UK starts drone attacks from home soil

The City of Lincoln in the north of England. Scenic. Suburban. And suddenly a hub for Britain's war on terror.


This week the government announced that it's now conducting drone attacks on Afghanistan from the base behind me - RAF Waddington - where 100 personnel are manning the hi-tech reaper drones carrying 500lb bombs and hellfire missiles.

Yesterday the RAF said they would only be conducting reconnaissance and surveillance missions, have they since changed there tune?

Dont really see what the problem is though, drones are more efficient, it's the way of the future. Would rather robots fight our wars than humans.

Drones (or UAS ,or UAV, or RPAS depending on your spin of choice) are simply the most cost effective way to provide surveillance/close air support in a permissive environment. I don't see what the fuss is about.

Theres no real difference between dropping a Pave-way Bomb from a Reaper or dropping it from a Tornado GR4. The Reaper has more persistence which if anything should help reduce erroneous strikes.

If you don't agree we should be in Afghanistan then thats a political issue and the weapon choice is irrelevant. If you do agree we should be in Afghanistan then saying that we should only do it in ways that put our people in the most danger is perverse.

reply to post by justwokeup


No that's not the point.

The point is that because drones supposedly help save the lives of the soldiers, it has the potential to make it far easier for a government to go to war and for people to accept it, if their troops aren't in harms way. Therefore we become more desensitized to warfare if it's "over there" and we are remote from it and the pilots are just in some base somewhere sat in front of a computer.

Drones strikes have killed hundreds if not thousands of innocents in Pakistan and Afghanistan, so it's not like using drones reduces errors. Or it's probably more the case of not having any clear idea of who they're blowing up and probably not losing too much sleep over it either. As long as they're labelled "terrorists", who cares right?

Yep, I never understand the problems people have with drones in war situations, yet they're fine with long distance snipers and heavily armoured vehicles/tanks, all of which have the same idea of keeping the people who are fighting safe through distance/protection from the enemy.

The only thing I can think of is the thinking that this could easily be used against their own population, but, since we already have police helicopters and planes, which do an important job, I don't see how different drones would be.

Originally posted by Kram09
reply to post by justwokeup

 

No that's not the point.

The point is that because drones supposedly help save the lives of the soldiers, it has the potential to make it far easier for a government to go to war and for people to accept it, if their troops aren't in harms way. Therefore we become more desensitized to warfare if it's "over there" and we are remote from it and the pilots are just in some base somewhere sat in front of a computer.

Drones strikes have killed hundreds if not thousands of innocents in Pakistan and Afghanistan, so it's not like using drones reduces errors. Or it's probably more the case of not having any clear idea of who they're blowing up and probably not losing too much sleep over it either. As long as they're labelled "terrorists", who cares right?

Not really true to be honest. The 'saving the lives of soldiers' thing is a red herring. They are used because they offer a persistence on station you don't get with fast jets.

The Taliban have zero capability against B1s , B2, Tornado GR4s or most of the other aircraft the coalition has used to drop bombs on them invisibly from a great height so its not really a sensible point.

In RAF service the Reapers will be used with the same Rule of Engagement as manned aircraft.

People are getting muddled because the CIA have been using drones in Pakistan in a counter productive assassination strategy. That has everything to do with the folly of americans getting into the assassination game, it has little to do with inherent moral problems with drones.

Originally posted by grimghost
the hi-tech reaper drones carrying 500lb bombs and hellfire missiles.

Correction - they can carry Hellfires or 500lb bombs, but they don't for the most part. British drones (and the RAF doesn't call them that) are, 90% of the time, unarmed and used for aerial recon.

Besides, what is the problem? We've been operating Reapers for years except that has been from a base in the US while we built the facility to do so here in the UK. Surely it is better that our national defence is conducted from our own shores than that of a foreign power?

reply to post by Kram09


US drone strikes.... Not UK ones. THe RAF does not, for the most part, carry out such missions and if they did, it is entirely within the UK's ROE, not the US's which is far more "blowy uppy"...

UK ROE's are highly restrictive - our boys on the ground can be taking heavy incoming fire, but if they can't PID the bloke shooting, they just have to sit there and take it - the Yanks on the other hand will simply blow the crap out anything that moves, including using drones.

Interesting replies, but my point still stands.

FFS. Why do we need to be involved in all this #. Four/five times I heard massively loud, and massively fast air craft over my house today. It scares the bejesus out of me every time.