The Mechanization of War has always produced a flutter in the hearts of the military and the supporters of war; each generation of weapon is heralded as helpful, and often more efficient.  Now we are into the generation of Implements of War being trumpeted as Cost Effective and Targeted.  Cool.

We've entered a new age in mechanized killing.  During the first Gulf War we dropped millions of tons of incendiaries on Iraq.  Cluster bombs and carpet bombs were touted for their power.  We had Smart Bombs, and Smart Missiles...and depending on your point of view, you either may have waved your flag more wildly, or gotten sick over the nearest basin.

During the '90s, drones, or unmanned aerial vehicles were used in Bosnia and Kosovo, then were put into wider use in Afghanistan and Iraq.  They were support tools for the war, maybe providing cover for operations, or surveillance, maybe blowing up a building or three.  During the Bush years, the US used maybe 50 of them; now the manufacturers can't keep up with orders.   Every branch of the military hankers for them, and their capabilities keep growing and being refined.

 Here is a list of manufacturers of drones; they are varied in size, capability, and reconnaissance and targeting software.  The Pentagon issues contracts to corporations to design and build new types and configurations.  Some systems being built could just give you the willies.  These drone robots Israel is working on are pretty creepy.

 Predators, Reapers, Hellfire missiles, Gorgon Stare, for godssake: a system that allows ten operators access to ten video feeds  at once, and can feed info back to Langley to confirm targets.  The next generation Gorgon will allow 30 feeds; bigger and better.  The imagery area and resolution are improving.  Jane Mayer in her 2009 article on CIA drone use and potential problems tells this story as told to her by Pakistan's Interior Minister:

 On August 5th, officials at the Central Intelligence Agency, in Langley, Virginia, watched a live video feed relaying closeup footage of one of the most wanted terrorists in Pakistan. Baitullah Mehsud, the leader of the Taliban in Pakistan, could be seen reclining on the rooftop of his father-in-law's house, in Zanghara, a hamlet in South Waziristan. It was a hot summer night, and he was joined outside by his wife and his uncle, a medic; at one point, the remarkably crisp images showed that Mehsud, who suffered from diabetes and a kidney ailment, was receiving an intravenous drip.

The video was being captured by the infrared camera of a Predator drone, a remotely controlled, unmanned plane that had been hovering, undetected, two miles or so above the house. Pakistan's Interior Minister, A. Rehman Malik, told me recently that Mehsud was resting on his back. Malik, using his hands to make a picture frame, explained that the Predator's targeters could see Mehsud's entire body, not just the top of his head. "It was a perfect picture," Malik, who watched the videotape later, said. "We used to see James Bond movies where he talked into his shoe or his watch. We thought it was a fairy tale. But this was fact!" The image remained just as stable when the C.I.A. remotely launched two Hellfire missiles from the Predator. Authorities watched the fiery blast in real time. After the dust cloud dissipated, all that remained of Mehsud was a detached torso. Eleven others died: his wife, his father-in-law, his mother-in-law, a lieutenant, and seven bodyguards.

(Pakistan believed Mehsud was responsible for the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, and various other attacks on coalition forces near the border.) 

There is increasing information about the CIA  running its own drone wars in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia, aided by Blackwater/Xe personnel whom they claim only 'load the bombs and missiles.'  Congress seems out of the loop, or indeed, may want to be out of the loop in some respects; it's not clear to me.  But at any rate, drone attacks are increasing in frequency.

When I tried to findinformation about the cost of drones, I discovered there might not be a 'per each' figure; rather, a company has been paid for a more package deal for contracting an operation.  But we are at least speaking of millions of dollars per drone, and the cost-effectiveness of the new killers is pleasing to many who favor clean aerial targeting of Bad Guys over ground invasions or other more conventional warfare.  General Atomics Aeronautical Systems who makes the Reapers and Predators are unable  to keep up with orders.  The Air Force already has 200+; the CIA ain't telling how many they have.

Reading about the plethora of UAVs in the work is head-spinning, both in number and type, from one with a 68-foot wingspan able to stay aloft for up to 14 hours and carry many missiles, to nano drones that can fly through windows to kill.

A recent New America Foundation report details its discoveries about the ramp-up of drones attacks in Pakistan.  People such as Conservative George Will, who has long opposed the War in Afghanistan, and wants the troops brought home, favors targeted kills and intelligence gathering leading toward targets, as does VP Joe Biden.  

And:

So far this year, various estimates suggest, the C.I.A. attacks have killed between three hundred and twenty-six and five hundred and thirty-eight people. Critics say that many of the victims have been innocent bystanders, including children.

From Jane Mayer:

People who have seen an air strike live on a monitor described it as both awe-inspiring and horrifying. "You could see these little figures scurrying, and the explosion going off, and when the smoke cleared there was just rubble and charred stuff," a former C.I.A. officer who was based in Afghanistan after September 11th says of one attack. (He watched the carnage on a small monitor in the field.) Human beings running for cover are such a common sight that they have inspired a slang term: "squirters."

The Obama Administration has also widened the scope of authorized drone attacks in Afghanistan. An August report by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee disclosed that the Joint Integrated Prioritized Target List--the Pentagon's roster of approved terrorist targets, containing three hundred and sixty-seven names--was recently expanded to include some fifty Afghan drug lords who are suspected of giving money to help finance the Taliban. These new targets are a step removed from Al Qaeda. According to the Senate report, "There is no evidence that any significant amount of the drug proceeds goes to Al Qaeda." The inclusion of Afghan narcotics traffickers on the U.S. target list could prove awkward, some observers say, given that President Hamid Karzai's running mate, Marshal Mohammad Qasim Fahim, and the President's brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai, are strongly suspected of involvement in narcotics.

And:

So far this year, various estimates suggest, the C.I.A. attacks have killed between three hundred and twenty-six and five hundred and thirty-eight people. Critics say that many of the victims have been innocent bystanders, including children.

 Mayer points out that this new form of warfare has evolved with little or no public discussion or media attention.  It carries its own set of pitfalls, from the ease of distance killing, to the furor of the citizens invaded by stealth, to the psychological ramifications of the soldiers operating the kill consoles far away from the reality of their targets.  Here is one such video.

 There are many available; some have dubbed it Drone Porn.

 It is likely that this sort of war is here to stay.  It is touted as cost-effective and efficient and targeted.  (Collateral Damage notwithstanding, i.e. civilian deaths or wrong targets.)

If you want to see what DARPA has in mind for the next forty years, read or scroll down the page of this Tom Englehardt -Nick Turse piece.

 A plurality of Americans may either love all this or yawn at all this; I don't know. 

 Vicki Divoll, a former C.I.A. lawyer, who now teaches at the U.S. Naval Academy, in Annapolis, observed, "People are a lot more comfortable with a Predator strike that kills many people than with a throat-slitting that kills one."

 Will there be public discussions?  Do we get a vote about all this?  Yeah; I didn't think so.