Drone Wars

The use of unmanned and autonomous technology has the potential to significantly change warfare.

17:33 16 November 2015

For years, the military has used human-controlled drones to eliminate enemy targets and carry out surveillance. Now, experts say that the introduction of unmanned and autonomous technology could lead to drone wars.

 

"The human being is a natural constraint on an aircraft’s endurance," said Andrew Tyler, Northrop Grumman’s Chief Executive in Europe.

 

"If you refuel these unmanned air systems, they can pretty much carry on until you actually need to maintain the engine. It could be 50 hours; it could be a hundred hours in the future. No human can sit around in an aircraft like that for that length of time."

 

Noel Sharkey, Chairman of the International Committee for Robot Arms Control, said: "The scenarios I have seen set up by the United States and think tanks project using swarms of something like the X47-B in the Pacific against the Chinese where they are outgunned.

 

"The enemy are not going to be frozen in time and they will also have these weapons. How are they going to interact and how could we prevent accidental conflicts arising? It is a nightmare scenario."