Unmanned Aerial Systems: DARPA, CODE and LAWS
Unmanned Systems are nothing new in the Air Force.
Remotely pilot’s vehicles have been at the forefront of the battlefield for
decades now. But these systems all rely heavily on functioning communication
links, and multiple crew members and support analysts. Without these key
elements today’s drones are hardly capable of accomplishing any mission at all
on their own. Operation in denied or contested airspace would be especially
difficult even with the application of low observable technology. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)
has been working to add more autonomy and give existing and future systems the
capability to operate in these denied and contested environments.
CODE is DARPA’s answer to this problem. “DARPA’s Collaborative Operations in Denied Environment
(CODE) program aims to overcome these limitations with new algorithms and
software for existing unmanned aircraft that would extend mission capabilities
and improve U.S. forces’ ability to conduct operations in denied or contested airspace.”
Their solution is to employ a number of cooperative UAS’s that work together to
build their own situational awareness. A single person would monitor the team
of UAS’s and would have the authority to approve or disapprove the team’s
actions. “CODE-enabled unmanned aircraft would find targets and engage them as
appropriate under established rules of engagement, leverage nearby
CODE-equipped systems with minimal supervision, and adapt to dynamic situations
such as attrition of friendly forces or the emergence of unanticipated threats.”
This level of responsibility for a UAS
however is raising a number of red flags in the international community. Being referred
to as LAWS, or Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems, these UAS’s theoretically
have the ability to engage a target while in a denied environment without a
human watching or having the ability to call off the strike. “CODE
aims to develop teams of autonomous aerial vehicles carrying out “all steps of
a strike mission- find, fix, track, target, engage, assess” in situations in
which enemy signal-jamming makes communication with a human commander
impossible.” The idea is that the rules of
engagement would be programed into the system and the UAS would be able to
identify and follow those rules on its own. Because computers have the ability
to process data millions of times faster than a human, theoretically the
systems would be capable of not only making better decisions but also faster
decisions.
“CODE’s envisioned improvements to
collaborative autonomy would help transform UAS operations from requiring
multiple operators for each UAS to having one mission commander simultaneously
directing all of the unmanned vehicles required for the mission. Commanders
could mix and match different systems with specific capabilities to suit
individual missions instead of depending on a single UAS with integrated
capabilities, the loss of which would be potentially catastrophic. This
flexibility could significantly increase the mission- and cost-effectiveness of
legacy assets, reduce development times and costs for future systems, and
enable new deployment concepts.”
There
are a handful of organizations that openly oppose the idea of LAWS like CODE,
but few are more vocal than the NGO Campaign to stop Killer Robots. Founded in
2012 in New York, their sole purpose is to prevent LAWS from ever being allowed
on the battlefield. Their website, Stopkillerrobots.org, details their agenda
clearly with strong points to consider. “Allowing life or death decisions to be
made by machines crosses a fundamental moral line.” They claim that killer
robots would “lack human judgment and the ability to understand context.” These
are important things to consider, however the determining factor on the
legality of CODE and LAWS resides at the UN.
Talks have been ongoing for the last few years at
the Convention on Certain conventional weapons. Most recently in 2015 at the
meeting of experts delegates from more than 40 countries joined together to
discuss the current state of the technology and whether or not LAWS like CODE
should be banned from use in combat. Those in favor of LAWS insist that their
internal review process is sufficient to declare LAWS meet all existing regulations
in the Law of Armed Conflict and the rules of engagement. Other nations are harder
to convince.
Regardless of the stand point, LAWS like CODE are
being developed. The technology is available and the United States is not the
only nation pursing it. If used responsibly and programed correctly it should
prove to be a valuable tool for military operations in denied environments.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2015/09/07/ban-lethal-autonomous-weapons/2yI2wF0wWRjHLmNQkPiCpI/story.html
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