U.S. drone operators show signs of exhaustion
U.S. drone operators show signs of exhaustion
By Gregg Zoroya, USA TODAY
Updated 3h 13m ago
About one in three airmen who operate cameras on high-altitude, remotely controlled spy planes and 30% of those who fly attack drones used to kill terrorists have emotional exhaustion from long hours of work, according to Air Force research recently released.
The airmen who operate drones from bases in Nevada and California complain of frequent shift changes, "mind-numbing" monotony, strains on families and ever-increasing workloads.
"There's just not enough people," says Wayne Chappelle, an Air Force psychologist who helped conduct a six-month study of drone operators from 2010 to 2011. "You have to constantly sustain a high level of vigilance, both visual and auditory information, and that would be really tough to do when there's a lot of monotony."
The aircraft — Predators, Reapers and Global Hawks — were used to track Osama bin Laden in Pakistan and are used to spy on Iran, locate and kill al-Qaeda leaders in Yemen and assist U.S. ground troops in Afghanistan and Iraq.
More:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/military/story/2011-12-18/study-drone-operators-exhaustion/52053016/1
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Kennah
(14,578 posts)There are plenty of high school seniors with lots of video game experience who will likely graduate with very few prospects for the future.
Job? Yeah, sure kid. Take a number and stand in line. You're 12,843,702.
College? Yeah, yeah, grades and all that, but are you rich enough to pay your own way?
Vocational training? In what? Mandarin?
Angleae
(4,801 posts)The enlisted will have no skills related to the outside world and no officer wants to fly a video game instead of a real plane.
Kennah
(14,578 posts)
jmowreader
(53,191 posts)Global Hawks, which are the size of small airliners, are flown by pilot-qualified officers.
Angleae
(4,801 posts)Think of them trying to get a job with the airlines with that on their resume.
jmowreader
(53,191 posts)Think of them trying to get a job with the airlines with anything but cargo planes on their resume.
Angleae
(4,801 posts)They fly scheduled routes and might even fly the same airframe. Bomber pilots are 2nd (at least they fly large planes). Fighter pilots 3rd, followed up by drone pilots.
jmowreader
(53,191 posts)Add to that, they have multiengine experience AND they fly passengers.
F-16 drivers? One seat and one engine. It's gonna take a LOT of training to overcome that.
Vincardog
(20,234 posts)
sabrina 1
(62,325 posts)I'll save my sympathy for the children they are killing and their grieving parents who will never get over the effects of their video games so long as they live.
Old and In the Way
(37,540 posts)It's a whole new genre of fighter. But one that, for the 1st time in world history, requires no skin in the horror of war. Somehow, directing drone strikes where you are obliterating real people a halfaworld away...and then leaving the office to head home for dinner and play with the kids; this has to be a surreal and troubling experience. I wonder how the psyche deals with this? The fear of one's own mortality in war is no longer a concern, but killing people by remote control is a new ethical dilemma, not only for the RC flyer, but also for the nation as a whole. How do we square fighting wars where only our enemies are at risk? How does it change our willingness to war when no mortal risk is involved to our military? Does this new type of weaponry technology dehumanize us as efficiently as it kills our enemies?
Brooklyns_Finest
(789 posts)Our Navy has pretty much had total control of the Ocean since the end of WW2. A lot of shock and awe came fom naval bombarment. Not being in harms way hasnt effected our navy much and i dont think drone warfare is very different.
Humans have done the worst things imagineable up close and personal, there is nothing that can happen in drone warfare that would be as horrific as what the germans and russians did to each other on the eastern front.
We have our drones, and they have their IED's, all is fair in love and war.
Old and In the Way
(37,540 posts)Air has been the most rapid adopters, but sea and land will get there eventually. When the day comes that we are fighting wars against humans, using robotic proxies, remotely controlled thousands of miles away from the scene...that's when the real problems start for this country.
Unless, of course, all countries have similar weapons and we transition war from killing humans to killing each other's robotic technology. That might not be a bad outcome in retrospect.
Evasporque
(2,133 posts)
Shoe Horn
(302 posts)...to everyone having this tech and 'peace for all' with only robots waging war on each other.
What gives me the most pause, personally, is the thought that one day our enemies will have this 'kill without consequence' ability... and use it on us.
Likewise, when discussing murder or assaults in fiction and in general, most people find it easier to imagine being the killer than the killed. A blind spot, to say the least.
Anyways...
Maybe I misread your posts. In which case, sorry.
Old and In the Way
(37,540 posts)Kind of science fictiony, yet not unthinkable in a logical progression of where the technology will take us in the future. War could be deemed too dangerous for humans to partake it and these robots will stand in as our proxies. Could have sworn Asimov or some other sci-fi writer wrote a book along these lines.
I guess my real concern today is how the technology can change the dynamics on decisions relating to attacking other countries with these weapons. If no military personnel are put in harm's way, it becomes easier for political leadership to employ it. When one side can wage a war, totally risk-free in terms of human lives and casualties, the nature of war changes. We have a distinct advantage today where the kill ratio favors us significantly, but mass adoption of this technology could reduce our risk to zero.
Shoe Horn
(302 posts)lifelong, sworn enemies of the US, right?
I agree, it's an interesting thing to turn around in the mind though.
Especially as we aren't under any threat of being blown to smithereens by some eye in the sky death from above 'gamer' army. Pretty sure the Iraqi's aren't as philosophically detached as we are as I'm sure you understand.
What with a hundred thousand+ dead civilians. Versus our two thousand for 9/11.
But, theoretically, if absolutely NO military or civilians are in harm's way...robots battling robots...if both sides somehow agree to this...then it's basically who can finance the robot war longer. It's a battle of money. And whoever runs out will then go back to dirty bombs and attacks on civilians as that's their only method of attack left.
Now, the threat of mutual drone / terrorist attacks on civilians may keep both parties peaceful (uh, I guess, hasn't worked in the Israel / Palestinian conflict)...but they'd have to have military bases close enough to launch the planes. Bases that need defending from real 'boots on the ground' attacks. And/or someone's homeland would have to be cleared out to wage the war in. When elephants fight, the grass suffers the most.
Basically, it seems easier and just morally 'better' to wean ourselves off of oil and somehow contain the countries we feel threatened by without pissing off everyone in the world with global militarization and pissing on the Geneva Convention with torture and infinite detention.
I don't really know that much about world warfare conventions or foreign policy...but I do feel somewhat responsible to at least pretend to be interested in how the rest of the world sees us, and why.
Good chatting with you.
Sorry to prattle on...
Old and In the Way
(37,540 posts)As great as our confidence is wrt our military technology, we shouldn't forget how the equation can change in a hurry. There was a time just over 70 years ago when one country had a dominating 'shock and awe' military infrastructure....that changed in a span of time much less than the Iraq conflict.
"Basically, it seems easier and just morally 'better' to wean ourselves off of oil" Take 1/4 the annual Defense Budget needed to provide muscle to get Big Oil's product to market + plus the cost of 1 unbudgeted invasion and occupation of Iraq = the investment $ necessary to secure energy independence and jumpstart a new economy. A monumental failure for the country...a financial windfall for MIC/Big Oil. And still as strategically dependent on ME oil as were in 2002, except it's $1.50 more per gallon.
justabob
(3,069 posts)It is a bit science fictiony... indeed, there is a Star Trek TNG episode regarding same 
. Total RC war is not so very far away and it is definitely going to change things, and I am pretty sure it is going to be ugly for everyone.
dixiegrrrrl
(60,159 posts)
Adsos Letter
(19,459 posts)iirc, the British military historian John Keegan raised the issue of the changing tactical/psychological impacts of warfare that accompanied technological advances; however, he didn't always credit technology with with the fundamental shifts, but emphasized cultural changes as well.
I'm going to do some internet searching to see if he has written anything on the use of drones in modern warfare.
boppers
(16,588 posts)Like:
The inventors of the sling.
The inventors of the arrow.
The inventors of the bullet.
The inventors of the toxic gases.
The inventors of the machine gun.
The inventors of the nuclear weapon.
The inventors of the ICBM.
The inventors of the cruise missile.
The inventors of the predator.
It's a bullies' worst nightmare, the nerds/geeks/whatever have more power than them.
mbperrin
(7,672 posts)I'll bet the soldiers at Dachau were tired, too.
Magoo48
(6,721 posts)
LastLiberal in PalmSprings
(13,291 posts)In Orson Scott Card's science fiction novel, young teens are trained in combat simulations. One, Ender Wiggin, proves to be a natural tactician and leader, so his training is accelerated to a much more refined and difficult level.
From the summary in Wikipedia:
Ender plays a game very similar to the Battle Room, where he commands ships in a 3-D space battle simulator. His subordinate officers are fellow students advanced early from the battle school who later become known as "Ender's jeesh". Each day the games become increasingly grueling, and Ender is slowly worn down to exhaustion. Waking and sleeping blend together as Ender nearly loses his mind, while still maintaining his military innovation and leadership. During his restless sleep he has recurring dreams of a fantasy game he played early in his training, as well as visions of the Buggers vivisecting him and removing his memories.
Ender's "final exam" consists of a scenario where bugger ships outnumber Ender's fleet a thousand to one near a planetary mass. Ender orders the use of a special weapon, the Molecular Disruption Device, against the planet itself, destroying the simulated planet and all ships in orbit. Ender makes this decision knowing that it is expressly against the respectable rules of the game, hoping that his teachers will find his ruthlessness unacceptable, remove him from command, and allow him to return home.
Soon after Ender's destruction of the "simulated" Formic fleet, Rackham tells him that all the simulations were real battles taking place with real fleets, and that he had killed all the queens on their home planet. After Ender realizes that he is responsible for the destruction of an entire species (as well as the "simulated" I.F. pilots with which he was careless at times), the guilt of the xenocide sends him into depressive sleep. He also learns at this point that he had previously killed two humans, Bonzo Madrid and Stilson, which only adds to his depression.
----
I expect these young drone operators -- especially those operating missiles -- to join the thousands of Army soldiers who have been mentally damaged by the reality of war.
Evasporque
(2,133 posts)Lots of bad press on drones recently so the Pentagon issues a "report" to make the story a human interest story....
saras
(6,670 posts)Let's get all whooped up and kick some ASS.
Maybe we can give it to the goddamned Flemish (http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x5449098) while we're at it.
DeSwiss
(27,137 posts)Humans couldn't cut it so they turned it all over to the computers? I'm sure we won't make that mistake.
- Right?
The Second Stone
(2,900 posts)And ignoring the moral implications
(1) Cut back the use of drones so that the operators are not over-extended
(2) Get more operators
Devil_Fish
(1,664 posts)I wouldn't want that job. I couldn't do it and then face my family when I got home. nor could I live with myself, knowing that I just killed perhaps a whole family on the other side of the planet.
In my oppinion if you are going to use robots in war, this is what it should look like:
Other wise perhaps this:
Any thing else has no honor.
D_F
Gringostan
(127 posts)Why don’t we just land the little buggers and give everybody a break.
rug
(82,333 posts)Nihil
(13,508 posts)... would love the chance to swap *their* injuries for carpal tunnel syndrome ...
