Countering Drones: Technology and Other Options
In 2019, a Hollywood action-thriller movie Angel Has Fallen depicted a futuristic scene in which the US President faces a swarm of drones in the middle of a river. To protect the President against the attack, a secret service agent Mike Banning, played by actor Gerald Butler, and his team fire indiscriminately with machine guns and handguns against the incoming armed drones, which seem to have a “fire, forget and find” capability. The drones shown in the film seem to be autonomous, which use artificial intelligence (AI) to identify the target and destroy them with a “hard kill”, using an armed firing weapon, without any human assistance.
This might seem like a next-generation fight scene but with advancements in military technology, the idea of killer robots is increasingly shifting from reel to real life. Iran has lost two eminent people to drone strikes. Many countries have already been a victim of drone attacks or “killer robots” as called in warfare. In January 2020, Iran’s top general Qassem Soleimani was killed in a US drone strike just off Baghdad airport in Iraq [1]. Later that year, in November, the founder of Iran’s nuclear program, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh was reportedly killed by “a remote-controlled” weapon, according to Iranian assessment. Loitering munitions have also displayed their ability to have a destructive impact on adversaries which was noticeable during the Armenia and Azerbaijan over the Nagorno-Karabakh region.
AI Drone Technology
The first known use of armed drones to carry out high-intensity attacks is said to be employed by the non-state actor Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. Later in 2019, the Saudi Aramco oil facilities were attacked by Houthi rebels from the Libyan border prompting international concerns over non-state actors acquiring low-cost drone technology.
In March, a UN report cited the possibility of the use of such autonomous drones with a “mind of their own” in the ongoing Libyan conflict. Known as the lethal autonomous weapons system (LAWS), the report said that Kargu-2 drones developed by STM, a Turkish state-owned defense company, might have attacked soldiers in March 2020. [2]. “The lethal autonomous weapons systems were programmed to attack targets without requiring data connectivity between the operator and the munition: in effect, a true “fire, forget and find” capability,” the report noted. Denying the use of autonomous technology to attack targets, the STM’s CEO, Ozgur Guleryuz stressed upon “a manual operator pressing a button” which can be cancelled any time before the drone carries out the attack. [3] “Autonomous technologies are advancing so fast, but we are not there yet. At STM, we always think ethically a human should be involved in the loop,” Guleryuz added.
The Kargu-2 (also called Eurasian Sparrowhawk in Turkey), is a rotary-wing combat UAV (UCAV) designed for asymmetric warfare or anti-terrorist operations, as per STM’s website. It is one of the many drones based on futuristic AI technology. Apart from Turley, the US, China and Iran are leading developers of AI combat drones. Amid the Kargu-2 controversy, Turkey is in the process of developing another combat drone called ‘Alpagu’, a lightweight model that can be carried and operated by a single soldier on the battlefield.
China already possesses an intelligent swarming attack technology, using close to 10 unmanned helicopter drones. Several media reports have released satellite images of the Malan airbase in China’s Xinjiang region showing the presence of several drones near the Indian border [4]. A swarm of small explosive-laden drones could present a massive threat across an entire area of a battlefield and China has been aggressively developing the capability as per various media reports.
The Existing Capabilities
The increased use of drones in modern-day warfare has not only made militaries around the world race to manufacture the deadliest and the most advanced killer robots but also to build counter-systems in order to have an edge over deterrence. Counter drone technologies include either “hard kill” which is physically destroying the enemy’s UAVs or “soft kill” which either destroys the jammer or hacks into the GPS technology.
One such system developed by Israel is the Heron drones which are famous for their anti-jamming capabilities that disrupt the command-and-control links and can prove to be effective in neutralizing UAV threats. The other counter or anti-drone technologies include Israel’s ELI-4030 Drone Guard counter-unmanned aircraft system which uses short-, medium-, and longer-range detection and flight disruption.
In the wake of a drone attack on the Jammu Air Force station in June this year, the Indian Air Force (IAF) issued a request for information (RFI) to invite bids for anti-drone systems [5]. “The counter-unmanned aircraft system (CUAS) is intended to detect, track, identify, designate and neutralize hostile UAS. Laser-Directed Energy Weapons (Laser-DEWs) are essentially required as a kill option,” said the RFI adding that it should provide a multi-sensor, multi-kill solution to enforce effective no-fly zones for unmanned aircraft while inflicting minimal collateral damage to the surrounding environment. It should generate a composite air situational picture for the operator and generate alerts based on user-defined parameters. India’s very own Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) has developed an anti-drone system that was deployed during last year’s Republic Day Parade and the Prime Minister’s Independence Day speech at the Red Fort in 2020 [6]. DRDO’s system can detect and destroy micro drones up to 3 kilometres using Directed Energy Weapon (DEW) laser technology. It is also equipped with jamming capabilities that can hamper operational command and control links but no further information on large large-scale production and potential deployment of this anti-drone system along the borders has been released.
Abhijit Iyer-Mitra, a senior research fellow at the Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies recommended the alternatives to counter cutting-edge drone systems. “One option is to invest in GPS jammers and geo-fencing agreements. The use of GPS jammers will be effective in neutralizing the unmanned system. The authorities will have no trouble in deploying them in Kashmir to thwart cross-border drone attacks,” he noted, adding that sealing effective geofencing agreements with commercial drone manufacturers will prevent UAVs from flying near critical infrastructure by pre-programmed codes put in by manufacturers [7].
The film also shows that a human operator suspends the mission of opening fire on Banning when the drone swarm moves closer to his boat in order to target him. Due to the abort instruction, the drones simply fly overhead the agent and attack the other person present there. This indicates the importance of human intervention while autonomous systems, which could be incorporated into local and international warfare laws of countries to prevent any means of “autonomous error”.
An alternative to technological options is the creation of an international independent body that registers, monitors and regulates the use of such Lethal Autonomous Weapon Systems (LAWS). The threat of drones has reverberated in the international community, reaching the United Nations. Last week, the UN talks on autonomous weapons systems – known as “killer robots” – failed to formulate formal negotiations to launch an international treaty to regulate and govern the use of such systems [8]. While Sixty-eight states supported a call for a legal instrument at the UN, media reports that Russia, India and the United States were among the countries that pushed back against such a treaty.
References:
[1]https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-iran-un-rights-idUSKBN2472TW
[2]https://eurasiantimes.com/did-turkish-combat-drones-autonomously-attacked-soldiers-during-the-libyan-civil-war/
[3]https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Aerospace-Defense/Turkish-defense-company-says-drone-unable-to-go-rogue-in-Libya
[4]https://eurasiantimes.com/chinas-xinjiang-airbase-near-indian-border-hosting-hypersonic-drones-reports/
[5]https://www.business-standard.com/article/current-affairs/iaf-to-procure-10-anti-drone-systems-for-deployment-in-border-areas-121070600160_1.html
[6]https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/drdo-ready-with-anti-drone-system-for-armed-forces-pm-modi-to-have-drone-killer-as-part-of-his-security-detail/story-ZzSLytENkCubX9CuP0XV7N.html
[7]https://eurasiantimes.com/drone-attack-on-jammu-air-force-station-three-urgent-steps-india-must-undertake-to-avoid-more-attacks/
[8]https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/12/18/un-talks-fail-to-open-negotiations-on-killer-robots
Pic Courtesy-Mitch Neilson at unsplash.com
(The views expressed are those of the author and do not represent views of CESCUBE)
