Microdrone Spy Planes

glinden writes "BBC News is reporting that Israel is now deploying microdrone spy planes. These planes have a wingspan of 13 inches (33 cm), can be carried in a backpack, can be launched by a single soldier, and can even fly through windows. The next step in the drone wars?"

Comments

Re:Fly through Windows?

[airrage]

I have to agree that it sounds rather fishy. What happens if the window is in a hallway? They should make a helocopter one instead of a fixed-wing one. That way it could hover and enter windows, buildings, etc. Of course maybe it's hard to RC the collective as I think it's called?

Very clever

[ackthpt]

While I'm postive this will lead to heated debate, flames and trolls regarding the situation in Palestine. I think it's very clever and resourceful to develop inexpensive methods of reconnaissance. But as these things buzz around they'd be hard to overlook. Maybe the next time the Israeli Army assasinates a palistinian they can do it with a poison needle or dart on one of these things instead of firing air-to-ground missiles. What's to stop the palestinians from doing likewise?

Preferably they'd eliminate the need for such things by reigning in their own hardline elements demands and work toward peace.

No justice, no peace.
Know justice, know peace.

Re:Very clever

[Anonymous Coward]

Peace doesn't buy you aquifers full of water.

And if you say anything about how unfair that is to everyone lese in the region that has to ration water while we pillage the Golan Heights Aquifers, you're an anti-semite and a Nazi.

I think that's great how that works out. Because I'm a Jew, I can be as big an asshole as I want, and you can't say anything! You anti-semite nazis!

Re:Very clever

[Anonymous Coward]

Preferably they'd eliminate the need for such things by reigning in their own hardline elements demands and work toward peace.

That's a good one. Ask yourself these questions:

What would happen if tomorrow the Palestinians said, "We are tired of this. We are no longer going to use violence to achieve our goals."

Most people I ask say that a peace treaty would be signed.

What would happen if tomorrow the Israelis said, "We are tired of this. We are no longer going to use violence to achieve our goals."

Most people I ask say that the Palestinians will kill all the Israelis.

Why are these answers different? Discuss, compare & contrast.

Re:Very clever

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't want to start too much of a flame war, but I think that there is a lot of myths flying around regarding Israel. I will restrain myself from ranting, but want to steer your attention to this website [www.us-israel.org] full of facts, WITH SOURCES. Take some time and become educated.

Re:Very clever

[mi]

Hey if you gave the Palestinians billions of US$ a year in military aid maybe they would.

This weapon, as well as Israel's famous gun (Uzi), and their tanks are of their own design.

Palestinians got a lot more than "military aid" in the past -- they got entire armies fighting for -- so it was claimed -- their cause. Israel's very existence hung on a hair against _hundreds_ of Egyptian and Syrian tanks.

Finally, the world certainly gives to Palestinians too -- food, medicine, buildings. Soviet Union and Arab nations were/are providing weapons and ammunition. As far as their weapon design -- well, adding chipped nails and bearing balls to the bombs for maximum maiming was quite an idea, was not it?

Re:Very clever

[Killswitch1968]

Dear lord. People accuse of Sharon of being cruel, but nothing outmatches the sheer barbarism of terrorist groups. At least Sharon tries to attack military targets, and doesn't ask 14 years old to blow themselves to pieces by saying they'll go to heaven when they do.

Re:Very clever

[WNight]

You are so terribly uninformed. The area occupied by Israel was largely unoccupied before the late 1800s and early 1900s when Jewish settlers started moving into the area. In the beginning they were quite popular - despite the long-lasting anti-semitism of many Muslims they brought industry and prosperity to the area. Moreso, they let the Arabs in the area be full citizens in Israel when it formed - Israel is currently the only democracy in the area. Ironically the Arab in the area have more political freedom in Israel than in the surrounding countries. Further, modern Israel is secular - there are many Jews, but the political structure isn't religious unlike in most of the surrounding countries.

When Israel was formed it was the largest single group of Jews in the world and its creation was merely a matter of the British setting borders in the area to best represent the political/racial groups. Most of the Arab countries in the area have no more historical right than Israel does.

Then consider the tactics. The Palestinians intentionally target civilians. The israelis intentionally target known terrorists, often passing up a chance at assasinating them until they're not surrounded by civilians. The Muslims intentionally try to kill the innocent - the Israelis do so only by accident.

Israel has gone out of their way to be fair, even going so far as to give back land taken during a defensive war. Ask yourself what any other country would do if in the process of defending itself in a war it pushed the enemy back and captured land. Would they give it back later, or keep it as just spoils of war? There's very little historical precedent for giving territory back to the agressors, yet Israel did this. The countries surrounding them easily have enough territory to take in the Palestinians and this has been proposed by people looking for peaceful solutions for years, but the Palestinians are left where they are. It just goes to show that the Muslims in the area aren't united by the fight for Palestinian freedom, they're united by religious hatred for Jews and the Palestinians are being used as pawns.

One group is secular, democratic, multi-racial, and targets military targets. The other group is religious, a theocracy (in practice, not on paper), racist, homophobic, etc, and intentionally targets civilians. Who really is the bad guy in this scenario?

Re:Very clever

[Chacham]

Furthermore, to label anyone who critises the state of Israel in any way as anti-semitic (which seems to be getting increasingly common) is a really good way to weaken the word anti-semitic.

Actually, Israel is criticized mostly for non-rational reasons. Some are anti-semitic, some are a feeling for the Arabs. The latter is many times labeled anti-semitic as well. The reasoning, according to those who apply this label, is that for those who would look at the facts would realize that the Arabs are completely in the wrong. As such, anyone who sides with them and believes their lies, is "obviously" doing it for anti-semetic reasons.

This goes one more step though. There is much propoganda throughout the Arab world. Many lies, and much distortion of fact. The Elders of Zion is best seller there, cartoons constantly depict Israeli's as killing Arabs for fun, statistics are abused, and the like. The main reason is the various dictators are anti-semetic, and the closed press is allowed to print only their views.

The non-Arab media tends to take the Arab's point of view. Their opinions are treated as fact, yet official Israeli statements are somewhat disqualified by the wording introducing it. This is then taken as being anti-semetic.

Traditional Judaism has a rule. If all judges in a death-penalty judgements believe the victim is guilty of death, the penalty is not applied. This is because something is amiss, as it can't be that noone found some merit. This is the case with the world. The whole world condemns Israel. If noone can find merit, there is something amiss. Compare it to the Nazis. There are *still* people who stand on their side. So how can it be that *everyone* is against Israel?

Because of all this, the word anti-Semetic is appropriate. It is not a dilution. Rather, it is a statement of reality, that just happens to be against the comfortable postition assumed by all.

Better killers

[Doesn't_Comment_Code]

This will most certainly be used in the ongoing struggle between Israel and Palestine. The last thing I want to see is either of those two groups become more efficient killers.

This is a spy plane, however. So maybe it will be used for intelligence to prevent violence. Or perhaps it will be used for intelligence to make waging war more effective.

Re:Better killers

[saforrest]

This will most certainly be used in the ongoing struggle between Israel and Palestine.

Don't you mean the struggle between Israel and Islamofascist terrorists?

Re:Better killers

[Anonymous Coward]

Or the Palestinian Freedom fighters and the Zionist invaders. Depends on which side of the electric fence you're on.

Drop the terrorist bit, it's old.

Re:Better killers

[GuyMannDude]

This is a spy plane, however. So maybe it will be used for intelligence to prevent violence. Or perhaps it will be used for intelligence to make waging war more effective.

The two tend to be linked at the hip. There is considerable interest in the military to develop means of preventing civilian casualties or collateral damage. And it's not just as simple as them not wanting to 'waste' ammunition on noncombatants, they really do want to avoid civilian casualties. First, military people aren't the psychotic, evil madman you see in the movies. Believe it or not, they have children too so they want to try to prevent the deaths of innocents in far away lands. Second, even if they didn't personally care about civilian deaths, the American people would and our allies most certainly would. The type of WWII war where massive civilian casualties are accepted so long as you kill lots of enemy combatants are long gone. Third, increased intelligence will help you refine a priori assumptions you made about the enemy's tactics. If you are planning on destroying a building you believe to be an enemy command center but then receive intelligence that it's actually a homeless shelter, that's more valuable than just noting that it's a non-target. It tells you that you really don't know where the hell the command center really is! And it also makes you pause and question the quality of the pre-battle intelligence that labeled it as enemy headquarters.

Spy planes are here to stay and they will play a more important role in the conflicts to come. And I don't think you can separate their capabilities into "prevent violence" and "enable violence" bins. Those two qualities tend to be one and the same.

GMD

Re:Better killers

[Otter]

And it's not just as simple as them not wanting to 'waste' ammunition on noncombatants, they really do want to avoid civilian casualties. First, military people aren't the psychotic, evil madman you see in the movies. Believe it or not, they have children too so they want to try to prevent the deaths of innocents in far away lands. Second, even if they didn't personally care about civilian deaths, the American people would and our allies most certainly would.

Absolutely. Whatever your views on the practice of targeting terrorist leaders (if you want to debate this point, there are other people in this thread happy to do it -- please go flame them instead of me), certainly killing bystanders or the wrong people altogether is entirely counterproductive.

This device described here is non-lethal and intended just for surveillance, but people following the news will note that far fewer bystanders are being killed recently than in similar hits in past years. The reason supposedly is a change from Hellfire missiles (or those insane attacks with large bombs that seemed to kill everyone but the intended target) to some semi-secret device with live video feedback that can be aborted at the last second.

But I agree with the original poster's sentiment -- at best you're going from hideous to just awful. Hopefully someday all this effort and creativity will be entirely channeled into positive things.

Re:Better killers

[chris_mahan]

> Even if you don't think they're a country with a government, the collective people can still be referred to as Palestine, and everyone will know who you're talking about.

like Tibet?

Re:Better killers

[mi]

The last thing I want to see is either of those two groups become more efficient killers.

You are wrong on two counts. First, the precise killing is a better killing, because a precise weapon reduces collateral damage -- the children, with which Rantissi and the like surround themselves in public suddenly become exposed to less risk.

Likewise Baghdad is still standing -- unlike some major German cities shortly after WWII -- because the precision of the bombing improved so much.

Second, you imply, that the two sides are somehow "equal". They are not. While Hamas and other "brigades" target civilians, Israel only targets its sworn enemies, who actively work on killing Israelis -- and it usually tries to arrest them first. True, sometimes innocent civilians die as the result of the Israel's actions, but they are never the intended targets...

Now, let's see some troll-heavy "moderation"...

Re:Better killers

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok, I've heard this said before. The palestinians are not a nation and there was never a nation "Palestine". So what? There are millions of arabs who live in the "occupied territories", most of whose families have lived there or in Israel proper (from whence they fled and now live as refugees) for many generations.

Israel should either absorb them into their country or find a two state solution. Saying "these people are not a nation, so they can go live in an Arab country and leave us their land" is not a realistic solution.

Re:Better killers

[BgJonson79]

According to a book I read (posting from work, book at home, take with large grain of salt), most of the land (85%?) was owned by absentee landlords in Turkey.

However, I agree. If Israel would stop using the wall idea to grab land and the Palestinians would stop blowing themselves up, maybe they could accomplish something.

I'd like to see...

[rthille]

the remote cockroach that they had here. Of course, it ended up squashed by a shoe, but before that it got critical intel out. Just imagine a battlefield where you can't trust that the spiders and snakes, or arctic hares aren't working for the other guys!

we all know...

[v_1_r_u_5]

some bored geek designed the microdrones to spy on the hot chics in those apartment complexes and then had to give it up to the military when he was caught.

Seriously though, there is no need to fly out

[blorg]

All the drones can fly for an hour while transmitting pictures back to their operators

The article doesn't say

[Anonymous Coward]

But, what about noise? It would seem that silent operation would be an important part of these spy planes' operation. However, the last model airplane I saw could be clearly heard for over a mile. If these things are aslo as noisy, they will simply become targets for the local skeet club.

It seems that Vi is better than Emacs.

Re:Fly through Windows?

[Matthew Schultheis]

Actually, exploding wouldn't be such bad idea as it wouldn't give the enemy any information about the plane itself.

72 Virgins

[Saeed al-Sahaf]

Not to be a political provocateur, but with what Israel has been up to the last few years, I'm sure that's exactly what they will do...

As opposed to what? Strapping it to some poor 10 or 15 year old kid who thinks he's soon going to be having his way with 72 virgins?

Re:72 Virgins

[Saeed al-Sahaf]

How is it "anti-Palestinian" to suggest there is something wrong with human bombs?

Re:72 Virgins

[pegr]

Not to be a political provocateur, but with what Israel has been up to the last few years, I'm sure that's exactly what they will do...

As opposed to what? Strapping it to some poor 10 or 15 year old kid who thinks he's soon going to be having his way with 72 virgins?

Yes. That's exactly correct. And until the Palestinian masses get it through their thick, religiously-warped, uneducated minds that they are sacrificing their youth, freedom, and future for the political squabblings of rich, power-mad immoral thugs (on BOTH sides...), this kind of thing will continue until they are all DEAD! But of course, I don't want to be a political provocateur...

Re:72 Virgins

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you not read any news at all? Have you not seen the pictures?

I've got another one for you - how about the boy who was tricked into carrying a (luckily faulty) bomb across a checkpoint? He didn't even know it was a bomb!

Re:72 Virgins

[Saeed al-Sahaf]

And how do you know that the 72 virgins bullshit is in fact bullshit?

Even if it is true, do you suppose that makes the human bomb any more justifiable?

Re:72 Virgins

[Hektor_Troy]

Nope.

BUT - assuming it is true, then it would be because some supreme being finds it justifiable, presumably/hopefully because he/she/it/they can see a bigger picture than we can.

You and I may not like it, but any supreme being would be a better judge than you and I. And who knows - maybe the people who get blown up get 144 virgins/whatever for being another kind of martyr?

We don't know, and we CAN'T know. Maybe there are supreme beings, maybe there aren't. Personally I think the notion of doing the bidding of invisible beings is tantamount to insanity, not to mention stupidity if you haven't actually talked to these invisible beings yourself, but are just going on what other people tell you.

But that's just me.

Re:72 Virgins

[CrankyFool]

There is, technically speaking, no moral or ethical reason why human bombs (AKA suicide bombers) are a Bad Thing[tm]. Remember, we saw an instance of this in WWII with the Japanese Kamikaze.

It is usually going to be easier to breach defenses one-way than to go in, hit the enemy, and leave. Arriving with the intent of blowing up frees you to focus on the task rather than be distracted by 'misguided' attempts to survive the execution of it.

Where it gets less great is when you do one of two things:
1. Not clearly identify yourself as a hostile target, causing the other side to naturally suspect EVEYRONE on your side and probably qualifying you as an unlawful combatant (the Law of Armed Conflict requires distinctive markings); or (much more seriously)
2. Target civilians, which is when you become not just a weapon, but a terrorist weapon.

There's no fundamental difference between a Palestinian wearing a uniform and a bomb blowing themselves up with a bunch of soldiers and, say, a US soldier storming a Japanese pillbox with a grenade knowing he's going to die. The issue is whether or not he's clearly marked and, more importantly, whether he's attacking soldiers on duty or civilians.

Re:72 Virgins

[Rei]

Which is more realistic: That the world's 4th largest nuclear power (Israel) will be wiped off the map, or that the nation that it occupies, which has almost 80% of its land officially taken, and has siezed for settlements and security buffers 75% of the rest, and has half its populaton with chronic malnutrition will be wiped off the map?

Think about it for a second. Who is taking whose land? I'm not talking about the past: I'm talking about the present.

Re:Dig that propeller!

[allyourbasebelongtou]

Real benefit would come to rescue and disaster recovery units if these babies could be controlled (or at least monitored) via satellite--or even something more remote than a laptop within 5K as the article suggests.

Imagine what could be done in a remote disaster situation in any region--even a metropolitan area--just by being able to fly low and into and around hard-to-reach areas.

Sure, while in this instance it's being used by soldiers, your point about rescue units, etc. is an idea I hope takes hold.

Re:War is part of humanity

[Otter]

Oh, on that scale I completely agree. There's an ongoing stream of celebrities arriving in Jerusalem to hold forth on how the region's problams should be solved (unfortunately, the promised Jennifer Anniston-Brad Pitt peace plan seems to have been shelved indefinitely). But Richard Gere, whom I'd always thought of as a dilettante bonehead, gave a very humble, perceptive, gracious speech about how conflict is a part of humanity and it's necessary to keep it in its place by making the most of all the best aspects of humanity.

My point was limited to this particular conflict. You have on one side what is probably the most technologically productive society per capita in the world (except maybe Taiwan) despite the enormous resources it pours into defense and on the other side, an overwhelmingly young population. It's an incredible waste (even before you get to this week's innovation of using a retarded child as a suicide bomber) that is going to be resolved sooner or later, but sooner would be far preferable.

Fewer casualties?

[danharan]

It is odd to read people think this will reduce the number of casualties, especially "collateral damage".

This is not unlike some of the security discussions we've had here. Force people to have 4 passwords, and they'll write them on sticky-notes besides their screen, reducing security. Passwords are _supposed_ to make systems safer, but abuse them and they are counter-productive.

Drone technologies will completely change the strategy of conflict. One month before 9/11, a colleague and I predicted rc planes would be used against the White House. Ok, so we were off. But think about it: if the Israelis can use this, why couldn't the "terrorist" Palestinians? Imagine for a second what an rc plane/helicopter could do with non-conventional means...

Assymetrical warfare is used because one side has no chance at symmetrical -conventional- warfare. As this reinforces "full-spectrum dominance", it only increases the risk of terrorist attack.

I hope such drones are only used for reconnaissance, and not to carry out direct assassinations, causing another escalation.

In the long-term, we will need to make our conflict resolution systems more robust, so they don't degenerate so fast and with such bloody consequences. Another interesting thing to note is as war becomes more capital intensive, we can expect the rise of Conscientious Objection to Military Taxation

Your ideology is about 30 years out of date

[MythoBeast]

The Palestinians would just kill the Israelis that are living on Palestinian land, or at least "deport" them back to Israel. You've obviously missed the entire point behind this conflict.

If 800,000 Mexicans built a city just north of the Mexican border, and proclaimed it to be Mexican territory, how would America react? What if they had more tanks and missiles than we did, and responded to our attempts to move them out by blowing up San Antonio and killing our leaders?

The Palestinians are the Israeli equivalent to our Native Americans. Israel is taking whatever it wants from them, and they're just trying to stem the flow of loss.

Re:Fly through Windows?

[Simonetta]

Killing of military targets is not murder,dude

Sorry, I have to disagree with this one. It's a new century and we can no longer pretend that murder is not murder by arbitrarily classifing the victims as acceptable military targets. There will never be world peace until solders accept that what they do is murder. I no longer accept that there is any difference between civilian murder and military murder. There are other ways of dealing with political situations; it's just that murder is the usually the fastest, cheapest, and easiest.
But let's not pretend any more that this is not was it actually is. Killing people is murder, and wrapping the act in military metaphors is just a way to do and feel good about it afterwards.

Re:Fly through Windows?

[JaredOfEuropa]

I got one of them... an extremely cool toy! But even with a beefed-up motor and battery pack, the range will be very limited and power will certainly not be sufficient to carry a serious explosive device.

The only ones you'll terrorise with this thing is your cats! Mine hate it, they hide when I fly it indoors :)

Re:Asymmetric situations.

[actiondan]

According to international law (which I loathe to cite), it is not occupied by Israel.

It may well be the case that, according to certain readings of international law, Israel is not defined as occupying the areas where the Palestinians live.

In which case, the Palestinians are long-time residents of Israel and should be given full citizenship and voting rights. Israel is a democratic state, right?

Re:Absurd level of moral relativism.

[instarx]

And the US was morally superior, you say? In WWII the US used flamethrowers to incinerate 50 teenage student nurses in a cave on Iwo Jima when they refused to come out. In Vietnam Wiliam Calley ordered the execution of 350 women, children and elderly at My Lai. More than 20% of the victims were under the age of 5. The US killed more civilians in the fire-bombing of Dresden (an open city) than the Japanese killed in Nanking by an order of magnitude. Did this make the US and all its soldiers amoral? No. Neither did Nanking make the Kamikaze amoral.

My point, and I think that of the original poster, is the morality of killing innocents does not hinge on the mode of delivery.

Re:Asymmetric situations.

[actiondan]

There are 120 members of the Knesset. If one fifth of the population of Israel is Arab, why is only one twenty-fourth of the Knesset Arab?

This report by the US State Department makes interesting reading if you think that Arab citizens of Israel have the same rights as Jewish citizens:

http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2000/nea/79 4. htm

How many Palestinians have you actually met?

The ones that I have met didn't seem to want anyone dead, of any religion.

The vast majority (at least in my experience) are just normal people who desperately want to do all the things that normal people do. They are afraid of the hardcore Palestinian militants in the same way that they are afraid of the IDF. The older people are worried that their children are being turned to militancy because what they see and hear about week by week is IDF troops and tanks knocking down houses and killing people. These kids do not have the opportunity to see the devastating effects that Paelstinian terrorism is having on Israeli citizens.

I really think you need to stop taking the actions of a small minority of Palestinians and using it to form an opinion of over 3 million people (that's a 2001 figure so probably higher now)

There are Israelis who hate Arabs with the same religious fevour that you are attributing to the Palestinians. Do I think that all Israelis think like that? No, of course I don't - I have taken the time to talk to some real Israelis and find out what they really think.

Dan.