Murky waters: Seagoing drones swim into new legal and ethical territory

摘要

When a 33-foot unmanned boat fired six missiles and hit floating targets more than two miles away in October, Naval Sea Systems Command hailed it as "a U.S. Navy first." They'd never before remotely fired long-range weapons from a seagoing drone. The CIA and the Air Force have used armed UAVs for more than a decade; the Navy's own aerial fleet includes the Fire Scout helicopter, the ScanEagle and the Broad Area Maritime Surveillance Demonstrator. But the water itself is a relatively new frontier for unmanned craft. The possibilities are endless, from minehunters to antisubmarine warfare to harbor patrol to maritime ISR. (The new acronyms are also endless, starting with USV, for unmanned surface vehicle; UUV, for unmanned underwater vehicle, and so on.) "Unmanned systems are not a luxury; they are absolutely imperative to the future of our Navy," Vice Adm. Kendall Card told a conference of unmanned maritime vehicle experts gathered in a hotel outside Washington, D.C., in February.