Comment & Analysis
Is the tide turning against the use of automated or unmanned systems in warfare? In the week that independent human rights expert Christof Heyns advised the United Nations that there should be a worldwide moratorium on the development of lethal autonomous robots, President Barack Obama was also reportedly planning to bring the controversial US drone programme under the closer scrutiny of Congress.
For British academics such as Professor Noel Sharkey of the University of Sheffield, who has vociferously questioned the legality and morality of strikes against so-called terrorists by unmanned vehicles, these moves might represent a welcome step forward.
For Heyns, the issue is about complete autonomy: that is, robots that act of their own accord to identify, track and eliminate targets. “While drones still have a 'human in the loop' who takes the decision to use lethal force, lethal autonomous robots have onboard computers that decide who should be targeted,” Heyns told the UN this week.
“War without reflection is mechanical slaughter. In the same way that the taking of any human life deserves as a minimum some deliberation, a decision to allow machines to be deployed to kill human beings deserves a collective pause worldwide.”
Whether that pause will occur remains to be seen. UAVs and drones have developed remarkably quickly over the past decade, although the systems Heyns is identifying have not been deployed publicly.
And it is worth pointing out the advantages of drones: the cost savings and ability to reach and carry out jobs that are unpleasant or undesirable for humans to engage in; and, on the battlefield, the ability to carry out a mission without risking a pilot's life. It's for this reason that the US is thought to be training more UAV pilots than pilots of conventional aircraft.
In the civilian sphere, the drones are already being used in the North Sea to inspect the flare stacks of oil rigs for maintenance purposes. Moves are under way to allow UAVs safe access to civilian airspace. In fact, defence company BAE Systems flew the first unmanned aircraft in British airspace back in April.
Lambert Dopping-Hepenstal, the programme director for Astraea, a project aimed at developing access to British airspace for UAVs, says that very small vehicles can be licensed to fly for commercial purposes at below 400 feet. “There is very restricted use of them. Most of the small ones flying at the moment are under 10kg.”
He emphasises that countries in Europe and the US must work together to develop common standards and protocols for UAV flight in civil airspace. “What Astraea is trying to understand is what the capability is like for UAVs to operate not in the segregated airspace of the military but in any airspace.
“There is a good foundation in the military work but you can't just fly a military UAV in unsegregated airspace.”
So there are dilemmas to be resolved in civvy street before UAVs are common sights in our skies. And the debate about their military use, as this week's events have demonstrated, is sure to rumble on.