Artur Caudhari, director of a New Jersey-based security consulting firm, said in a recent interview the government in the last few centuries has used a “precision strike” strategy to execute strikes. That refers to using a high-tech weapon aimed at where a target is, such as a person’s heart.
The U.S. military is considered the chief purveyor of precision strike technology, with Predator and Reaper aerial drones using laser-guided precision air-to-ground weapons, but their effectiveness has been questioned before.
“When the U.S. military is in a situation where it needs to protect itself, and they’re not facing any real conventional threat, they’ll use small drones that can stay aloft for five or six days in certain weather conditions as decoys to send out this warning and make sure nobody’s there,” Caudhari said. “Most drone missions are over Afghanistan. It’s a safe area.”
The U.S. military also has a wide-hatch drone aircraft. The Reaper, similar to U.S. air force drones, uses the same systems but is armed with a nuclear warhead, a system that is less accurate than a conventional weapon.
“These things are extremely accurate,” Caudhari said, adding another factor is the size of the drones. “They’re very much bigger and have a bunch of sensors.” The Reaper has a payload capacity of more than 1,500 pounds and a sensor payload capacity of up to 1,500 pounds, and one can envision a Reaper that can carry as many as 25,000 pounds of munitions, he said.
A U.S. intelligence official said the drone used by the CIA mission was not like that of the Predator or Reaper as used during the Bush administration, which was flown by a Lockheed Martin F-22 fighter jet. They referred to the U.S. intelligence official “on condition of anonymity” because they were not authorized to comment publicly.
The drone that was used in the CIA strike was a small Predator remotely piloted aircraft that had been modified to carry a non-nuclear warhead, officials said. The drone was used in “nonlethal missions that have no humanitarian or civilian intent,” an Air Force official said. The use by the CIA will not be addressed.
One aspect of the war game that seems unprecedented is the use of drones at all, at a time when the United States