Rise Of The Insect Drones by Tom Olago
According to a New York Times estimate a year back, the Pentagon then had about 7,000 aerial drones in its inventory, compared with fewer than 50 a decade ago. The drones are usually designed in the form of natural insects such as moths, hawks and other inhabitants of the natural world. They are also virtually impossible to discern using the naked eye. So that seemingly beautiful, strong hawk that you see in the sky just might be minding your very personal business rather than any real ‘bird business’.
Other drones are more conventional, far bigger, and less likely to be mistaken for airborne creatures. One such recently manufactured drone, the Zephyr UAV, has been nicknamed 'Daddy longlegs'. It is similar in design to a dragonfly and will be able to spy on ISIS for up to 90 days. Such is its efficacy that it has been dubbed a potential “game-changer” in the battle against extremists in Iraq and Syria. Its makers, Airbus, claim it "endures like a satellite, focuses like an aircraft and is cheaper than both of them".
The smaller drone versions are however the ones far more likely to be used on and around the areas where ground forces or troops operate. A CNN report earlier this year stated that a Pentagon agency (DARPA) is developing a surveillance ‘robo-hawk’ that could fly through the detritus of the urban combat jungle at 45mph to take the dirt and danger out of mopping up operations. Other ‘robobugs’ could follow suspects, guide missiles to targets or navigate the crannies of collapsed buildings to find survivors.
Other potential tasks would include looking for enemies, survivors, booby traps and more. Underlying algorithms could ultimately enhance other types of unmanned missions, including underwater environments where GPS systems don't work.
DARPA’s Army Research Laboratory, known as ARL, in Adelphi, Maryland, is currently working on a project to develop robotic surveillance insects with wings just 3-5 centimeters in length. Other projects have been even more ambitious. According to a past Washington Post article, some federally funded teams are even growing live insects with computer chips in them, with the goal of mounting spyware on their bodies and controlling their flight muscles remotely.
It’s clear that drones are not exactly news, as they have been reported on for a number of years. For instance, in 2012 New York college students attending an antiwar rally in Lafayette Square were convinced they reportedly saw small flying machines that were ‘definitely not insects’ hovering above.
In another similar instance five years back, protesters in Washington and New York claimed that there were ‘robobugs’ hovering around them. At that time, entomologists interviewed believed that the entities were black dragonflies. Unfortunately, the entomologists could not explain the bulb shape attachments to their tails that many reported seeing; nor could they explain their organized flight which was widely reported by observers.
And although most would welcome the military edge, disaster management and other types of benefits that drones undoubtedly provide, the counteractive issue of privacy violations has always emerged strongly.
The FBI has admitted it sometimes uses aerial surveillance drones over US soil and suggested further political debate and legislation to govern their domestic use may be necessary, according to other reports. And according to comments attributed to former FBI Director Robert Mueller in 2013, the FBI was then in "the initial stages" of developing privacy guidelines to balance security threats with civil liberty concerns. The fact that the FBI still went ahead to implement drone technology before finalizing privacy guidelines became another contentious issue.
Such surveillance reportedly constitutes a violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 12. It applies overseas and in the United States where 30,000 drones have been authorized for use by 2020. Article 12 of the Declaration of Human Rights states: “No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honor and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.”
Another thorny issue that won’t wash with the general public is the number of staff and administrative tasks required to utilize and interpret drone findings. In 2012, it was reported that every day, the Air Force needed to process almost 1,500 hours of full-motion video and another 1,500 still images, much of it from Predators and Reapers on around-the-clock combat air patrols. This led to a recruitment campaign conducted by the Pentagon for 1400 more people to operate its growing fleet of flying surveillance robots.
And so the rise of the insect drones continues. The “game-changing” drones may be here to stay, but the challenges and controversies around them just won’t go away.
Read more at http://www.prophecynewswatch.com/2015/November04/044.html#PGGIPFDivRlIsBx5.99
Tags: Drone, Insect, Bugs, DARPA, Military, End Time
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