Terrorist and Insurgent Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs): Use, Potentials, and Military Implications - Emerging Threats, Historical Overview, Chronological Narrative, Implications and Policy Responses

Professionally converted for accurate flowing-text e-book format reproduction, this is an interesting academic research paper outlining the threat posed by terrorists using unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and drones.

The work presents a counterintuitive analysis in the sense that armed drones are typically viewed as a component of America's conventional warfighting prowess — not a technology that would be used against U.S. troops deployed overseas or against civilians back home. Utilizing a red teaming approach, the author, Dr. Robert J. Bunker, a past Minerva Chair at our institution, investigates the emerging threat of such UAV use. His unique analysis and creative approach, especially when related to the threat scenario variants generated, make for very informative reading.

The work is divided into an introduction to the topical area, a UAV historical overview and discussion of present use by the U.S. military, a chronological narrative of terrorist and insurgent UAV use (and attempted use) from 1994 through 2015, the ensuing baselines and trending identified, and the foreseen potentials derived from these trends — based upon tactical, operational, and strategic influencing scenarios, and the resulting military implications and suggested policy responses this will entail. The analysis not only has immediate value for Army force protection and counterterrorism programs, but also for research being conducted on projected robot-on-human force-on-force engagements in insurgency type environments, as well as strategic considerations related to emerging "drone swarm" concepts and the changing character of warfare as robot Landpower technologies evolve and are increasingly fielded.

The Strategic Studies Institute hopes that the analysis and recommendations found in this monograph will be of use to the various U.S. Army organizations impacted by nonstate threat UAV use and those entities in sister services also so effected, as well as domestic policing and federal law enforcement bodies tasked with counterterrorism and homeland security missions. Further, other Army and sister service entities, as well as various U.S policymaking bodies, hopefully will find the larger implications posed by this report related to semi-autonomous and autonomous UAV type robotic systems of some benefit.