caused the situation that we now face. Nevertheless we are beginning to see more and more voices calling for the use of armed drones. Read more →
US drone strikes resumed this week in Pakistan with the first strike taking place on Wednesday evening near Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan. This was quickly followed by a second strike early Thursday morning, although as the Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ) reports there is some confusion about the details of the second strike. The strikes are the first in Pakistan since 25 December 2013 – a five and half month ‘pause’. Read more →
The article hails the war in Iraq and Afghanistan as being “the making of the unmanned aircraft industry” and expresses grave concern that “the prospect of peace poses serious danger” to the industry. Indeed the author suggests an armistice now, like the armistices of the past would be “a downfall” and “a curse”.
The anonymous drone industry insider goes on to praise the trend of “increasing the level of vehicle autonomy and demoting the human from a ground-based pilot to multi-aircraft supervisor” as well as suggesting that civil airspace restrictions on drones due to public safety “will smother any chance of growth for UAVs if the comparative freedom of Afghanistan ceases to be available.” (Honestly I am not making this up!). The article finishes with a plea that the drone industry “must persuade military decision makers to trust autonomous technology to make decisions at least on par with the quality of humans in similar situations.” Oh, and, ahem, the industry must also “cut down on accident rates” (I promise I’m not making this up!)
I believe that this anonymous comment piece lets the PR mask of the drone industry (indeed the arms industry) slip and shows what people behind the growth of Drone Wars are really thinking: Firstly, that war is good for business, peace a curse. Secondly, despite the protestations of the politicians and senior military officials, the push towards greater autonomy for drones and armed robotic systems is real and being led by industry. And finally, despite drones regularly going ‘rogue’ and crashing, the holy grail for the drone industry is to be allowed to fly drones in civil airspace alongside manned aircraft.
The SOCOM MQ-1C unit, is a newly formed quick reaction capability unit to support special operations (Special Forces, SEALs, rangers, NATO commandos) in Afghanistan and Iraq. According to a report in Aviation Week last December about Sky Warrior and the new units, they were created as part of Defense Secretary Robert Gates’ intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance surge.
NOTE: Last post for a while as I’m taking a break with the family….
Today’s Sun calls for the deployment of British drones to attack ISIS in Iraq and Syria. Rupert Murdoch thus joins a small but vocal chorus (including Liam Fox and Jack Straw) calling for the UK to join in with US airstrikes.
