Col. Tom Balbierer of the Air National Guard's 174th Fighter Wing stands beneath the wing of the Reaper, an unmanned aerial surveillance plane based at Hancock Field in Mattydale. The drone has a wingspan of 66 feet. The planes are remotely operated from a control room on the base. The Reaper can be used for both surveillance and can be armed with a payload of about 3,000 pounds. Gloria Wright / The Post-Standard
The US announces plans to arm drones that will be operating inside the US with missiles and bombs as part of a 30,000 strong domestic deployment.
Fully armed remotely controlled aircraft used by the United States military and its allies in the War on Terror overseas are set to begin a new era of operating over domestic soil.
The US military has revealed that stronger and more powerful versions of the famed Predator drones, known as MQ-9 Reaper drones, are being fitted with missiles and other explosive ordinances as part of a deployment of 30,000 drones authorized to fly over the US by the NDAA and the armed drones will now be operating inside the United States.
A military spokesman at the Hancock Field Air National Guard base in NY said the drones will only be armed with missiles and explosive ordinances when they are operating in airspace over US military bases and are only being armed as part of a program to train others to operate America’s new drone fleet.
Legislation passed by congress authorized the integration of military and public airspace into a single national aerospace grid to support both civil and public drone flights over U.S. skies.
The news comes as law enforcement agencies announce plans to weaponize their drones with “less than lethal” weapons such as tasers, tear gas and rubber bullets.
Overseas, the UK has already equipped their once unarmed surveillance drones to carry missiles.
The Wall Street Journal is reporting that the U.S. congress is expected to pass legislation that will arm Italy’s fleet of Reaper drone aircraft with missiles in a deal that is likely to pave the way for the roll-out of armed drones across the spectrum of NATO allies.
The news comes as the Obama administration comes under fire for his use of drones in the secret U.S. assassination program.
Recently Obama appointed John Brennan as the first ever Assassination Czar delegating him as the sole authority to designate people for assassination under the United States top-secret assassination program.
The appointment led a public backlash which forced the Obama administration to reveal unprecedented details to the New York Times about the use of the drones in the assassination program.
The article revealed a series of hair-raising spine-tingling facts including revelations that Obama personally ordered attacks he knew were going to kill woman and children along with the admission that we are conducting a new type of attack called “signature strikes” which involves bombing entire groups of civilians not even knowing who they are.
At the same time it was revealed in accounting for civilian casualties overseas, the Obama administration has categorically counted everyone killed by the program as an ‘enemy combatant’ while even not even knowing their identities with the exception being when US intelligence was able to obtain absolute proof the assassinated person was not a combatant.
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