The Verge - The emerging politics of drone warfare

President Obama will address legality of drone program on Thursday

2013-05-19T16:48:03Z

The AP reports that President Barack Obama will discuss the legality of his administration's controversial drone program, as well as other counterterrorism measures, during a speech on Thursday. The speech comes after mounting pressure on the administration from Democratic and Republican lawmakers, as well as advocacy groups, who have demanded greater transparency regarding the government's legal justification for drone strikes.

The US government has been criticized for failing to acknowledge the extent of its use of drones for targeted killings, as well as the opaque legal justification behind their use. In April, the American Civil Liberties Union told Wired that "the targeted killing program raises serious questions about government...

US Navy launches first drone from aboard an aircraft carrier

2013-05-15T08:54:09Z

The US Navy this week successfully launched an unmanned plane from an aircraft carrier, marking what officials are calling "an inflection point" in the military's use of drone aircraft. The X-47B prototype drone, manufactured by Northrop Grumman, took off from aboard the USS George HW Bush Tuesday, and made two low approaches before circling back to land. The test, held off the coast of Virginia, marks the first time that the Navy has ever launched an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) from an aircraft carrier.

US drone strikes condemned as illegal by Pakistan's highest court

2013-05-13T04:58:05Z

A decision from Pakistan's highest court in Peshawar has ruled that US drone strikes on tribal lands have taken place illegally and in violation of human rights.

The court found that the strikes constitute war crimes, and occur without the consent of the Pakistani government, leaving a secret deal forged by the CIA and Pakistani military as the only possible hint of cooperation between the two nations. The decision cites recent estimates that the strikes have caused "at least 400" civilian casualties since 2004, a number supported by previous reporting from public interest groups such as the Bureau of Investigative Journalism and the New America Foundation. The case was originally filed by a charity representing the families of 17...

US Navy drone flies two days straight using liquid hydrogen tank

2013-05-12T03:47:03Z

As the US military discovers just how useful drones can be, it's eager to keep them flying as long as can be, and the US Office of Naval Research now has a drone that can fly for two whole days. The Ion Tiger, an experimental surveillance plane that uses a hydrogen fuel cell as its power source, flew for a record 26 hours using pressurized hydrogen back in 2009, but late last month it managed a full 48 hours and one minute thanks to a new cryogenic storage tank filled with liquid hydrogen. That's not the only way to keep lightweight aircraft flying for lengthy periods, as laser beams and solar panels have recently shown, but the hydrogen could allow planes to fly further afield and at more flexible hours of the day than the other...

Canadian mounties claim first person's life saved by a police drone

2013-05-10T16:23:04Z

As the US continues to grapple with the idea of letting drones fly through the country's airspace, our neighbors to the north have reported a new milestone for unmanned aerial technology: the first life saved using a drone. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police in the province of Saskatchewan announced yesterday that they successfully used the small Draganflyer X4-ES helicopter drone to locate and treat an injured man whose car had flipped over in a remote, wooded area in near-freezing temperatures. Zenon Dragan, president and founder of the Draganfly company that makes the drone, said in a statement: "to our knowledge, this is the first time that a life may have been saved with the use of a sUAS (small Unmanned Aerial System) helicopter."

Automated killer robot development should be paused, says UN report

2013-05-01T21:42:01Z

A United Nations report published online this week says the UN should get countries of the world to suspend development of robotic, fully automated weapons systems until "such time as an internationally agreed upon framework" is reached. The report was prepared by Christof Heyns, a UN human rights lawyer, and its due to be debated at the UN Human Rights Council later this month. Still, the current version of the report provides a window into the UN's thinking on what will come next after an era of remotely piloted drones, presenting an alarming vision of a dystopian near future. "Tireless war machines, ready for deployment at the push of a button, pose the danger of permanent (if low-level) armed conflict," Heyns writes in the report.

US drones could remain over Afghanistan after 2014 withdrawal

2013-04-23T23:11:04Z

The US military is due to pull most combat troops out of Afghanistan by the end of 2014. But after that, an armed American presence could remain over Afghan skies, depending on what agreement for continuing operations is reached between the US and Afghanistan. Air Force Major General H.D. Polumbo, Jr, told reporters at the Pentagon today that drones, including armed unmanned aerial vehicles operated by the US, will likely continue to be used to support the Afghan army's operations through 2014 and probably on into 2015. “You’ll have that hybrid ISR [intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance] as I call it, that armed ISR, remotely piloted aircraft capability all the way through ’14," Polumbo is quoted by Danger Room, later...

ACLU appeals for greater transparency on drone killings

2013-04-16T11:31:04Z

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is appealing a January decision that allowed the CIA to withhold details of its drone targeted killing program. In a statement given to Wired, Hina Shamsi, the ACLU National Security Project director explained that "the targeted killing program raises serious questions about government power in a constitutional democracy."

Last week, McClatchy released evidence from secret documents that showed the extent of US drone killings. The evidence showed that, despite CIA assertions to the contrary, the targeted killing program was not restricted to high-level targets; according to McClatchy, "at least" 265 of the 482 people killed in the 12-month period ending September 2011 were "unknown extremists."

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