In recent years, the policy debate around military drone use has mostly focused on armed drones and largely ignored the much more rapid and widespread proliferation of non-weaponized drones.  “Unarmed and Dangerous: The Lethal Applications of Non-Weaponized Drones” of the Center for the Study of the Drone seeks to shed light on the many ways that unarmed drones can directly enable kinetic operations. This detailed study describes six common strike-enabling roles for unarmed drones and explains why the use of drones in each of these roles is significant.

Date: March 2020

Author: The Center for the Study of the Drone at Bard College

‘In the Frame: UK Media Coverage of Drone Targeted Killing’ by War on the Rocks analyses the warfare in Libya, which is probably the biggest drone war theater in the world.

“Western governments have watched the battle over Libya’s capital, Tripoli, with disinterest, even as it has drawn in a growing number of foreign powers. But this conflict has more to teach us about the future world order, or disorder, than many observers appreciate. The patterns of warfare in Libya today not only reflect the erosion of the U.S.-led international order, but they directly contribute to its demise. Three aspects in particular highlight the new international disorder. Armed drones embody a trend toward military action that minimizes the risks and costs to the intervening powers, thereby encouraging them to meddle in conflicts where no vital interests are at stake. With arms-length instruments such as drones and mercenaries, intervening states also seek to maintain a degree of deniability. The main reason why for the rise of deniability, however, is that the great powers are increasingly tolerant of even dubious denials of an increasing range of foreign meddlers. The authoritarian states intervening in Libya also lead disinformation campaigns whose scope illustrates dramatically altered international power relations. Warfare in Libya reveals seismic shifts in international order that have invited cavalier meddling by distant powers big and small, amid international indifference.”

Date: 3 March 2020

Author: War on the Rocks

In the second six months of 2019 Internazionale and VoxEurop produced six press reviews for the European Forum on Armed Drones (EFAD), monitoring how the topic of armed drones is developed and observed on the European press. This report is based on the articles published by the main European newspapers.

Date: 20 January 2020
Author: Internazionale & VoxEurop