Drones Now Make Up Nearly One-Third of U.S. Military Aircraft
January 10th, 2012Via: Wired:
Remember when the military actually put human beings in the cockpits of its planes? They still do, but in far fewer numbers. According to a new congressional report acquired by Danger Room, drones now account for 31 percent of all military aircraft.
To be fair, lots of those drones are tiny flying spies, like the Army’s Raven, that could never accommodate even the most diminutive pilot. (Specifically, the Army has 5,346 Ravens, making it the most numerous military drone by far.) But in 2005, only five percent of military aircraft were robots, a report by the Congressional Research Service notes. Barely seven years later, the military has 7,494 drones. Total number of old school, manned aircraft: 10,767 planes.
A small sliver of those nearly 7,500 drones gets all of the attention. The military owns 161 Predators — the iconic flying strike drone used over Pakistan, Yemen and elsewhere — and Reapers, the Predator’s bigger, better-armed brother.
But even as the military’s bought a ton of drones in the past few years, the Pentagon spends much, much more money on planes with people in them. Manned aircraft still get 92 percent of the Pentagon’s aircraft procurement money. Still, since 2001, the military has spent $26 billion on drones, the report — our Document of the Day — finds.
Related: Civilian Contractors in the Kill Chain
WAY back when, I was offered an OCS slot with a guaranteed billet at Annapolis upon successful completion, based on my aptitude and test scores.
In my mind, this was ultimately aimed at a desire to land a slot in flight school and become a sky jockey, a jet pilot, a rocket man. The wet dream of so many tech-obsessed young American males.
I was told I had a 48-hour window to make up my mind, before the offer would be rescinded and the slot given to the next slightly-less-worthy OCS candidate.
A dream come true, right?
Initially, I hedged, a little taken aback at the reality of signing away the next 13 years my life at the tender age of 18.
The more I contemplated, the more certain I became that this “dream shot” was actually a nightmare in disguise.
Never having much love or respect for overarching authority or blind obedience, the military environment would clearly be problematic.
And for the first time, I actually began to consider the finer details of the job description beyond the romantic Top Gun glossolalia. That I would be asked to blow up things (and people) I would never even see, let alone know, was the clincher.
No matter how much I genuinely wanted to burn the sky, acting as an agent of genocide wasn’t something I was capable of doing and I knew that when looked within for my answer.
And I am certainly not alone.
Kevin – I know you remember pondering here, probably almost a decade back, whether societal collapse(s) would happen quickly enough to prevent the powerful elites of the world preparing themselves for it’s coming. In many ways it’s becoming apparent that things are unraveling too slowly to prevent that.
So many positive and healthy cultural changes are happening, certainly…greater awareness of our situation is steadily becoming more widespread…. And yet, at the same time, the final Crackdown is also ramping-up.
The chief problem with any business has always been Employees. Other human beings. It’s especially so with the military industry. People, no matter how trained and indoctrinated, are still people. You can get them to hate different people, but not so easily people from their own culture. The military has tried for many years to woo the prejudiced, the angry and the ignorant…but those types only brought a multitude of other problems. Machines are clearly the final step in the complete devolution of militarism from an heroic pursuit of communal liberty to a lifeless means of mindless control of all people everywhere.
I find it so very shameful that there are so many ‘idiot scientists’ who agree to work on things like robotic military devices, crowd control weapons, uber-deadly virus cultivation, increasingly weird genetic pursuits, etc. I could easily see how a day may come, decades from now, when “Science” will be viewed much the same as Witchcraft was viewed hundreds of years ago. As a dark force, not to be allowed, a bringer of sickness and death. I know a number of people who already view it much that way.
If only there was a way to get people with conscience to put pressure on their family members and loved ones who work on these types of things. To convince them that this is no way to make a living…that they’re selling us all out, including their families and loved ones. But the modern sciences are so thoroughly filled with small-minded people anymore.
@lagavulin
Re:
You can get them to hate different people, but not so easily people from their own culture. The military has tried for many years to woo the prejudiced, the angry and the ignorant…but those types only brought a multitude of other problems.
—
See: The Life and Death of Pvt. Danny Chen:
http://nymag.com/news/features/danny-chen-2012-1/
Cheers to you Miraculix for having a working conscience.
Lately, in considering the rise of the machines, I’m thinking the best thing that could happen to Planet Earth and all of its inhabitants is a major EMP event.
Just have the sun blow all these freaking war mongering gizmos to pieces. That might make life on Planet Earth for the rest of us very troublesome, but what the heck?
I don’t know if it was the editorial in the local newspaper supporting the XL pipeline, or what, but I’m so freaking sick and tired of rape, pillage, war, kill, hate, crime, murder, ad naseum that I am getting ready to get the old bataca out of the attic to beat on the pillows so to let out my rage. I prefer letting out my anger without harming another human, animal, or plant, but I’m not perfect.
But truly, inside right now, I feel a very big rage against the machines, the systems, the world as it is right now. It is not a destructive rage where I want to hurt anyone. I am just angry. It’s a pretty impotent anger when you are mad at the Pentagon, the US goverment, the banks, whatever.
My best cheer today was reading this: the best way to rob a bank is to own one.
Miraculix – you are certainly not alone, and I’m comforted that I am not either. Sometimes I doubt my choice not to join the machine (USAF – ROTC). Not many get that I don’t want to bomb everything.