Therein lies the scary bit that most seem aware of but are apparently struggling to express - our logic tree is moving from two decisions to one. Under the present system, when a politico declares someone an enemy the shooter still must decide if the enemy/threat is legitimate. Our military was intentionally set up as an apolitical entity with its own independent set of laws to protect the people from political abuses. Eliminate the shooter and you eliminate your final safeguard.
Well i really don't know how the USA's armed forces are setup. When I was in the British armed forces Her Majesty was our boss.
I believe the British way of thinking about this stuff. Is that its still a human that makes the final weapon release decision.
The acquiring of the target and then selection of the target just won't be the person on the stick.
The target it acquires will then fed through to someone else who will then make the ROE yes or no. They will then release the weapon.
The pilots of these things take years to train up and when they get it wrong they are suspended for months. Someone watching a video feed and then pressing a button doesn't take nearly as long to get into the hot seat or cost as much.
The US military is similar. Ultimately the President is Commander-in-Chief, but our military has its own laws (Uniform Code of Military Justice), courts, prisons, etc so no matter how perverted civilian laws/enforcement become (ie allowing rioting, etc), our military stays independent of most politics. Whether you're a pilot or a rifleman, if you pull the trigger you own the round for better or worse so there is a very real final decision and you're ultimately held responsible. Granted, pilots have a bit more of big brother onboard to tattle on them if the wrong decision is made, tho film media is everywhere on the ground so both often do face endless scrutiny after split-second decisions and may end up in prison or otherwise for making (and sometimes not making) wrong/bad decisions. As mentioned above, I think autonomy is definitely an inevitability in both aerial and eventually ground warfare. Another inevitability I foresee is the need for major population control/possible reduction to combat our environmental impact. It may sound paranoid, but the fact that a small subset of the population will control both with ever diminishing safeguards against tyranny is concerning.
I do agree with comments on the limits of technology. Eyes "on the ground" always see more and IMHO hearts there do feel more as well. I am young enough to have served in current conflicts and am encouraged by recent diplomacy, hoping one day to take a tour of Iraq and Afghanistan safely as a tourist as many WW2 veterans eventually did of their former battlefields.
dik,
To be fair that is pretty much unavoidable when discussing drones.
Personally I appreciate hearing the honest experiences of someone who has faced these issues in a very real way.
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinions, but they are not entitled to their own facts."
iron metallurgist... I did not mention "demonstrations caused by people protesting against cops murdering unarmed citizens, either." Case in point. Inappropriate and should be deleted as should this posting. There is no question that unmanned drones taking out targets being wrong.
Journalist Chris Hedges said of being present at the collapse of east germany in '89 that the east german military would not, in strength, fire on the east german people, and this contributed to or hastened the collapse. Presumably, an AI could have these programs ruled out, although US drones have fired on US citizens abroad in the past.
Peripherally, at least two movies of my youth, Blue Thunder and Running Man are based on people that wouldn't fire on domestic targets.
Drones have already been used over Minneapolis for surveillance.
"doing surveillance of Sarnia, Canada" … (with apologies to the Sarnutians) what on earth do they hope to see ?
"Our military was intentionally set up as an apolitical entity" … sorry disagree, remember MacArthur in Korea ? The president is the head of the military and tells them what he wants them to do; they then execute his orders. But possibly you mean "apolitical" in the sense that they are not (overtly) active in the political stage.
another day in paradise, or is paradise one day closer ?
autonomous drone controlled by an AI computer program. Designed by a management committee ( Does 737 MAX ring a bell?) ,and of course no one has ever heard of an error in computer coding before. It appears that the AI controlled weapons will be the de facto "limits to growth" of the human race, supplanting starvation and plain old human controlled warfare.
"...when logic, and proportion, have fallen, sloppy dead..." Grace Slick
I wonder how the Tarnak Farm Incident would have played out with drones?
WIKI said:
The Tarnak Farm incident refers to the killing of four Canadian soldiers and the injury of eight others from the 3rd Battalion, Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry Battle Group (3PPCLIBG) on the night of April 17, 2002, near Kandahar, Afghanistan.
An American F-16 fighter jet piloted by Air National Guard Major Harry Schmidt dropped a laser-guided 500-pound (230 kg) bomb on the Canadians, who were conducting a night firing exercise at Tarnak Farms.
The deaths were the first of Canada's war in Afghanistan, and the first in a combat zone since the Korean War
