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Unmanned aerial warfare: Flight of the drones | The Economist - 7 views

www.economist.com/21531433

itgs drones1.1_reliability_integrity 2.6_military 3.11_robotics_AI_exp_sys

shared by anonymous on 27 Oct 11 - No Cached
  • anonymous on 27 Oct 11
     
    Summarize m12 nov 2 az
  • ...1 more comment...
  • Azman Fadhilah on 11 Nov 11
     
    On September 30th, a missile strike launched from a UAV killed Anwar al-Awlaki, al-Qaeda's most effective propagandist. This was an example of how the UAV are changing today's combat. These babies are equipped with sophisticated sensors and carry Hellfire missiles and laser-guided bombs. There may not be a man in the cockpit, but each Reaper UAV requires more than 180 people to keep it flying. A pilot is always at the controls from a ground control unit and another officer operates its sensors and cameras. UAV have become the weapon of choice over the past decade. Theres not a month that passes without reports that an al-Qaeda or Taliban leader has been killed by UAVs. There are more hours flown by America's UAS than by its manned fighter jets and more pilots are being trained to fly them than their manned equivalents. The frequency of drone stikes on terrorists in Pakistan has rose from one every 40 days to one every four days under Obama's admin. The UAV's ability to loiter for hours, minutely observe human activities while transmitting full motion video to its ground crews and can strike with pinpoint accuracy has made it the essential weapon in America's war on terrorism. Drones come in many different shapes and sizes. Predators and Reapers are the larger and more popular ones. Some are micro sized devices that imitate a bird used for eavesdropping or a mid sized plane that can be hand launched by soldiers to tell them what is happening over the hill. The medium sized UAVs would be able to defend airspace against enemy intrusion to attacking enemy air defenses. The largest UAV would operate as airborne warning and control, aerial refueling tankers, lift transports and long range bombers. The next generation of drones will also have AI, which allows them to shoot to kill. The UAS are used for "dull, dirty, dangerous, difficult or different" tasks. These tasks include surveillance missions requiring time and a degree of persistence that crews of
  • Jenny Mok on 11 Nov 11
     
    manned aircraft couldn't provide. Also, UAS could be used to fly in to observe or take samples after a chemical or biological attack. Any missions too dangerous for manned aircraft will be taken care of by the UAV. UAV have other advantages over manned aircraft as they have more detailed information about their targets, their strikes are more accurate and cause fewer civilian casualties. They are also cheaper and smaller. Since they have no pilot, the space could be used for fuel and thus they can fly much longer than manned aircraft. Without the need to accommodate crew, drone can be given radar-cheating stealthy shapes and can maneuver better. There are however a problem afflicting the drones as they depend on two-way satellite communications. If the datalink is broken the remote pilot will lose control of the aircraft. For missions requiring constant oversight, the vulnerability to electronic jamming or a direct attack on a communications satellite is a huge problem. Another problem is that the dones has a slight delay between the remote pilot and the aircraft. To reduce latency, small, solar, or laser powered ultra long endurance drones can form a chain in the sky along which satellite signals can be bounced. To reduce the workload on pilots, big UAV can take off and land automatically. The US Air Force plans to have a pilot operating up to four drones at a time. Civil liberty advocacy groups have raised concerns about targeted killings by drones. Bus as long as a UAS pilot can trust data from remote sensors, he or she should be able to make a proper assessment the same ways as the pilot of a manned aircraft. UAS pilot will be in a better position to do so since he or she will have more time to assess the situation accurately and not be exhausted b the physical battering of flying a jet.
  • Jenny Mok on 12 Nov 11
     
    Allowing the UAV to fire a weapon based entirely on its own data analysis raises a lot of ethical problems. Using UAV to kill enemies thousands of miles away is like a cowardly action of a bully sheltering behind superior technology. There are fears that UAS will lower the political threshold for fighting and an essential of restraint will be removed. Drones make leaders fonder of war.
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