WASHINGTON: At the Zhuhai air show in southeastern China last November, Chinese companies startled some Americans by unveiling 25 different models of remotely controlled aircraft and showing video animation of a missile-armed drone taking out an armored vehicle and attacking a US aircraft carrier.
The presentation appeared to be more marketing hype than military threat; the event is China's biggest aviation market, drawing both Chinese and foreign military buyers. But it was stark evidence that the US' near monopoly on armed drones was coming to an end, with far-reaching consequences for American security, international law and the future of warfare.
Eventually, US will face a military adversary or terrorist group armed with drones, military analysts say. But what the short-run hazard experts foresee is not an attack on the US, which faces no enemies with significant combat drone capabilities, but the political and legal challenges posed when another country follows the American example.
The Bush administration, and even more aggressively the Obama administration, embraced an extraordinary principle: that the US can send this robotic weapon over borders to kill perceived enemies, even American citizens, who are viewed as a threat.
"Is this the world we want to live in?" asks Micah Zenko, a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. "Because we're creating it."
What was a science-fiction scenario not much more than a decade ago has become today's news. In Iraq and Afghanistan , military drones have become a routine part of the arsenal. In Pakistan, according to US officials, strik es from Predators and Reapers operated by the CIA have killed over 2,000 militants. In Yemen last month, an American citizen was, for the first time, the intended target of a drone strike, as Anwar al-Awlaki was killed. If China, for instance, sends killer drones into Kazakhstan to hunt minority Uighur Muslims it accuses of plotting terrorism, what will the US say? What if India uses remotely controlled craft to hit terrorism suspects in Kashmir, or Russia sends drones after militants in the Caucasus? American officials who protest will likely find their own example thrown back at them.
The qualities that have made lethal drones so attractive to the Obama administration for counterterrorism appeal to many countries and, conceivably, to terrorist groups: a capacity for leisurely surveillance and precise strikes, modest cost, and most important, no danger to the operator, who may sit in safety thousands of miles from the target. To date, only the US, Israel and Britain are known to have used drones for strikes. But American defense analysts count more than 50 countries that have built or bought unmanned aerial vehicles, or UAVs, and the number is rising every month. Israel and China are aggressively developing and marketing drones, and Russia, Iran, India, Pakistan and several other countries are not far behind. The Defence Security Service, which protects the Pentagon from espionage, warned in a report last year that US drone technology had become a prime target for foreign spies.
It is easy to scare ourselves by imagining terrorist drones rigged not just to carry bombs but to spew anthrax or scatter radioactive waste. Speculation that al-Qaida might use exotic weapons has so far turned out to be just that. But the technological curve for drones means the threat can no longer be discounted. "I think of where the airplane was at start of WWI: unarmed and limited to a handful of countries," says P W Singer whose book "Wired for War" is a primer on robotic combat says. "Then it was armed and everywhere. That is the path we're on."
The presentation appeared to be more marketing hype than military threat; the event is China's biggest aviation market, drawing both Chinese and foreign military buyers. But it was stark evidence that the US' near monopoly on armed drones was coming to an end, with far-reaching consequences for American security, international law and the future of warfare.
Eventually, US will face a military adversary or terrorist group armed with drones, military analysts say. But what the short-run hazard experts foresee is not an attack on the US, which faces no enemies with significant combat drone capabilities, but the political and legal challenges posed when another country follows the American example.
The Bush administration, and even more aggressively the Obama administration, embraced an extraordinary principle: that the US can send this robotic weapon over borders to kill perceived enemies, even American citizens, who are viewed as a threat.
"Is this the world we want to live in?" asks Micah Zenko, a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. "Because we're creating it."
What was a science-fiction scenario not much more than a decade ago has become today's news. In Iraq and Afghanistan , military drones have become a routine part of the arsenal. In Pakistan, according to US officials, strik es from Predators and Reapers operated by the CIA have killed over 2,000 militants. In Yemen last month, an American citizen was, for the first time, the intended target of a drone strike, as Anwar al-Awlaki was killed. If China, for instance, sends killer drones into Kazakhstan to hunt minority Uighur Muslims it accuses of plotting terrorism, what will the US say? What if India uses remotely controlled craft to hit terrorism suspects in Kashmir, or Russia sends drones after militants in the Caucasus? American officials who protest will likely find their own example thrown back at them.
The qualities that have made lethal drones so attractive to the Obama administration for counterterrorism appeal to many countries and, conceivably, to terrorist groups: a capacity for leisurely surveillance and precise strikes, modest cost, and most important, no danger to the operator, who may sit in safety thousands of miles from the target. To date, only the US, Israel and Britain are known to have used drones for strikes. But American defense analysts count more than 50 countries that have built or bought unmanned aerial vehicles, or UAVs, and the number is rising every month. Israel and China are aggressively developing and marketing drones, and Russia, Iran, India, Pakistan and several other countries are not far behind. The Defence Security Service, which protects the Pentagon from espionage, warned in a report last year that US drone technology had become a prime target for foreign spies.
It is easy to scare ourselves by imagining terrorist drones rigged not just to carry bombs but to spew anthrax or scatter radioactive waste. Speculation that al-Qaida might use exotic weapons has so far turned out to be just that. But the technological curve for drones means the threat can no longer be discounted. "I think of where the airplane was at start of WWI: unarmed and limited to a handful of countries," says P W Singer whose book "Wired for War" is a primer on robotic combat says. "Then it was armed and everywhere. That is the path we're on."
- Times of India
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