At Fort Huachuca (you say it Wa-choo-ka) near the Mexican border in Arizona they let me take the controls in the flight simulator that teaches young soldiers to fly unmanned drones half a world away.
You don’t have to be a qualified fighter jet pilot anymore to be allowed to fly these things – or an officer. Thousands of young enlisted soldiers – many as young as 18 – are being trained to fly these aerial vehicles and the US military just can’t get enough of them.
“Is it a bit like playing a video game?” I asked as I handled the joystick. It is they admitted – although everyone was at pains to stress that doesn’t mean they don’t take their job seriously.
Even the trainer admitted its easier to teach the “video game generation” and told me that all those hours they’d spent in their bedrooms – being nagged by their mothers to do something more productive – was now paying off.
The US military are now so addicted to the use of these drones they call them “army crack”. One hit and you are hooked they say. Ground forces now don’t want to leave their bases in Iraq and Afghanistan without those “eyes in the sky” above their heads.
One young soldier told me about a combat mission he flew in Iraq. Although he was in a control station inside a little trailer hundreds of miles from the battle, via his Hunter drone, he could see far more clearly what was going on than the marines who were on the ground.
As they made their way into a graveyard Staff Sgt Salvador could see insurgents who were hiding out there ready to ambush the Americans. He was able to describe to the ground forces that there was gunman hiding behind a tan coloured building 50 meters to their north, another hiding behind a low wall 50 meters to their west. They shot straight through the walls. At targets they couldn’t actually see. And Salvador could tell them when they’d killed the Iraqis.
The aerial technology the US uses is sophisticated and expensive. But the principle is not dissimilar to remote controlled toy planes. And it’s becoming quite easy to copy.
The editor of Wired magazine built his very own drone in his garage for just $1,000. And it’s known that various terror groups are already trying to do the same thing.
Experts warn that terrorists have realised there is no better way to deliver a radioactive, chemical or biological weapon into the heart of a city like London or New York.
Several of the people recently arrested in America for attempted terrorist attacks on New York – both the man who left a car bomb in Times Square and the one who was planning to bomb the subway – say they were inspired by wanting to retaliate against US drone attacks in Pakistan.
As the US army were proudly showing off their technology to me no one seemed worried about the idea that similar kit could be used against them.
“What terrorist is going to have a Predator?” scoffed an official from the Dept of Homeland Security recently.
Well, Hezbollah have them already and have flown them over Israel. And it is notable that China has developed its own version of the Predator – the Pterodactyl. And Iran is currently building surveillance drones that they could attach weapons to.
Right now the American drones are al-Qaida’s biggest enemy. The way the US uses them for “targeted killings” inside Pakistan is as effective as it is controversial.
This week they announced a predator strike had killed Sheik Sa’id al-Masri – al-Qaida’s third most important leader. And over the last year they have successfully killed many other al-Qaida warriors, along with unknown numbers of civilians.
But if al-Qaida manages to develop the technology themselves drones could become their most dangerous weapon.